THE HEART OF LIONBEAR

'Building Something That Serves'
Exclusive Interview with Ashley Connelly
Featured in 'Innerviews'
Hosted by Allié McGuire

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Every brand begins with a name, but the best ones begin with a reason. Ashley Connelly built Lionbear Ventures to help small businesses and communities move from possibility to progress. Here, she shares the story behind the name, the purpose behind the work, and the vision that pushes it forward.

ALLIÉ: Ashley, let’s start at the beginning. For someone meeting Lionbear Ventures for the very first time, what do you hope they feel when they hear your name?

ASHLEY: I think when people hear Lionbear Ventures, they’re usually like, “What’s that?” It could be anything, right? That’s fun. It makes you want to ask more questions. “Tell me more about what you do.” It’s fun. 

ALLIÉ: Yeah, it definitely is like that doorway to intrigue. I know that’s the first question I asked. “Tell me more about that,” because it’s like two animals, but one entity. What is happening here?

ASHLEY: Yeah, it’s like, “Lion, bear. Tell me more. One word, two animals.”
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​ALLIÉ: So, let’s go a little bit deeper, because I’m always fascinated by the names that people choose for the things that they build. There’s usually always a story inside of them. Let’s get right to it. What is the meaning behind Lionbear, and what parts of you, your work, or your purpose live in that name? Tell us the origin story of Lionbear.

ASHLEY: Yeah, so I came out of an industry where I worked in corporate America. I worked in some smaller nonprofits and institutes. I was a person who found myself in a new job every two years because I would get bored, or I would want to chase a new thing. I’m curious. I’ve done this. This is not challenging. Or there’s a shiny thing over there.

I said to myself, “That’s probably not a great way to live as a professional, to be changing jobs every two years.” So, I said, “Well, you may need to own your own business someday, because that might be the only way this will become a permanent thing for you to really invest yourself into something that you can build and hold on to.”

So, I said, “What would I name it?” And I knew it had to be some kind of personal brand or something that also had breadth. I was changing jobs every two years. I couldn’t say, “I’m Grant Writing Company ABC,” because what if I didn’t want to do that? I wanted a space to be versatile, to pivot to, because that’s just who I am by nature. I thought, “Well, it’s got to be something personal.” And I chose Lionbear. I liked the way it felt bold. I’ve always kind of toyed around with animal names for some reason. I also thought about, “If I owned a bar, what would I name it?” It was always something like The Stubborn Bear or something funny and kitschy. I just think animals are fun, and we all have our own spirit animals.

I ended up with Lionbear. I have two children. My son’s name is Theodore, and from a young age, my husband kind of always called him “little bear.” Then I had a daughter after that, and I was living in Italy at the time. Her name is Leona, and I learned that Leona in Italian is the word for lioness. So, I said, “How do I play on bear and lion?” Then I was like, “Let’s push them together. We’re going to be Lionbear.” That’s where it came from.

Then, as you’re looking at bears and lions, the characteristics felt quite representative of myself. There’s the ferocity that comes with a lion. And then the bear is courageous. It’s consistent. It can be feisty when it needs to be. I just felt like it was a bold embodiment of what I want to be, what we want to be for our clients, and what we’re asking our clients to be. Be out there. Be bold.

I had a friend once tell me, when I told him I was kind of nervous about the name, “I don’t go out into the consulting world and see names like that on papers very often. It’s usually Great Lakes X or Michigan Blue.” And I said, “Well, what do you think about Lionbear Ventures?” And he said, “People won’t forget you.”

ALLIÉ: That is important. Very, very important, actually. So, success there. The box is checked.

Before Lionbear became a company, there had to be a moment, or maybe a season, when you realized something needed to be built. So the question now is, what was happening, Ashley, in your life or in the communities around you that made you say, “This is the work I’m meant to do”? I know you said a moment ago that you wanted to create something where you had flexibility to pivot and to change, but what was it that went on in your life that said, “This is what it is, and this is why”?

ASHLEY: It was an interesting time. It was COVID. I was working for a nonprofit, which was an amazing experience. It was a startup nonprofit, and it was quite relevant to the things they were working on during COVID. But I also had a child taking kindergarten virtually from home on a laptop, which was very stressful. Startups are stressful. And I was feeling that impulse once again to be like, “I want a new job.” And I thought, “Oh God, don’t. Maybe this is the time, sister. Just go out on your own.”

At the time, I had gone through an accelerator for recycling. It was called NextCycle Accelerator. I think that kind of gave me this feeling of, “Well, maybe I really love working on recycling.” Again, there was that shiny object over there.

