Latest / 85 Percent: A Wanderful Podcast / Season 3, Episode 1: My Ancestors' Wildest Dreams with Anela Malik

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Season 3, Episode 1: My Ancestors' Wildest Dreams with Anela Malik · 85 Percent: A Wanderful Podcast

• Beth Santos: All right, hey everyone. We are here with another episode of 85 Percent, our Wanderful podcast. ⁓ I am so excited ⁓ the first really first guest that we're recording in our in our new season. We have all of our Bessie Award winners ⁓ in the season that we'll be talking to. But the one that is in this ⁓ is one of my most favorite and exciting ones because it is our creator of the year. So hold ⁓ Before you even speak, because I don't even want you to say for those who like are not watching on video and are like, but who is she talking about? I haven't been following this. Let me read you this absolutely wonderful and ⁓ very dramatic bio that hopefully is gonna set you all up. And this is the best part because we are recording on Riverside. This is one of my first times using Riverside, but they have sound effects. So we're throwing the sound effects in. Okay, ready? Here we go. What do you get when you cross a career diplomat, a multi-six-figure creator, a national geographic author, and a certified foodie? Anela Malik, that's what. She traded her diplomatic badge for a blog and never looked back. Now she's the author of American Soul: The Black History of Food in the United States, a two-time NAACP Image Awards nominee, and the host of Our Block. A video series celebrating Black owned businesses and local legends across the country. And this year she took home the Bessie Award for Creator of the Year, our community's highest honor for creators who are actually changing the industry. So without further ado, please welcome Anela Malik Stop, it's like a standing ovation. Okay. Wow. Thank you everyone. That was absolutely incredible. Anela how do you feel? The audience is just up in arms today. Did you expect that on a Friday morning? Anela Malik: I did not expect that. It's also a little bit long, but I I enjoy it. Beth Santos: Well, you know, it could have gone on for like a whole other 30 seconds, but I had to tell everyone to quiet down because we have like a whole interview to get to. So thank you for being on 85 Percent. It's so great to have you. Are you where are you right now? Anela Malik: DC where I'm based. So I'm actually home for once. Beth Santos: I love. I love it when somebody's like, I'm home. I'm usually not home, but here I am. I love DC. Do you know that I lived in DC for a couple years? Because this is all about me. So I did. I lived in Eastern Market. And ⁓ every yeah, what? Anela Malik: ⁓ no. I do I do think it's the best city. People are always like, ⁓ what about New York? What about Chicago? No, no, no, no. DC is amazing. Beth Santos: I mean I Honestly, DC is great. DC is really great. And I think people who don't know, like a lot of people know it for like the politics, right? And you know, okay, it's whatever, political hub of America. But there is so much good culture, and there's people coming from all over the world, and it is so fresh. Like because there are a lot of people that are coming from international government, it feels like this beautiful microcosm of. like the world and I loved it. Yeah, I loved it when I was there. So I'll just, you know, I'll like mansplain at you this entire time about how awesome DC is. but also I hope you're not melting because isn't it like two hundred degrees down there? Anela Malik: Actually right now no, and I'll take it. I'll take it. Yeah. Beth Santos: Take it in take it and enjoy. Great. Well, Anela, we sang your praises. ⁓ but let's talk a little bit about what's actually going on here because Creator of the Year is like a serious accolade to get in our community. And I want to kind of like give everyone a little bit of a real download of what we're talking about here. Because when we talk about creator of the year in in our Wanderful community. ⁓ there's a very specific type of person that we look for when we're kind of, you know. So the the process for those of you who haven't followed like how the Besie Awards work, there is an open nomination process. Anyone can nominate. Then the Wanderful team takes those nominations and selects three finalists. And then those three finalists go up for voting. And anyone who is a past or present with attendee can vote. So the thing that's really nice about that is two things. One, It's our community elevating one of our own, ⁓ in in the sense of like creators supporting creators. The other thing about it is that we have this cool nuance in the voting process, which includes the Bessies Society. So it's not just like complete vote. The Bessies Society consists of anyone who is a past Bessie Award winner. And they also get to vote, and their votes counted, I think, like 2x. So it's really people who have won. Who are then looking at and choosing the next, the next generation. And for the Creator of the Year Award, I think a lot of people think, ⁓ this is like, you know, the best, right? Like this is like the best creator. But really what what we try to focus on, because like how can you qualify that? Like, how can you even, that's not even like a fair thing to say to anyone about anything. ⁓ but but I think the thing that really for me differentiates the creator of the year is that this is a person who has gone above and beyond. Beyond just creating like one channel of content that is now sort of unleashing a movement and becoming an entrepreneur and taking this to another level where they are advocating for something, leading something, ⁓ encouraging something, encouraging action in other people. And I think that that goes beyond just like starting an Instagram channel. That is an ecosystem that you've created. around one or maybe more central missions. And so if you all are still not sure if Anela is entrepreneurial enough, let me just read this out. She has the unfiltered and fed newsletter, a member community, an experiential brand. She also runs boutique travel experiences that sell out basically every time. She's a speaker and has like multiple videos of her speaking everywhere. She's a brand ambassador and campaign leader who's worked with a number of brands in travel and beyond. She's the author of, as I mentioned, American Soul, The Black History of Food in the United States, a two-time NAACP Image Award nominee documenting how slavery, migration, resistance, and reinvention have