Of all the places for Zim Ugochukwu to be in the world, I surprisingly learn on our call that she's only an hour away from where I'm hiding out in North Carolina. “I just got my apartment in Durham two weeks ago," she says.
But why Durham?
“My boyfriend's here. And it's also where I grew up, so I'm giving myself a year here and then I'm going to move to another country."
Ahh. That makes sense.
It's the first time that the young entrepreneur and founder of Travel Noire—a digital platform that has become the ultimate guide for the unconventional Black traveler—has had a place to call home since she packed her bags back in January. Over the last six months it seems that she's been living the dream: dashing from country to country, as beautifully documented for her 17.4k followers on her personal Instagram page, while working on creating products for the recent launch of Travel Noire Experiences. Who wouldn't want to set up an impromptu workspace in a picturesque country where an ocean view is not an option, but a requirement?
However, Zim admits, as with anything in life, all that glitters ain't gold.
“Like I'm in bed right now. I woke up today and I was like I don't feel good, I've been here all day."
She hasn't quite recovered from the jetlag that flew back with her from a last-minute trip to Portugal. No, she didn't go there to stunt for the gram, but because she needed an escape from the solitude that leaves many entrepreneurs desperately clinging on to their sanity.
“There are periods of time where I won't even leave my house," she admits. “People see the Portugal part and they're like 'oh my god, you're traveling!' And it's fun; it's great, but the period before that locked up in your apartment staring at a screen for 15 hours, like that's not sexy at all."
She talks about the battle of an entrepreneur in one of her recent posts. How people don't understand the sacrifices that come with the title of being a B-O-S-S. Dealing with taxes, and the government, and other people's problems. How working 15-hour days have left many of her fellow entrepreneur friends fighting depression, no matter their level of success. It's a topic that's brushed over in the black business world, but that's claiming the lives of many who can't seem to find light in their endless world of darkness. It's not something that Zim wishes upon anybody.
“Whenever people say they want to be an entrepreneur I tell them that they don't. You don't want to be an entrepreneur. You like the idea of having something of your own, but in all reality it's the hardest thing you'll ever have to do."
Luckily for Zim, traveling is not just her business, but one of the ways she escapes the chaos that comes with her lifestyle. She also prays, nourishes her mind with inspirational books and quotes, and takes advantage of the listening ears of her friends and boyfriend when she needs words of encouragement.
She describes her significant other as the yin to her yang: a little bit more calm, cool, and collected. Amidst the frequent business trips, managing her team, and over a hundred other contributors, it seems as if he is the one constant in her life, quietly holding her down behind-the-scenes since they met back in college in Greensboro, North Carolina four years ago. The mystery man is a sacred piece of her life that she chooses to keep private. Just a couple of weeks ago they celebrated their anniversary, which she publicly acknowledged with a lower body shot of them lacing fingers. The caption simply read: it's so easy loving you.
I curiously asked her how she manages to run her business and have a love life—something that many women claim they have a hard time balancing. She accredits their constant communication (they speak frequently over the phone or via text when she's out of the country) and him also being a traveler as keys to their success.
Their relationship is, thankfully, much different than that of her parents.
Her mother arrived to Mankato, Minnesota arranged to marry her father, but soon after Zim was born packed up her children and caught a Greyhound bus to California, refusing to stay in an abusive relationship. Her father, who would return from a business trip only to find an empty house with no contact information left behind, moved back to Nigeria. He wouldn't see Zim and her brother until 15 years later when they would take their first international trip to Nigeria to visit the village where her mother grew up. For six weeks she enjoyed meeting distant cousins, family members, and exploring the foreign terrain. But meeting her father, well, that was a different experience. Her only connection to him was through the letters her mother kept hidden that she used to sneak and read. Although her mother never spoke ill of her father, meeting him in person allowed her to formulate her own opinion—the five kids, wife, and mother that lived in his tiny two-room home was enough to convince her, as if she didn't already know, that her mom was superwoman.
“To see where we were living and what my mom was singlehandedly able to do in the U.S., and to see where he was living, it was crazy; it was mind blowing."
Growing up Zim learned at an early age that traveling would be her way of life. She moved from Minnesota to Los Angeles, and back to Minnesota before settling in Durham. Her strict upbringing and expectation of excellence would lead to her cloning genes at the age of 19, becoming the youngest precinct judge for North Carolina's Board of Elections, and being on the executive board of an anti-tobacco organization, amongst many other accolades. Her credentials earned her spot in the prestigious Henry Luce Scholars program, which sent her and at least 14 other post-college graduates to Asia in effort to bridge the cultural gap between them and the western world. Zim openly speaks about her time there as being the catalyst to her wanting to create something that would empower people like her, to share their love of travel and cultural emersion in effort to educate those who were skeptical about traveling abroad.
