Fran Hauser

2016 ✨
Angel investing era 💼📈
Signed my first book deal (throwback to the original working title!) 📖✍️
A Fairy Godmother Award from 🧚💛
So much NYC time 🗽—all black outfits + slick ponytails 🖤🙃 (not sure I could pull off the ponytail today!)
First winter renting in VT ❄️🏔️ (which turned into buying the townhouse—best decision ever 🏡❤️)
Boys were 6 & 4—parenting felt simpler 👦👦💫
These photos with my dear friend , from a fundraiser —seeing her again really tugged at my heart 💔🤍
Soundtrack of the year: Love Yourself 🎶💿

📚 Last week at , we hosted two nonfiction events that stayed with me.

One focused on entrepreneurship & building businesses with , , and .
The other explored what it really means to serve on boards with Jon Foster.

After those conversations, I realized how much I love when the different chapters of my professional life collide ✨

Before Bedford Books, I spent years as a media executive, startup investor, and board member. I’m also an author—and now I run an indie bookstore in a small town. What keeps surprising me is how none of these chapters feel separate.

The questions founders ask about growth, focus, and trade-offs aren’t that different from the ones board members wrestle with—or the ones writers face when shaping an idea, or booksellers face when building community!

When you allow your experiences to overlap, you stop feeling pressure to “start over” every time your role changes. Also, learning builds over time when you stay curious across chapters, instead of treating each one as a clean break. 💡

Most careers aren’t linear—and sometimes the real growth happens in the overlap. ✨