shaped what America eats. She is the host and producer of our block, a food and travel docuseries. What else? Am I missing anything else? And you start as a diplomat, and you're also a human with like a personal life and things to do and walls to paint and like groceries to buy. And here we are. Anela Malik: ⁓ I have been painting a lot of walls recently because I just moved. But yeah. Yeah. Beth Santos: Well, it's it's so exciting to have you and what I'd love to do first is just like to hear your story. You know, like why, how did this all come about? Where did this come from? Anela Malik: So I think maybe this is my age as well. Like I'm a ⁓ I'm firmly a millennial. And so for me, becoming a creator was an accident. ⁓ and I it it shocked me when I started talking to like younger Gen Z creators and realized that sometimes that's not the case, that this was their plan. But just it just goes to show how the world has changed and our media ecosystem has changed. Beth Santos: Love it. Fair. Anela Malik: I did all the things that I was supposed to do, right? So I went to college, I went to grad school, ⁓ I got the big girl job and I didn't hate it entirely, but ⁓ turns out I don't have the temperament to work in a large, extremely hierarchical organization. Beth Santos: You mean like you don't love bureaucracy? Anela Malik: No, ⁓ unfortunately. And you know, some a lot of people don't love it. But ⁓ there's something in my personality that can't tolerate it and in fact will fight it. and so I eventually left the Foreign Service and I decided that I was gonna quit being a diplomat. And not a lot of people know this actually, but when I quit, I didn't know whether I was gonna have to pay back my training costs because where I was at in my training cycle. I had finished a tour, done all the training for another tour, ⁓ and quit. And so I took the risk that I might. Beth Santos: Hello. Anela Malik: might owe the US government like $60 to $70,000. But I knew I needed to walk away. Thankfully I did not. I went through like a very long process related to these costs. ⁓ But I was willing to take a risk to get out of a situation that I knew was not serving me. ⁓ And content creation was something I had done for the job actually. I Beth Santos: Good. Yeah. Cool. Anela Malik: I was We have specialties in the Foreign Service, and my specialty was called public diplomacy. And essentially that's like running programming and messaging for directed at foreign audiences. And so my first viral videos were Facebook videos for US Embassy Amman Jordan speaking Arabic, like talking about student programming and stuff. Like very viral, very old, young Anela videos on Facebook, you know, speaking in a foreign language. Beth Santos: Still searchable? Can we still find them? Anela Malik: Yeah, I I dug them up a few months ago on the embassy website and was like never show these to anyone. But I had a lot of ⁓ fun doing that part of the job. Beth Santos: All right, everyone, that's your homework assignment. Whoever finds the video first. No, I'm kidding. Anela Malik: ⁓ and so I had started an Instagram for funsies. And I realized that if this was gonna be part of my official role and I was gonna have to make content and you know, write copy for public consumption, all of these things, I needed practice because this is not what I studied in school. And you know, I had never really made videos before, anything like that. So I started my Instagram for fun as a side thing, and I never thought that it would make money or be a job. But eventually when I Beth Santos: And what year was this? Just like for context, like how long ago was that? Anela Malik: 2018, 2019, 2018. ⁓ but again, like a hobby that had no structure and real plan. and eventually when I left the Foreign Service, I thought, let me try to do something with this. at that point it had grown and I had started because I had rotated back to DC for a little while. So I had started Beth Santos: Okay. Okay. Anela Malik: focusing on local businesses and s storytelling about my community, but I didn't really know if it was gonna work out. I just knew that it was something I could try. And if it didn't work out, my plan was to go work in a restaurant. I had always worked in restaurants before I became a diplomat. And I know it's not work that our society tends to elevate, like you know, professional restaurant work is long, it doesn't long hours doesn't pay super well, all those things. But for me, I was like, I loved it and I can always go back to it. And that didn't happen. ⁓ but I've had to learn very quickly how to be an entrepreneur. I think because I entered this space with no real backup plan. And I had a little bit of money saved, but not much. Like I didn't have much runway. I was just like, fuck it, I'm out. and that, my friends, forces you to become really innovative really fast. Beth Santos: That is true. That is true. It's like, what do they say? Entrepreneurship is like building your parachute on the way down, jumping out of a window and building your parachute on the way down. There you go. I mean, to your point, like, you know, yeah, it's great to have a backup plan, but also not having a backup plan sure makes you figure it out fast, right? Anela Malik: Yeah. ⁓ and I knew I was like gonna lose my health insurance and so I was like, ⁓ I have to figure this out like fast. Beth Santos: So what did you do? Anela Malik: So I started doing everything at once, which was awful and do not recommend. I did not sleep well for like probably the first year because again, I was winging it. and so one, I started pitching. Two, I started really trying to make my content more ⁓ professional, but also more creative and more me at the same time. I figured, well, I could do what everyone else is doing, or I could do what I want to do, and that would make me stand out. I started a newsletter and a subscription element to that newsletter right then. and mind you, all of this like I had less than twenty thousand followers on Instagram and I wasn't on any other platform. And I was already like, own revenue streams. I have to figure that out. Pitching, I have to figure that out. Beth Santos: Mm. Anela Malik: Email is a way to reach people, you know, in case social media goes down, which I've had issues with that. ⁓ I have to figure that out. So it felt like drinking from a fire hose and it was really, really tough. you know, like staying up to the wee hours to build a website. And then the website's terrible because I don't really know how to build a website, but