After returning to America with limited funds and no concrete career plans, she moved to southern California to live with her mother and stepdad. It only took six months before her mom started hitting her with daily suggestions of nursing or medical school, so she packed her bags and headed to San Francisco with $300 to live with her fairy godmother—a board member of an organization she was previously a part of, who kindly opened up her home free-of-charge. It was just the break that Zim needed to get her thoughts together, stack her cash, and start planning her next big venture—Travel Noire. After being fired from her full-time producer job, she took her $17,000 in savings and began to put her business blueprint into action.
It's been almost two years since Travel Noire burst onto the scene with enticing photos and creative offerings, and it shows no signs of slowing down. New positions are being advertised on her social media feeds, offering a benefits package that would make many reconsider their current situation: employees can kickback anywhere in the world with unlimited vacation days (she requires a minimum of 25 paid vacation days), paid cell phone plans, and memberships to Oyster and Fitbit to allow them to stimulate their minds and take care of their bodies while on the road. There's even an option to take unlimited classes through Skillshare to brush up on those photography and painting skills that you always dreamed of mastering.
“It's super important to me and the culture of the company to make sure that we are flexible and open, and that we make sure that our team is happy," she says.
To make sure they're happy, healthy, fulfilled and learning what they want to learn.
The team is constantly working on new products and creative ways to package them. Their direct feed from travel glitch sites, such as The Flight Deal and The Deal Alert, are included as a part of their Travel Noire District $60-per-year subscription-based service, which only opens up to the public every few months. And for those free-99 lovers, there's always the how-to videos on Travel Noire TV, pieces on travelnoire.com, and weekly emails from Zim herself. The Travel Noire hashtag, also has over 169,000 posts from fellow travelers sharing unique experiences from around the world.
Although running the Travel Noire machine may be daunting at times, there's no doubt that Zim cherishes the opportunity to be able to wake up in a different country on any given day and do what she loves, because there was a time when she worked a job that she had no passion for or desire to stay in.
To those in similar situations, she offers this advice:
“With no risk, there's no reward and you either get comfortable with uncertainty and not knowing where you're going to end up or you settle and you live this life that you don't want to live."
Well said, boss lady.
All images courtesy of Zim Ugochukwu
RELATED
So, we handpicked one hundred It Girls who embody that palpable It Factor moving through us as young Black women, the kind of motion lighting up the world both IRL and across the internet.
It Girl 100 became xoNecole’s most successful program, with the hashtag organically reaching more than forty million impressions on Instagram in just twenty-four hours. Yes, it caught on like wildfire because we celebrated some of the most brilliant and influential GenZennial women of color setting trends and shaping culture. But more than that, it resonated because the women we celebrated felt seen.
Many were already known in their industries for keeping this generation fly and lit, but rarely received recognition or flowers. It Girl 100 became a safe space to be uplifted, and for us as Black women to bask in what felt like an era of our brilliance, beauty, and boundless influence on full display.
And then, almost overnight, it was as if the rug was pulled from under us as Black women, as the It Girls of the world.
Our much-needed, much-deserved season of ease and soft living quickly metamorphosed into a time of self-preservation and survival. Our motion and economic progression seemed strategically slowed, our light under siege.
The air feels heavier now. The headlines colder. Our Black girl magic is being picked apart and politicized for simply existing.
With that climate shift, as we prepare to launch our second annual It Girl 100 honoree list, our team has had to dig deep on the purpose and intention behind this year’s list. Knowing the spirit of It Girl 100 is about motion, sauce, strides, and progression, how do we celebrate amid uncertainty and collective grief when the juice feels like it is being squeezed out of us?
As we wrestled with that question, we were reminded that this tension isn’t new. Black women have always had to find joy in the midst of struggle, to create light even in the darkest corners. We have carried the weight of scrutiny for generations, expected to be strong, to serve, to smile through the sting. But this moment feels different. It feels deeply personal.
We are living at the intersection of liberation and backlash. We are learning to take off our capes, to say no when we are tired, to embrace softness without apology.
And somehow, the world has found new ways to punish us for it.
In lifestyle, women like Kayla Nicole and Ayesha Curry have been ridiculed for daring to choose themselves. Tracee Ellis Ross was labeled bitter for speaking her truth about love. Meghan Markle, still, cannot breathe without critique.
