Interview with Eloise Palmi, Cofounder and CEO of No Grey
This interview was conducted by Megan Capriccio, FemTech Collective Global Ambassador in Sydney
Continuing our series of highlighting FemTech Founders in Australia, I’d like to introduce Eloise Palmi, the Co-Founder and CEO of NoGrey based in Melbourne, Australia. As former Head Mistress of Australia’s leading professional dungeon space, Eloise possesses over 5 years experience in the field, including 1000+ one-on-one negotiations. Enthusiastic consent is not simply her profession, but her passion. Building on her candidacy for the seat of Dunkley (2013 Federal Election ASXP), in 2017 Eloise entered the start-up realm as Co-Founder of a unique mobile application, where she is leveraging her professional experience navigating the legal landscape of the adult industries.
What is the idea behind your project or product and how did you come up with it?
Purely need. The origin of NoGrey comes from a conversation Grant, my Co-Founder, and I held in early 2015 when we discovered that we both struggled with gaining sufficient details from potential play partners. Fast forward a few years and there was a lot of issues arising in the scene around consent which we felt largely stemmed back to the inability many people have of concisely communicating what each person was looking for in a scene. The need for a tool to enable effective, rapid communication that could provide both clarity and an easily referenced single record was recognized.
What impact do you hope it makes on women’s health, FemTech, or Women in health?
One of our big focuses has been introducing safety and an element of accountability. Not only will NoGrey allow users to be incredibly clear about what they desire and what they don’t wish to explore but we are allowing users to give feedback on ‘respectfulness’.
How long did it take you to be where you are now? And how did you get there?
The business didn’t take shape until we began requirement gathering and modeling an actual business case in June of 2017. First designs began coming together that same month and we registered Elucidare (holding company) in October 2017. It took almost 18 months to build our MVP to the level we were happy to release it on the Appstores. We did have a sneaky preview release to celebrate our one-year in October 2018.
What was the biggest obstacle?
The actual industry. Despite our societies proclamations about having liberated values, supporting open mindedness and not discriminating based on sexual preferences, it was difficult securing a merchant account for an app that encourages people to actually talk about their fantasies.
What are your biggest achievements to date?
Winning ‘Best New Product’ at the 2018 Australian Adult Industry Awards. This was achieved with only our beta release and came about by a hugely excited cohort of test users sharing the app around Melbourne. We hadn’t even officially released yet!
What motivates you?
I’m extremely passionate about informed enthusiastic consent. We wanted to restore a lot of fun to the scene whilst empowering people to explore in a safer environment. Enabling people to express themselves freely without fear of prosecution is something we wish to stand for.
What are the challenges of being an entrepreneur in the niche you are in (or Australia)? How about being a female founder / entrepreneur?
Honestly, this is the first time I’m doing this, so I can’t give it a true frame of reference. I’ve freelanced almost my entire adult life, and this is next level, it is incredibly tough, and has broken me more than once.
Is the #WomenInTech movement important to you and if yes, why?
Women and equality in general is HUGELY important to me. I come at this more from a solutions side than a tech side, but women being recognized in tech and contributing advancements to society is something I value in Nikki, my incredibly talented Technical Co-Founder. My ideas would be just ideas without her delicious brain.
What is the most important piece of advice you can give to all female founders and female entrepreneurs out there?
Nobody, male or female knows what they are doing first time round… so just own that. We are usually better at asking for help than men, so already have an advantage. Don’t feel like an impostor for one second. Just don’t give up.
What will be the key trends in the health tech industry in the next 5 years and where do you see it heading? What is Australia’s role?
Sadly I think Australia will be left behind. There does not seem to be a willingness to invest in SexTech. Or if investors are open to this, the investment groups/VCs are too afraid to be linked to the sector. It is really disappointing considering the industry is outperforming FinTech in some areas.
What’s next? (for you and/or your product)
There has been so much change in 2019 I have no idea for me. For NoGrey, we’ve just returned from a 10-day intensive in Argentina building out all of the user stories for Phase 2 and 3. We cannot wait to show the world our ‘full’ product. The scene negotiation tool will not be the only world-first NoGrey offers our community!
Who are 3 women in health tech that inspire you?
Maxine Lynn
Dominnique Karetsos
Cindy Gallop
Website: https://nogrey.app
Facebook: @nogreyapp
Instagram: @nogrey_app