I'm like, it's up. and so I started a lot of things, failed at some things, did some things poorly, but just kind of kept working on it. and over time I think really developed an ethos around my own entrepreneurship that's just like How do I want to operate in this space and in this world? ⁓ and kind of landed on one, I want to tell stories that matter, but we have to figure out a way to fund them. And we can't always rely on brand partnerships because one day brands will wake up and decide they don't love us anymore. And that's just like the way of America and our politics. I wanted to be able to pay my team well. ⁓ and that was that for me is a marker of success as opposed to like Beth Santos: Yeah. Yeah. Anela Malik: I think some people assume you just want to scale forever. I don't really need to do that. and eventually the goal was to get to a place where I could do all of that and still have some balance. Beth Santos: Yeah. I love that. But like, okay, so then so you start this in, you know, twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen. You're like, great, I'm gonna write twenty twenty twenty is when you quit your job. What month may I pray tell? what month pray tell? What in the fall? Okay, so okay, wait, we have to back this up. So COVID happens. You are a diplomat. That's interesting. Anela Malik: twenty twenty is when I quit my job, which is when everyone ever So when everyone went through a big life change in the fall. It's the fall. Yeah. Beth Santos: Were you in the US at the time during COVID? Okay. Anela Malik: I was, I was in training. ⁓ and I got stuck here for a while 'cause nobody was moving. Nobody was, you know, going anywhere. Beth Santos: Right. So we're we are now in lockdown for like six months, and you're like, I have an idea. I'm gonna quit my salary job, dive into travel content creation, and like make it through the rest of COVID. Anela Malik: To be fair, at the time I was doing to be fair, at the time. At the time I was doing food content. and but I knew, I knew that if I was gonna continue with content creation, I wanted to add in travel. I've always been a traveler, otherwise I wouldn't have been attracted to a job like being a diplomat. Beth Santos: So yeah, as your mom, I must ask, what the hell were you thinking? that's different. Anela Malik: And I figured okay, I'll wait it out until I get vaccinated and then we'll layer and travel, which is exactly what we did. And it was painful and expensive and all these things. But because also what I tell new new creators who want to get into the travel space is well start traveling close to home. Like you don't have to go far. Find your old vacation photos, videos, whatever, use that, package that. But coming out of the pandemic and trying to layer and travel, I didn't have. Beth Santos: Yeah, great. Anela Malik: any reason travel imagery to rely on. I hadn't been taking like trips. And so I was like, well I can't really follow that advice. I have to just begin traveling. ⁓ and so I think it was a little bit more expensive at that point, but I knew it was important to me because it's an important part of my lifestyle. Beth Santos: Yeah, fair. Yeah. Cool. So then so the first first iteration of this. So first you start with the Instagram. Then you have the newsletter. Is that where it started after that? Unfiltered and fed, which was called something else before or no, it was also always called that. Okay, okay, okay. Great. Anela Malik: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So Instagram, newsletter, those are my first two, and really my biggest focus. And my newsletter's been housed in multiple places. First it was on Patreon, and now it's on Substack, and we're moving to Beehive, but it doesn't, it's a new it's the same function. It's just who's who's doing the back end. and actually I was late to TikTok because I was so focused on the newsletter. and that is something that now looking back, I'm like, I should have been earlier to that platform, but I I don't think it's possible to be. Beth Santos: Yeah. Anela Malik: everywhere at once, especially in the beginning. And my strategy has always been to try to do one thing well. And then I'm still trying other things while I'm doing that one thing. But like this will be my focus right now. I'm going to get better at it. Once I'm better at it, I need to figure out how to keep it at that level and then layer in another thing. But Beth Santos: Yes. Anela Malik: That does mean that sometimes you'll be caught in a situation where there's like a new platform, it's up and coming, you kind of know that it's here to stay, everyone's on it, but you're like, I don't have time for that right now. Beth Santos: Yeah, totally. Well, and you have to decide. And I think that's like that's really great advice for for anyone. You know, I think you having having started this pre pandemic, we'll say, you know, almost ten years ago, eight years ago, ⁓ the the quantity of platforms and media and channels was a lot less than it is now. Now it's like there's so many it's not even like, you know, do you do, you know, let's say let's use like ⁓ I'm thinking of like the old Twitter X, you know, as an example. You've got a lot of things that are like Twitter. You've got Blue Sky, you've got Threads, you've got X now. Like, so it's not even like, ⁓ I'm picking between Twitter and Facebook and you know, and that's it. And same with newsletters. It's like, okay, well, I could have, you know, a traditional newsletter like Kit or I could do Beehive or I could do a Substack or I could do a Patreon or I could do, you know, a MailChimp, or I could have none of it. I don't know, do My Space page again. ⁓ like so it's I think it like even within each category, there's so many choices to make. And ⁓ and I imagine that for someone who's starting out nowadays, it's just like so overwhelming. And I really like that advice that you have of like just pick one and optimize it, make it work as best as possible, and then let that engine run and then start the next thing if there's the next thing, rather than doing it all at once. Anela Malik: Yeah. and there's a lot more opportunity as far as like platforms and and providers now. There's also a lot more tools. So you don't have to reinvent the wheel every time you get on a new platform. You may want to have a slightly different strategy for this platform based on what feels most native to that space. But everybody is doing video now. Video is king. And and for all the folks that have complained about the move to video, I'm