In politics, Kamala Harris, Letitia James, and Jasmine Crockett are dragged through the mud for standing tall in rooms not built for them.
In sports, Angel Reese, Coco Gauff, and Taylor Townsend have been reminded that even excellence will not shield you from racism or judgment.
In business, visionaries like Diarrha N’Diaye-Mbaye and Melissa Butler are fighting to keep their dreams alive in an economy that too often forgets us first.
Even our icons, Beyoncé, Serena, and SZA, have faced criticism simply for evolving beyond the boxes society tried to keep them in.
From everyday women to cultural phenoms, the pattern is the same. Our light is being tested.
And yet, somehow, through it all, we are still showing up as that girl, and that deserves to be celebrated.
Because while the world debates our worth, we keep raising our value. And that proof is all around us.
This year alone, Naomi Osaka returned from motherhood and mental health challenges to reach the semifinals of the US Open. A’ja Wilson claimed another MVP, reminding us that beauty and dominance can coexist. Brandy and Monica are snatching our edges on tour. Kahlana Barfield Brown sold out her new line in the face of a retailer that had been canceled. And Melissa Butler’s company, The Lip Bar, is projecting a forty percent surge in sales.
We are no longer defining strength by how much pain we can endure. We are defining it by the unbreakable light we continue to radiate.
We are the women walking our daily steps and also continuing to run solid businesses. We are growing in love, taking solo trips, laughing until it hurts, raising babies and ideas, drinking our green juice, and praying our peace back into existence.
We are rediscovering the joy of rest and realizing that softness is not weakness, it is strategy.
And through it all, we continue to lift one another. Emma Grede is creating seats at the table. Valeisha Butterfield has started a fund for jobless Black women. Arian Simone is leading in media with fearless conviction. We are pouring into each other in ways the world rarely sees but always feels.
So yes, we are in the midst of societal warfare. Yes, we are being tested. Yes, we are facing economic strain, political targeting, and public scrutiny. But even war cannot dim a light that is divinely ours.
And we are still shining.
And we are still softening.
And we are still creating.
And we are still It.
That is the quiet magic of Black womanhood, our ability to hold both truth and triumph in the same breath, to say yes, and to life’s contradictions.
It is no coincidence that this year, as SheaMoisture embraces the message “Yes, And,” they stand beside us as partners in celebrating this class of It Girls. Because that phrase, those two simple words, capture the very essence of this moment.
Yes, we are tired. And we are still rising.
Yes, we are questioned. And we are the answer.
Yes, we are bruised. And we are still beautiful.
This year’s It Girl 100 is more than a list. It is a love letter to every Black woman who dares to live out loud in a world that would rather she whisper. This year’s class is living proof of “Yes, And,” women who are finding ways to thrive and to heal, to build and to rest, to lead and to love, all at once.
It is proof that our joy is not naive, our success not accidental. It is the reminder that our light has never needed permission.
So without further ado, we celebrate the It Girl 100 Class of 2025–2026.
We celebrate the millions of us who keep doing it with grace, grit, and glory.
Because despite it all, we still shine.
Because we are still her.
Because we are still IT, girl.
Meet all 100 women shaping culture in the It Girl 100 Class of 2025. View the complete list of honorees here.
Featured image by xoStaff
Then there were those who gave up their zip code altogether and found a permanent home in the skies. After years spent recruiting students for a university, Lisa-Gaye Shakespeare became a full-time travel influencer and founded her travel company, Shakespeare Agency. And she's not alone.
These stories mirror the experiences of women across the world. For millions, the pandemic induced a seismic shift in priorities and desires. Corporate careers that were once hailed as the ultimate “I made it” moment in one's career were pushed to the back burner as women quit their jobs in search of a more self-fulfilling purpose.
xoNecole spoke to these three Black women who used the pandemic as a springboard to make their wildest dreams a reality, the lessons they learned, and posed the question of whether they’ll ever return to cubicle life.
Answers have been edited for context and length.
xoNecole: How did the pandemic lead to you leaving the cubicle?
Randi: I was becoming stagnant. I was working in mortgage and banking but I felt like my personality was too big for that job! From there, I transitioned to radio but was laid off during the pandemic. That’s what made me go full throttle with entrepreneurship.
Gabrielle: I moved around a lot for work. Five times over a span of seven years. I knew I needed a break because I had experienced so much. So, I just quit one day. Effective immediately. I didn’t know what I was going to do, I just knew I needed a break and to just regroup.
