From The Strong PLace
I’m Hannah, and I founded and run Aila Magazine. Thinking about my childhood and growing up, all that comes to mind is Dove. The smell of Dove. I'm really close with my Nan and I spent a lot of time with her when I was growing up because she lives five minutes up the road from me. And she literally uses all the Dove products, so, to me, when I think of childhood, I just think of Dove soap, body wash, bubble bath, all of that. When I think about Nan, I also think of beige tea’s. You know, smiley faces, fish fingers, and peas or beans. That's what I think of. She’d always try and get some veg in there, but I was just there for the smiley faces. My Grandad loves ABBA, and he got me into them from a young age. I loved Dancing Queen. Even now, he always says “Dancing Queen, that’s your song Hannah.”
I graduated last year during the pandemic, after studying fashion branding & communication in Birmingham. It was a new course, so we were the first year that had ever done it. And they gave us quite a lot of creative freedom really, we could do whatever we wanted as long as we hit the marking criteria. My final major project was Aila, and that’s how the magazine started. It was strange, graduating in the pandemic. I basically graduated in my bedroom. I still call myself a graduate, even though it’s been nearly a year now. I live in Birmingham, with my mum and my brother and I’ve got a little cat called Cleo. It's been a weird time after graduation. I’ve got a part time retail job, and in all my spare time I run Aila. I feel a little bit in limbo at the moment, and I think a lot of people feel the same. I’m just going with the flow and trying to grow Aila as much as I can.
Aila is a fully illustrated magazine. That was a purposeful decision, because I wanted to make something for women where they had a complete break from any sort of photography or imagery that they could compare themselves to. So it's all illustrations, and the content of the magazine is basically aimed to empower women, educate women, and just encourage them to be the best versions of themselves. I like to make it as accessible and relatable as possible. Anyone can write for Aila. You don't have to be a professional freelance writer or anything. We cover all sorts of things from body positivity to relationships, friendships.
The main things we talk about at Aila are; I say body positivity, but also body neutrality and just body image on the whole, because I know for a lot of people body positivity and really loving yourself can feel like a difficult place to get to. So we talk about body acceptance a lot, being ok with where you are right now. We talk about relationships and friendships, mental health, self esteem is a big one, and building confidence. We've started to branch out to the point where I basically just say to people, if there's something important that you feel like you need to talk about, and you're looking for a platform to put that on, I'm all ears. We've had women speak about postpartum mood disorders, things to do with the menstrual cycle and issues like that. I've had a couple of Mums who have written about motherhood.
Self care and self love are big buzzwords now. They get spoken about a lot. But I think sometimes they need to be spoken about in a bit more of a relatable way. Everyone who writes for me is writing from first hand experience. So these articles are raw, people read them and can actually relate to them. They aren’t articles telling you to go and buy XYZ to love yourself better, they’re saying go and tidy your space for 10 minutes, go and check in with yourself. Things that everyone can do.
It did really, really well at uni, and actually got shortlisted for an award in London. I had to go down to London and present the magazine to a panel. It didn't win, but that experience really made me realise that there might be more to the magazine than just a uni project. They really loved the idea, and said that they hadn’t come across a magazine that was so relatable especially to young women. One of the judges actually has kept in touch with me and followed along the journey to give me some advice here and there. So obviously throughout all of this, we were in the midst of the pandemic. I had nothing else to do, I was on furlough, so I just ran with it. So I did the second issue, which was in December 2020. It did really well again, and I realised I did really want to take this further. Women were messaging me saying, “You've helped me with this, I don't feel bad about this anymore, I already can't wait for the next one.” Some women were saying it had made their day, that they were going to pass it on to a friend it might help. It felt so surreal. I was just sitting in my bedroom thinking, “What the hell?” This tiny magazine I started at uni is now going out into the world and actually having an impact on women’s lives.
After issue two did so well, I got in contact with The Prince’s Trust and said this is what I’m doing, I don’t have any money, can you help me? So they put me on their Entrepreneur Mentorship Scheme and helped me to apply for a business loan. It was like Dragon’s Den. I had to pitch to a panel to see if they'd accept me for a loan. I pitched twice and then on the second time I finally got accepted for a small loan. I was like, "Right, okay. I can do another issue now." That happened around April 2021, and I published the third issue in June 2021. I’ve just started working on the fourth issue, which will be published in November 2021.