not a videographer. Neither am I. Beth Santos: But I still do it. Anela Malik: Yeah. No, you know, you if you're if this is your career, you have to adapt. It's a very fast-moving, innovative space, but also use what's available to you, right? So, okay, maybe you don't like a certain style of video, but the the style we're doing right now, actually just sitting around and talking, you could test doing that, demonstrating your expertise on YouTube, and then just chop up the clips and put them somewhere else. And that can give you saturation on multiple platforms while you're still doing something that doesn't doesn't isn't too out of your comfort zone. you have to be willing to try and you also have to be willing to fail. And if you're trying to be a content creator, you're gonna fail pretty publicly. And I think that part is pretty hard for people. Beth Santos: Yeah. Absolutely. I don't think anybody likes to to be wrong, you know, first of all, to be wrong. But then second of all to like have that happen in your face on a public landscape. Or even if it's like not something you said, but something you did, something that didn't work, or something that, you know, God forbid you were doing that you didn't even realize, like, ⁓ wow, she did this thing in in the background, there was a chicken walking by and she didn't even know. You know, like all those little things are just there's so many surprises. But I'm curious about one of the things that you said earlier. of like falling falling into this, being an accidental creator, if you will. And how now there are so many people who, you know, you talk to a 17 year old who's like, what do you want to be when you grow up? And they're like, I want to be a creator, you know, very intentional. Like, what how does that what do you think about that? What would you say to somebody like that? And how is that shaping kind of how you think about your career? Anela Malik: I would say, especially I think about my nephew. He really wants to be a he wants to be a streamer. and he's like 10. And these are the people he idolizes. And I think a lot about how one, there's immense opportunity for him and young people. God, I sound old when I say young people, but like him and people who are coming up, right? And I it's funny because I don't even think of myself as that old, but when I think about my nephew's only 10. Beth Santos: Wow. Yeah. Us old millennials. Yeah. Anela Malik: And he's got so so many years before he's even 18 and maybe moves out of the house. ⁓ and he's already thinking about being a streamer. Like, that's who I'm thinking about when I think about like up and coming creators, is like kids. And I would say there's immense opportunity. ⁓ but also I would find it very, very difficult to do this job if I didn't already have a very firmly developed sense of self. Beth Santos: Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Anela Malik: And I see this a lot with other creators, the comparisons that you run against other people that you don't even know, you're just watching their content, it makes you feel good or it makes you feel bad. That's not healthy for us. Beth Santos: So interesting. Anela Malik: All sorts of stuff like that where, you know, my nephew is still so concerned with all of the things that come with growing up and like figuring out who he is. And I think it could be really beautiful to do that on camera, but I also think it could be really dangerous. And I see this too with some of the, especially TikTok. I think the TikTok has a lot a huge age range of creators. But I see and have seen on TikTok a lot over the years these incredibly viral, dramatic fights between creators. And I always look at them and I'm like, one of two things is true. One, they're incredibly young. Or two, they got big really, really, really fast during lockdown when we were all trapped inside. And the level of fame and essentially scrutiny they're under is very new to them. And so they don't have the kind of boundaries or the judgment yet to recognize when they need to take a step back. and so I view that again as like. Their lives have changed so fast, or they're just maybe not so sure of themselves and who they are and and who they want to be, that it can get you in trouble. while at the same time, there's an immense amount of opportunity. And for folks who want to become influencers or creators, I always say that I would never discourage you because this is the best job I've ever had. However, I do think that they need to be really cognizant of the stats of the industry, right? So few of us make a real living doing this, like a comfortable living. And it's the studies show, right? Like the majority of Gen Z and younger say they would want to be a creator when they get older. So that's your competition, is half of the Beth Santos: Yeah. Yeah. Anela Malik: half of the planet basically. It's an immense amount of competition in an industry that changes rapidly and evolves not even year over year, month over month. and then on top of that, if you layer in, you know, some of the stuff that comes just from growing up, it can be very, very difficult. ⁓ so I wouldn't discourage anyone, I would tell them though, if you don't like learning new things, this is not the job for you. Because go work somewhere else where you learn a skill and like that skill evolves pretty slowly and you can become a master of that craft. And there's no shame in that. But this is a job where the thing that you are an expert at might not be important in three months. Beth Santos: Yeah. Yeah, no, I think you're right. ⁓ and and I I appreciate the nuanced perspective that you're bringing to this. I too feel old in this industry when I talk about it sometimes because I and I think, you know, I think in that way we benefit, right? Because we've seen this industry evolve and become an industry, you know, before it was even considered an industry. It's just a thing, you know, and and I think that gives us a really interesting bird's eye perspective of how it's changed people and I have a nine-year-old daughter and a five-year-old daughter and a two-year-old son. And ⁓ and my nine-year-old is doing very similar things to your 10-year-old nephew, which is like, I wanna be a YouTuber. And I'm like, I don't I actually don't let my kids go on YouTube at all. You know, and I think the it's interesting how much being on camera when you are not personally developed, you know, like emotionally developed. ⁓ can really affect you. And so I think that it is really important for the