Politically, the Biden administration was putting out all of this infrastructure money, all of these federal programs. I was seeing idea after idea of what the possibility of this money could do for communities.
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​Meanwhile, my dad is the water commissioner for the Village of New Lothrop, and I’m talking to him about grants. I’m talking to him about politics and what’s going on. I just kept asking the questions. “How does it work in village government? Do you realize that there’s infrastructure money coming to help you with these exact problems you’re describing?”

He was saying, “My water systems need $50,000 to upgrade.” For one, I didn’t even know that a village managed the water system. I was just like, “Holy cow. My dad is responsible for the safe drinking water of an entire village. Wow. And he needs money. And he has no idea how to go or where to go to get it.” It was that coupled with this deep commitment to equitable access for individuals.

Being a female who came up in my career through the defense industry and doing a lot of work with engineers, I just perpetually experienced this lack of accessibility or a seat at the table. So, seeing some individuals or some organizations get access to so much money, and not feeling like they were always good stewards of that money, then going out and seeing communities like New Lothrop, I thought, “Oh my God. Why is this happening?”

That inequity was happening, and I think that is systemically what could be wrong in many ways with our country. I said, “You know what? I need a new job.” I felt compelled to go and try to do something about this If there’s something that I think I can do about a problem, I feel compelled. A lot of times, it’s basically out of curiosity. Maybe I can fix it, right? Maybe I can do it.

So, I took the leap, and I started Lionbear Ventures on my own. I got a contract to be on a recycling accelerator and help with that, which was fun. I loved it. It was rewarding. Then I got a contract to start trying to write grants for small communities like New Lothrop. Then we won a grant for $150,000 to pay Lionbear to do that.

We were off to the races, and I kind of validated what I knew. There was a problem. And for the last four years, we’ve been trying to solve that. It’s about access to people who want nice things in their communities too. They just don’t know where to go. Nobody’s talking to them. Nobody’s telling them what to do.

ALLIÉ: Well, this start that you’re off to, and the work you’ve been doing, has been very successful, with millions and millions of dollars raised for smaller communities. So much of your work seems to be about helping people and communities access resources that they may not have known how to reach on their own, like the example you gave with your father. What do you wish more people understood about the dreams, the ideas, and the potential sitting inside these smaller communities?

ASHLEY: I think there are a lot of people who want to do something to improve their community. I think there are a lot of people who want to do good things. They want to show up. 

You don’t need to be a grant writer. You don’t need to know all the resources. You first need to have the commitment to follow through. You have to have the commitment to want to learn, to absorb the resources that are available for you. And things can be very hard. You have to be prepared to fail.
I think if you’re willing to be that individual, then the rest of it can be taught or shared with you. But at the end of the day, I can’t help clients be successful if they’re not willing to commit for the long haul and know that we may have the perfect Plan A, but we never see through a perfect plan. It never goes perfectly. So, we may go to Plan B or C. And then are you prepared to go to Plan D through Z? How much are you willing to see this through?
Because I can’t want that for you.

I’m not in your community. I’m not leading your community. I’m not having the conversations that you need to be having in your own community about what’s right for you. I trust that you are the one who knows what’s best, when to say enough is enough, and when to pivot out of this whole deck of options.

I just think it comes down to wanting to be a leader and having the humility to know that I might fail, but I’m going to try anyway. Because if I never try, I’ll never know.

​ALLIÉ: Yeah. I love that. And that is such a deep-rooted fear that so many have. But when you can get through that, when you get beyond that, then all the potential is there.

One more question for you today, Ashley. When you look at Lionbear today and the work that is still ahead, what do you hope this brand becomes known for? Not just in terms of funding or strategy, but in terms of how people felt after working with you.

ASHLEY: Well, I don’t know about how they feel, but I always say that we want to be a group that does cool things. I want to do good things with good people.

It’s all about the team environment. I want to work with good people every day and see good things happen. I want you to have nice things where you live too.

So, I think it’s about walking away with a sense of pride and accomplishment, knowing that they gave it their all. Sometimes it works out. Sometimes it doesn’t. Sometimes there are so many things, especially right now, that are completely out of everybody’s control with the way budgets are being allocated and priorities are shifting, both state and federally.

Nothing is within our control, but just being apathetic and saying, “Well, I can’t do anything about it,” isn’t the answer. Everybody can always do something. Go plant flowers in your downtown district.

I think working with Lionbear is walking away feeling like you are proud of the work you put in, and you tried. Maybe you learned something. Maybe you are smarter and better and more equipped for what might come next. ∎

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​Learn more about Lionbear Ventures: www.lionbearventures.com