Lisa-Gaye: I was working in recruiting at a university and my dream job just kind of fell into my lap! But, I never got to fully enjoy it before the world shut down in March [2020] and I was laid off. On top of that, I was stuck in Miami because Jamaica had closed its borders due to the pandemic before I was able to return.
Randi O
xoN: Tell us about your journey after leaving Corporate America.
Randi: I do it all now! I have a podcast, I’m an on-air talent, I act, and I own a public relations company that focuses on social media engagement. It’s all from my network. When you go out and start a business, you can’t just say, “Okay I’m done with Corporate America,” and “Let me do my own thing.” If you don’t build community, if you don’t build a network it's going to be very hard to sustain.
Gabrielle: I realized in New York, there was not a lot to do for Black lesbians and queer folks. We don’t really have dedicated bars and spaces so I started doing events and it took off. I started focusing on my brand, Raw Honey. I opened a co-working space, and I was able to host an NYC Pride event in front of 100,000 people. I hit the ground running with Raw Honey. My events were all women coming to find community and come together with other lesbians and queer folks. I found my purpose in that.
Lisa-Gaye: After being laid off, I wrote out all of my passions and that’s how I came up with [my company] Shakespeare Agency. It was all of the things that I loved to do under one umbrella. The pandemic pulled that out of me. I had a very large social media following, so I pitched to hotels that I would feature them on my blog and social media. This reignited my passion for travel. I took the rest of the year to refocus my brand to focus solely on being a content creator within the travel space.
Gabrielle
xoN: What have you learned about yourself during your time as an entrepreneur?
Randi: [I learned] the importance of my network and community that I created. When I was laid off I was still keeping those relationships with people that I used to work with. So it was easy for me to transition into social media management and I didn’t have to start from scratch.
Gabrielle: The biggest thing I learned about myself was my own personal identity as a Black lesbian and how much I had assimilated into straight and corporate culture and not being myself. Now, I feel comfortable and confident being my authentic self. Now, I'm not sacrificing anything else for my career. I have a full life. I have friends. I have a social life. And when you are happy and have a full quality of life, I feel like [I] can have more longevity in my career.
Lisa-Gaye: [I'm doing] the best that I've ever done. The discipline that I’m building within myself. Nobody is saying, ‘Oh you have to be at work at this time.’ There’s no boss saying, ‘Why are you late?’ But, if I’m laying in bed at 10 a.m. then it's me saying [to myself], 'Okay, Lisa, get up, it's time for you to start working!’ That’s all on me.
xoNecole: What mistakes do you want to help people avoid when leaving Corporate America?
Randi: You have to learn about the highs and lows of entrepreneurship. You have a fast season and a slow season and I started to learn that when you're self-employed the latter season hits hard. Don't get caught up on the lows, just keep going and don't stop. I’m glad I did.
Gabrielle: I think everyone should quit their job and just figure it out for a second. You will discover so much about yourself when you take a second to just focus on you. Your skill set will always be there. You can’t be afraid of what will happen when you bet on yourself.
Lisa-Gaye: When it comes to being an influencer the field is saturated and a lot of people suffer from imposter syndrome. There is nothing wrong with being an imposter but find out how to make it yours, how to make it better. If you go to the store, you see 10 million different brands of bread! But you are choosing the brand that you like because you like that particular flavor.
So be an imposter, but be the best imposter of yourself and add your own flair, your own flavor. Make the better bread. The bread that you want.
Lisa-Gaye Shakespeare
xoNecole: Will you ever return to your 9 to 5?
Randi: I wouldn’t go back to Corporate America. But I don’t mind working under someone. A lot of people try to get into this business saying, “I can't work under anyone.” That’s not necessarily the reason to start a business because you're always going to answer to somebody. Clients, brands, there’s always someone else involved.
Gabrielle: I went back! I really needed a break and I gave myself that. But, I realized I’m a corporate girl, [and] I enjoy the work that I do. I’m good at it and I really missed that side of myself. I have different sides of me and my whole identity is not Raw Honey or my queerness. A big side of me is business and that’s why I love having my career. Now I feel like my best self.
Lisa-Gaye: I really don’t. For right now, I love working for myself. It's gratifying, it's challenging, it's exciting. It’s a big deal for me to say I own my own business. That I am my own boss, and I'm a Black woman doing it.
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Featured image courtesy of Lisa-Gaye Shakespeare
Originally published on February 6, 2023