those of us who are in this industry to understand that and to, you know, to to push against it, to push it to make it better as much as we can. Because I do think that there are times it can get very ugly. And and especially when it comes to, you know, young people and, you know, scientific Scientific proof that that young women in particular have been very affected by the, you know, the the lack of self-esteem that they have when they're going through like adolescence and ⁓ and preteen life. And so so I think that's interesting. I'm glad that you brought that up. ⁓ you at some point, like I don't want to go back too far because like I'm just digesting this journey for myself, but You launched a few of these things. You've got this newsletter going. Here we are coming off of this conversation about making this into a career. What was the point when you were like, ⁓ this actually can be a career? Like this is actually something that is working. What started working for you? Anela Malik: Ironically, like two years ago. So I went full-time in 2020. So two years ago, 2024, I think I was still on the fence about whether I wanted to do this long term. so it was not quick, friends. but also I think, you know, I had come from a career that was really stable. And so I struggled not with Beth Santos: Hey, I love that. Anela Malik: I I always made it work financially once I went full time because I had to, but I struggled with the ups and downs of entrepreneurship. And it's something I think I had to come to terms with like more emotionally than anything else. So like you can have the best month of your life, and then three months of no one emailing you back. And I have systems now which makes make me feel much more secure, right? I have an accountant and I have ⁓ cash flow projections and I have cash reserves. Beth Santos: Mm-hmm. Yeah, fair. Anela Malik: And but you don't start off with those things unless you have an incredible amount of startup capital. So now I'm like, yeah, this is a really viable career because I've I've made it so. But in the beginning, when it was mostly just like month to month, that I felt was immensely stressful. And I was like, I can't do this forever. And thankfully I'm off that hamster wheel, but it took me a long time to get there. And it's the type of thing I think as a creator as well. you have to create for yourself, right? So what does stability mean for you? What does longevity mean for you? What do you want it to look like? You have to have a very clear picture so you can map that out. And so for me it was okay, I don't want to have consumer debt and I want to build cash reserves. because that's what's going to make me feel more secure. Now granted I still have student loans. But like slowly, you know, year by year, we've gotten to a place where I'm like, okay, you know, I could I could take a few months of a slow something and I would be just fine. Beth Santos: Yep, it's coming down. Anela Malik: And so now I think it's given me a lot of freedom. And I actually I just posted a YouTube on this that's it's always surprising to me what does really well, but it was a masterclass I taught on this framework that I like kind of have developed over the years called the ownership stack. But it's really just a framework that I developed for figuring out what projects to take on and also how I was gonna make my work financially viable. and Beth Santos: Mm. Anela Malik: I talk about in that video about how it's given me a lot of freedom. And this is a long multi-year process. And you know, I didn't start off in this financial position. And there I still have a ways to go because once I pay off my student loans, that's a huge burden that's gone. ⁓ and a huge monthly expense that's gone. And so Beth Santos: Yeah. Yeah. Can't wait. Mm-hmm. Anela Malik: But having revenue streams that I, you know, control that are dependable and predictable in addition to brand partnerships has made it so that I have a lot of freedom to take on projects that are a little bit more risky ⁓ and to tell the kind of stories that I want to tell that I think a lot of other creators don't have. And that's just because when you start out, the brand money is the Beth Santos: Hm. Anela Malik: the first thing most of us reach for and it can be very lucrative and ⁓ you know if you're doing well can be very easy but then it's out of our control. Beth Santos: Yeah. And this is one of the things that I really love about you is that you are taking a creator career and you've developed it into an entrepreneurial career. You know, you've created things that you own. You have an audience that is yours and you sell things to them and to others. You know, you have trips that you plan. you have all sorts of other, you know, you do your dinner series. you also had something else that I imagine came up in twenty twenty four, which was your book. 'Cause that published in twenty twenty five. So there must have been an opportunity coming. What happened? How did that start out? And tell us about it. Anela Malik: so my book actually took a lot longer than that. yeah, because it's a history book. so my book came about 2021. and Nacho, I hate telling the story because people it upsets people and I'm sorry. Beth Santos: ⁓ my gosh, so even before that. Nat Geo reached out to me and said, write this book. ⁓ good. Good for you. But that's actually really great because you'd only been in the in the business for like a year. So that's fantastic, Anela. Anela Malik: Yeah. Yeah. People always like Yeah, and I also talk about the why and the positioning and kind of how that happened in that same YouTube video that I keep referencing. Cause this is a story that I think like upsets people, but I'm also like, there's a lot more that we could learn from this, right? I had already positioned myself as an expert in this thing. ⁓ and so when you're an expert, it's a lot easier for people to be like, ⁓ I remember her name and I can plug her in for this project. And so it took about a year and a half to write it. But then there were also delays, pandemic delays. I don't know if if maybe for people who weren't involved in publishing at this point, we don't remember, but like I think at one point there was like a paper shortage. There was in a big ship that capsized that had a lot of like a tanker ship that was full of books and it was all this stuff. So there was a lot of delays. That is just Beth Santos: ⁓ my gosh. ⁓ Anela Malik: how it goes sometimes. But it came out in 2025. and even for my book tour, I think I took a