She Started One of America’s Best Design Stores. Now, She Wants to Help You Do You

Charisma is something you either have, or you don’t. And Shannon Maldonado has it. Fans and followers of the Philadelphia native’s boutique design shop, Yowie, will be familiar with her magnetic charm and candor through the announcements she posts to Instagram, or IRL visits to the storefront and pop-ups she’s hosted across the city. (Add eloquence to her list of talents, a skill learned in a past life in corporate fashion presenting to executives, she says). Safe to say, there’s no camera-shyness here. But only recently did she decide to broadcast her on-screen confidence through more traditional channels.

In July, Maldonado, ever the entrepreneur, announced the concept for Small Enough, a television series that peels back the curtain on small businesses and their creators to expose what they’re building, and how they’re doing it. The pilot paints an exciting picture of Philly’s self-starter scene. We meet Lindsey Scannapieco, an urban developer focused on unconventional adaptive reuse projects with her company, Scout, who tells us about the time she used a kiddie pool to keep beer cold for an event. After a refreshingly candid chat, Maldonado takes us on a field trip to meet with her (very funny) contractor at a historic building she’s turning into an 11-room hotel. She’ll be the first to tell you that she’s just figuring it out as she goes.

"So many small-business owners that I talk to, we’re all like, ‘Oh my god, we don’t know what we’re doing,’" she says. "When you’re running a small business, 100 percent of it is learned on the job."

The show, in fact, didn’t even start as a show. Maldonado was talking with a good friend, Nathan Nedorostek, about how to grow her brand during the pandemic, and the two ended up creating a pitch deck for a series of Instagram clips that would track her moves—a "how it started, how it’s going" kinda thing. It’d be a way to create content while providing anyone at earlier stages of a start-up with a blueprint to finding their way in the small-biz world.

But Yowie was founded with a spirit of collaboration—the store showcases local designers with a rising-tide-lifts-all-boats approach—and Maldonado has always sought to uplift the artists and makers that surround her. At one point, her web shop even had a button called "Life Advice" that invited people to ask whatever was on their minds; oftentimes they wanted to know how to start and run a small business.

All of this led her and Nedorostek to a different idea: Maldonado as host of a series wherein she meets other budding and experienced entrepreneurs at eye level. Nedorostek would executive produce alongside another friend, Sean Sullivan, who wrote the script and music for the pilot.

"I started to feel strongly about that idea," says Maldonado. "I wanted to find commonalities across the board with other creatives, but also learn about what they’re doing differently. That’s a big part of what we hope to discover in the series."

There isn’t one to speak of—at least not yet. But if the pilot for Small Enough is any indication, an entire season—or several, if we dare to dream—could serve as a trove of inspiration and information that quashes doubt and disbelief in the hearts of anyone interested in starting a small business. Five years ago, that was Maldonado, Yowie but a twinkle in her eye.

At the end of the pilot, Maldonado bids us farewell as a bus approaches (she doesn’t drive, and doesn’t seem to want to). But instead of pulling over, the bus just cruises on by and leaves her on the sidewalk to figure out what’s next. Lucky for Maldonado, it’s a skill she’s been developing for most of her life.

Related Reading:

America’s Best Independent Design Shops: Yowie

Philadelphia’s Arbiter of Cool Is Turning Her Beloved Shop Into a Creative Hub and Hotel