Issue three was chosen to be in the Books That Matter August subscription box, which was a huge moment for me. All of their subscribers were then following me and messaging me like, "Oh, my God, I got your magazine and the Books That Matter box. I love it." I think that was a turning point really. When you’ve got complete strangers from all over the world telling you that what they're reading, what you've produced is making them feel XYZ in a positive way, it's just crazy. I don't think it'll ever sink in, to be honest. It's had more of an impact in a short amount of time than I anticipated. It's been a bit of a whirlwind.
People were a bit skeptical of me trying to start a new publication because they thought, nobody buys magazines anymore. Everything is free online. But I thought differently. I wondered if maybe people don’t buy magazines because they can’t find magazines that they actually want to consume and support. When I was younger I used to love going to pick a magazine. That was so exciting. And then as I got older, I realized I was buying them and just enjoying them anymore. They were just either making me feel bad about myself, or telling me to buy more stuff. But I love reading a physical book rather than a Kindle, and I feel the same about magazines. Especially nowadays, it’s really nice to do something away from a screen.
So people’s attitudes towards me starting was one of the issues I faced at first. But there was also the finance side of it, I started off using my savings but they didn’t last very long. So The Prince’s Trust was a huge help there - their funding means I am able to pay my illustrators. I print locally, which does up the cost of printing but I really wanted to start as I mean to go on, and do things in the best way possible. I had a little bit of a shock to the system because basically I thought my money would last a bit longer than it did. So that's been hard and that's why there's been a little bit of a gap between issue three and four, because we basically had to raise a bit more money again.
I think when you’re having a bit of a rocky patch, your self belief in what you're doing can wobble. When I realised I had no funds left, I did start to doubt whether I could do it. I just didn't see myself as the kind of person who could run a business. A lot of it is just my own limiting beliefs that have come up from running Aila. So I’m working on that. It’s making me more self aware, I’ve learnt more about how my mind works and I’m able to nip it in the bud quicker if those thoughts start to come in. I journal a lot, and track what’s going on with me. So the content in the magazine, it’s not coming from a person who is perfectly level headed. I have these issues too and use the pieces we publish to help myself as well.
The best thing that's come from Aila, is not only the work I’ve been able to do on myself, but the community of women we have who are all relating to each other and supporting each other. It’s opened up more networking in a creative sense as well for lots of people. The illustration community is just amazing. I am so, so, so glad that I decided to have it all illustrated because I think not only has it brought women together, being able to relate to each other, and uplift each other, but also it’s created a community on the business side of things. I know lots of girls that have met through Aila and now they're working with each other on something else. So I think just the best thing that has come out of it is being able to connect with so many fab women, really. I don’t think it gets better than that, to be honest, especially during the pandemic when people were craving community - I just made my own.
It sounds so cliché, and I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I feel like I’ve found my purpose in life. It feels like everything that I've been through in my life has led up to doing this, because I've been able to incorporate so much of my own experiences. And I do think that's a big part of why people relate to Aila so much, because I’m the face behind it. I’m very present on our social media and make it known that I’m right there beside them, going through lots of this stuff too. I’m not shy about sharing the fact I wasn’t always as confident and secure as I am now, and Aila has really helped me to get to that point.
I want Aila to become the go-to magazine for women. It’s a big dream, but that’s my aim. I want it to be the magazine on all the shop shelves, that women read, give to their little sister, lend to a friend. The magazine that everyone reads and everyone gets every week, the magazine that groups of girls pour over during their lunch break at school. I really think I can do it. I also hope that people start reading Aila from a younger age, so that we’re not all in our 20s and 30s and only just learning these things. I wish I could go back to my 16 year old self and give her a copy of Aila.
If I could speak to that 16 year old girl now I would say, “Strap yourself in, Hannah. Don’t be afraid of the fear.” What I've realised is that starting a business, starting anything new, is so scary. I think sometimes you can feel that fear and think I shouldn't do it or I can't do it, but I think really sometimes the biggest risks have the biggest rewards. I wish I could go back and tell myself that there's always going to be parts of life that feel scary, but it doesn't mean that you can't do it. And it doesn't matter that you don't know what you're doing. Noone knows what they’re doing. Everyone is making it up as they go along. I would tell myself that you're allowed to be messy. You're allowed to be scared, but don't let any of that stop you from actually going for it. Because the fear will never go away, in fact it will get bigger as you grow and take more risks. But you do get used to feeling it and sitting with it. You have to be your biggest cheerleader, because no matter how much your family and friends love you, no one else can do that for you. Especially as women, I think we often downplay how well we’re doing in a way that men don’t. It’s not showing off to believe in yourself and know that you can do well.
Hannah Greenway