pretty kind of not unique approach because so many authors have to do this, but my entrepreneurial brain really helped in that ⁓ my publisher did cover, you know, my travel for the the book, which was incredible because a lot of publishers don't. but then I had all these things I wanted to do, right? I wanted to have the it's a food history book, there's recipes, I wanted there to be events and ways for us to plug in with local chefs. And so I wanted to every book event to have like some sort of food element. Beth Santos: ⁓ cool. Anela Malik: And so we we managed to do it, but I did it by like pitching people here, negotiating here, contacting, you know, contacts there to be like, hey, would you host us? And so it came together and it was really fun. but that was me planning all of that, doing all the copy, making all the promotional materials, selling all the tickets. Beth Santos: Yeah, that's a lot of work. Anela Malik: And so again, like all of the projects that you work on, they all feed into each other. I wouldn't have known how to do any of this if I hadn't done all the stuff I had to do the years before. Beth Santos: Yeah. I think a lot of people don't realize how much work on the author there is in books. You know, when I published my book, Wander Woman, I mean, that's like that's the that's part of like the marketing plan. You know, so for somebody, you know, I pitched the book to someone else. And in that pitch, you're putting out, okay, here are the audiences that I have, here are the distribution. And then I remember when I was like, So, ⁓ details on my book tour. And they're like, ⁓ no, no. If you want a book tour, like plan it, but You shouldn't even do one. ⁓ my god. Just like, while I'm doing it. So yeah, you're like knocking on doors, calling places, organizing the things, pre sending out the press release. I mean, really, there's an expectation that the authors are marketing their books now. ⁓ which by the way, I bought a copy. I don't have it yet. Otherwise, I'd be like showing it. And I'm also gonna buy a copy for somebody listening. So we're gonna have a giveaway. so you can also get your own copy of American Soul. I'm I'm Curious about this journey too, because so you've got this book, American Soul, came out last year. You also have another project that's focused on blackness in America, travel, food, culture, a little bit too. It's called Our Block. Tell us about this. Like, this is like now we've got a few different channels that we're working through. Anela Malik: Yeah, so we know it's twenty si it's twenty twenty-six now. Gosh. ⁓ I'm like, ⁓ god, we have to ⁓ go back. No. ⁓ so I was approached about being a host for this this docuseries and I f Beth Santos: What year are we in again? Who knows? Yeah. Anela Malik: Immediately when the project came up was like, ⁓ I would love to do this. This is exactly in line with the type of work I want to do, right? Being out talking to people, giving them a place to share their stories. and you know, we we're it's 2026, we're still living in the same kind of context where ⁓ all of a sudden everyone forgot about 2020 and the promises they made and the the grants have been rescinded and the DEI positions have been closed and ⁓ and that harms not just black folks. But all of us, right? and so especially when this project was proposed to me, I thought, you know, this is a something that I think could be really cool, but also no one's gonna fund right now. And in fact, you know, we pitched it around, ⁓ We did end up getting one destination to sponsor an episode. But beyond that, no one was interested. And so we crowdfunded the money for this, which involved weeks of like putting my face online and being like, I need you to give me money. Beth Santos: I hate that. Don't you love that? Isn't that great? And people are like, but I thought she was successful. Why can't she fund this whole thing by herself? Like that's the first thing I always think about when it's like, it's like, look, these things cost a lot of money to produce these shows, you know? And you're creating your own reality, which is so amazing. You're just like, who cares about getting, you know, somebody to fund this or a brand? Like our community can fund this. I love that. Anela Malik: Yeah. And Yeah. Yeah. ⁓ sorry I have to sneeze. And I so one thing I I wanna say because I think this is something that is lost on a lot of people. People see someone with a lot of followers and they're ⁓ she must be rich. And ⁓ I I will say that Beth Santos: Bless you. Anela Malik: Having a platform allows you to hopefully negotiate for better deals. but it takes strategy, it takes connections. And frankly, studies have shown and I've experienced this. If you are non-conforming in some way, you are not gonna make the money that the like conventionally attractive white women do, ⁓ who dominate the creator space, and then white men, which is wild to me that the creator space is overwhelmingly women, but when you look at the top paid creators, suddenly we Beth Santos: Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it's men. Yeah. Yeah, it's white men. Yep. Yep. Anela Malik: see a bunch of men. I'm like we the the twelve percent of this industry or something, but they managed to capture most of the revenue. Beth Santos: Yep, that's right. Anela Malik: So money in this industry is not distributed equitably. ⁓ and black creators, there is a significant pay pay gap. ⁓ and so I think about that too, and I thought about it when I was fundraising that people look at my platform and they're like, ⁓ well, she must be rich. I am a mid-sized, tattooed black woman who talks about politics and ⁓ isn't afraid to say the word black. ⁓ and like this is 2026. Come on now. We know exactly how that goes. But I have been able to thrive despite all of that because I have created this business and multiple businesses for myself. And the pitch that I made to people when I was crowdfunding for the show was that if you want this type of media to exist in this era, you're gonna have to fund it or it won't exist. I don't wanna hear nothing about we don't have any that's because you didn't wanna put it together. and so we crowdfunded and filmed five episodes with a crew around the country last year. and again, we got the money we needed for those episodes, but we barely paid ourselves. ⁓ Because can you imagine travel to five cities, five days on the ground in each? We God forbid want to stay in a hotel that doesn't have roaches. and rental car because we have equipment, food, all of that stuff. and