It’s been 20 years since Shira Yevin, the lead singer of punk band Shiragirl drove a pink RV into the Vans Warped Tour grounds, the now-defunct punk rock pageant infamous for being male-dominated. In response to the pageant’s lack of female-fronted bands, Yevin’s band crashed the pageant and arrange an impromptu all-female stage. This led to the creation of Warped Tour’s Shiragirl Stage, which hosted over 300 bands, together with Joan Jett & The Blackhearts and Paramore. It was later honored with a Warped Tour exhibit on the Rock and Corridor of Fame.
After Shiragirl Stage, Yevin went on a “lifelong crusade for carving out a space for women in music and other male-dominated industries,” she informed TechCrunch. This started with the launch of Gritty in Pink in 2020, a Dwell Nation-backed platform designed to empower girls within the music trade.
A couple of years later, the corporate rolled out its flagship product, InPink, a job market for females and non-binary artists, amongst different professionals throughout the music and dwell leisure area, akin to tour managers, photographers and video editors who focus on live shows, and graphic designers for poster creation. Like freelance platforms Fiverr and Upwork, customers can publish listings to focus on their companies on InPink’s market and join with main manufacturers.
“On the freelance talent side, it’s hard to find opportunities without a network or personal connections. If you’re not in the ‘boys club,’ most jobs aren’t even posted. And then, of course, admin headaches, sending invoices, chasing down payments, and fairly pricing services are major struggles for all freelancers but for women in particular…We’re aiming to build the next-generation career platform for talent and help [women] upscale and network,” Yevin stated.
Along with its concentrate on girls and non-binary creatives, InPink additionally goals to handle different DEI (Range, Fairness, and Inclusion) wants with a function referred to as “Diversity” tags, which filters creators based mostly on particular range standards: Asian, Black, Indigenous, Hispanic/Latina, Queer, and POC.
InPink has grown to over 3,000 customers and has facilitated a number of dream gigs for individuals on the platform, together with Leanne Bowes (bassist) and Constance Antoinette (guitarist), who work with Demi Lovato. Moa Munoz, in the meantime, secured the bass participant place for pop star Olivia Rodrigo.
The corporate has processed $300,000 in transactions thus far.
Trying forward, InPink continues to develop new options, akin to two AI-powered instruments: a good pay scale that analyzes market charges to find out honest compensation for feminine creatives and an identical instrument that can assist firms uncover expertise extra effectively.
The honest pay scale is especially notable as feminine musicians are nonetheless being underpaid or don’t know the way a lot to cost for his or her companies. As cited by a examine from the Recording Academy, about 18% of respondents who establish as performers or music creators earned lower than $40,000 a yr in 2019. Extra broadly, girls freelancers reportedly cost 47% lower than males on on-line marketplaces.
Yevin defined that InPink’s honest pay function will advocate how a lot customers ought to cost based mostly on “location, the service, and the scope of the project.” The AI will pull from “diverse” sources to “make sure that [the price] is as accurate as possible,” Yevin stated, but declined to share additional as it’s nonetheless within the early phases of growth.
In the meantime, the forthcoming matching instrument helps job seekers uncover tasks that finest swimsuit their expertise and pursuits. The AI additionally analyzes previous efficiency to make optimum matches for firms.
“In the future, it’s going to be more of an AI prompt, so you can prompt what you are looking for and get what you need in a quicker way,” Yevin added.
The AI options are anticipated to launch in early 2025 or sooner.
Different concepts on the product roadmap embrace a paid Professional subscription, which will likely be obtainable to higher-level expertise who’ve labored with notable names. The corporate can be trying to increase past the music trade and supply its companies to adjoining sectors in leisure, akin to sports activities and dwell occasions. Yevin stated InPink is already working with one sports activities consumer, Angel Metropolis Soccer Membership (the LA-based girls’s soccer league), to assist them rent expertise for pre-shows.
“We’re already seeing the potential with other industries,” Yevin stated. “We see InPink transforming the future of work for music, entertainment, and beyond and making it more flexible and equitable in the process.”
Gritty in Pink has raised over $500,000 from Different Wealth Companions, Gaingels, LiveNation, Lengthy Seashore Accelerator, and angel buyers. The corporate is ready to shut a $1 million pre-seed spherical quickly and was lately accepted into the Berkeley SkyDeck incubator.