the first episode will debut August 6th. ⁓ and of course you can find it on my channels. You can find it on YouTube. and then Beth Santos: Yep. Right. Anela Malik: you know, we're rolling through the other cities after that. ⁓ but it's been incredibly rewarding and I think what we shot Is incredible, just the organic conversations we had with people. But getting this out and putting it together is one of the hardest things I've ever done because we are working on a shoestring budget with multiple stakeholders ⁓ in an environment that frankly is very, very difficult. The creator economy, the last year, I'd say, has to me felt incredibly difficult to navigate. and so I'm very excited for it, but also I'm like, I can't wait for it to be over for a little bit. Beth Santos: It's a lot of work. I mean, but here's the thing too, and and I think like people stand to understand this better. You are it's not like you woke up one morning, had 200,000 followers, and then all these opportunities came flooding your door. Maybe it happened with Nat Geo. But besides that, everything else you've like independently built on your own, brick by brick. But what does building mean? It means constructing the thing, but then it also means like literally selling. To every like, whether that's a financial sale, whether that's pitching yourself as a capable host, whether it's convincing the world to accept this as a thing. And you have a clear message. I mean, can you talk a bit? And I know we're getting close to the end, but what is the travel industry missing in your perspective? What is what is this gap that you're filling here? Anela Malik: I have so many, so many thoughts. Yeah, this could be a whole this could be a whole episode. So Beth Santos: Like, can we restart this? And Anela Malik: My work in the travel space has involved intersecting with some of the largest travel companies in the world, airlines, like you know, big group travel companies, big luxury travel companies, cruises, which I don't really cruise, but that's a whole nother thing. But still have a lot of like back and forth with ⁓ you know, these cruise creator programs and hotels and destinations. So I think I have like a pretty broad ranging view. And there's a few things. One, I think. there is a huge there's a huge desire a documented desire for travelers who want either culturally rooted or locally rooted experiences right and it's not just amongst black travelers it's just in general and the way that we've traveled is changing And studies show, right, like millennials make up a huge portion of the travel market. ⁓ millennials like a massive portion of the travel market, because now we're old enough to have to own houses, right? So we we not only have money, but we have like adult money. ⁓ and so we're spending more on Beth Santos: Yeah, right. We we're real grown ups now. Anela Malik: We're spending more on trips, but the types of activities we want on those trips are different. and we want culturally rooted local craft, boutique, you know, any of these kind of words. And we are more concerned about things like responsible travel than our parents' generation. We're less likely to want to just stay on a resort for two weeks. Black travelers wanna see themselves represented in marketing and in in travel in general. The same for other marginalized groups. But then when you talk to kind of these stakeholders, a lot of them I think haven't updated their playbooks. And what do I mean by that? So I I have even told some of my contacts at some of these really big travel companies, I'm like, hey, you know millennials are X amount of the travel market. Here's all the data. You don't have any products that are aimed at millennials as far as your travel products. They're all aimed at either older or you hopped straight down to 18 to 25, which is is not us. And the that middle band who has so much disposable income and is more likely to take time off than anyone else, you're you don't have a product for it. And they've said in response, ⁓ yeah. And I'm like, okay. Beth Santos: Yeah. Sure. Anela Malik: Just to just like an idea. I'm not gonna develop the product for you because you should pay me a consulting fee for that. But just putting out there. so a mismatch between the offerings and what studies show that the market wants. I think that's one thing that I see a lot of. a mismatch between marketing materials and your audiences. That's another thing. and Beth Santos: Okay. Okay. Always selling. Always selling. Anela Malik: Then I would say that as far as working in the space as a creator, I think that there's a lot of short-sightedness on the part of travel organizations ⁓ and stakeholders. So for example, I run these very luxe boutique travel experiences that I build with partners on the ground from the ground up. I usually go and scout for weeks at a time. I'm literally going to Tunisia in August to scout for two and a half weeks. And when and I spend my own money, like I think I'm gonna probably just spend three to five thousand dollars because I have to try the hotels and I'm I'm also testing different providers to see who we would want to run our on-the-ground experience where I know we're gonna get a certain level of quality and care. ⁓ you know, who's gonna be the people who picks you up at the airport, all of these things. Beth Santos: Cool. Anela Malik: And I have the sales data. So the conversion data, which is is hard as a creator because a lot of the campaigns you've worked on previously, it's like awareness, awareness, you know, they want virality, but there's it's harder to clack track sales and travel because the sales timeline is so long, right? You might see something this year and book it next year for next year's vacation. There it's very hard to track attribution. So I've been going to partners and saying, hey, in six months I've sold $650,000 worth of travel experiences. ⁓ I would love to come test your product, trial your product. I really think it would be a good fit for my community. Here's why. ⁓ and they're like, yeah, you could come, but You know, we'd want content from you, and we couldn't cover your flight. And and I'm like, ⁓ but here's the thing: I'm not gonna pay you to make content to then a year from now bring a group where I have to pay you $150,000 to run that experience. and so I think despite even having the data, there's been quite a few partners that I've walked away from because it felt like first, before they were willing to evaluate me as a B2B partner, first they wanted to explain. Exploit me as an influencer. And I was like, even if I was just doing influencer marketing for you, this would still be a bad deal. Why should I spend thousands of my own dollars to promote a product for you where you don't even use affiliate links? Beth Santos: Yeah. Yeah, you're absolutely right. ⁓ so just those things, you know, just those things that the travel industry needs to work on. I mean, but but I think you raise some very good points. And ⁓ the thing I love about all of them is that you're not just talking about it, you're living this stuff, right? You're like, the industry's not doing this right. I'm gonna go and just build it myself in the way that I believe, you know, from the show to the trips that you're organizing to the dinner series. I mean, I think that Anela Malik: So thanks. ⁓ Beth Santos: To to the words that you're sharing when you write. ⁓ I think that there is a very powerful effect that people need to remember, which is the power of your dollar as a vote. You know, and wherever you spend that dollar, that is that is capitalism voting. Right. So if you want to see more of something, then that's then make sure that your money is going to those things because they don't just show up anymore. You know, this isn't just like, ⁓ we'll just wait and see what happens to us. And I love and appreciate that you are not only encouraging people to do that, but you are building your own circumstances. And I think that's what a real entrepreneur is. So thank you. Thank you for what you're doing. We have like a couple minutes left. So my last question, maybe my last question, is who is in this industry that deserves more credit than you believe is getting right now? Anela Malik: Thank you. Mm. So ⁓ I have intersected, because I'm in this travel, group travel space, with so many women who are building their own group travel companies from the ground up. Everyone has a different ethos. ⁓ And ⁓ I think they deserve a lot more credit because they're really taking on. some of the big heavy hitters, right? Like we, we have, and I've worked with some of these companies, so me saying their name doesn't mean anything about them. I like them. Like Intrepid Travel, I was an ambassador with them for a long time. Love their ethos. you know there's EF, there's there's so many of these group travel companies. and the people that I'm really interested in, there's booked trips. Beth Santos: Cool. Yeah. Anela Malik: They do book-themed, literary-themed trips. And I know for a fact that they are scouting and like their attention to detail for their itineraries is ⁓ phenomenal. and then there's another one that does women-focused travel. I think it's Sororall. I don't know how to pronounce it. Beth Santos: Hm, so we're oral. Yeah. Anela Malik: They're doing really cool stuff. I think there might be a certified B Corp, which is wild because as a small business, that's very expensive. I just got health insurance like two years ago. I'm not, you guys are not gonna see me try to get a certification anytime soon, guys. Like that's crazy. and they're very clear about their mission, they're very clear about their offerings, and they're doing it their own way, which is what I really respect. Beth Santos: Yeah. Hard. Anela Malik: As far as creators, I have an incredible cadre of creator friends who I think are all fabulous. ⁓ I'll shout out, shout out Sojo who accepted my award at the Besties. And I think she has a really unique take on travel, train-focused travel. And it's something I never really would have thought about because I didn't grow up around trains, right? So I was like, what? That's a thing. ⁓ but just goes to show you that there's always Beth Santos: Yeah. Anela Malik: a new avenue to explore, but she really has her own style. And that's something that I wish more up-and-coming creators would take into account. That yes there are trends and yes there are kind of proven formats, but in a sea of sameness, it's you that's gonna make you stand out. And so developing your entire infrastructure and strategy based on what someone else is doing is like not gonna be a hundred percent effective. Beth Santos: I I think you're so right that, you know, the you know, people are always like, ⁓ what's your niche? What's your you are your niche. There is no one who will ever be like you. Exactly. There's no one who ever was like you. And I love this thing that you had said when I think it was maybe when the book came out and you said, I am my ancestor's wildest dream. I think that that's so special. And may we all find opportunities to delight our ancestors, you know, to be the thing that that ⁓ is what is what we've been fighting for, that the generations that follow us can be really making the world better, you know, and improving what we have. So you're doing incredible things. We're so proud of you. I cannot wait to see this video series. Can you tell us where to find everything? Where should people go for stuff? And we'll put it in show notes too. Anela Malik: Yeah, so I think the easiest way would be to just subscribe to my email newsletter. ⁓ because I have so many things and then I don't have to send you to 25 places. so just go to unfiltered and fed.com and you will hear about the series when it comes out and anything else that I'm working on. But also that's where we go deeper on food and travel storytelling. ⁓ and it is the only way to access our trips and experiences, which I do that on purpose rather than ⁓ cold selling. It's like a whole strategy there. ⁓ basically it makes it so that the people who Beth Santos: Perfect. Anela Malik: on our trips aren't assholes because they've they've already they're already in the ecosystem and they've heard me rant about Trump and talk about LGBTQ issues and also like say fuck a bunch of times and so there's like a similar level of like just Beth Santos: Because they're c part of the community, right. They're followers. Yeah. Yeah. Anela Malik: awareness there ⁓ as opposed to we could sell a lot more trips if we just put them on the website and let people buy them directly. We don't do that. ⁓ So unfiltered and fed.com and you'll hear from me there but also we have outside contributors as well who pop up typically to drop something that's really nerdy and needs a little bit of research. ⁓ So food and travel deep dives by actual journalists ⁓ you'll get those there too. Beth Santos: Delegating. I love it. Anela, thank you so much. It's been such a pleasure. Best of luck. And ⁓ everyone else, we'll catch you next time. Anela Malik: Thank you.