Sadia Sisay is a Sierra Leonean born, British founder and creator of beingU. Who believes that who people are is more important than what they have done. Her past and present has certainly proved that no matter what you go through you can and will achieve anything if you commit to your dream. Sadia’s entrepreneurial story is one of tenacity, courage and passion. She moved to the UK from Sierra Leone at 16, trained as a cancer nurse, then worked in the pharmaceutical industry until 2008 when she left and decided start her own business and became the proud founder of beingU. She first attempted to launch the brand in 2011 however personal challenges meant she had to put her dreams on hold but she is back and more passionate than ever.
At the core of her entrepreneurial journey has been her family and loved ones. After losing her husband to an unexpected death in 2014, she has rebuilt her life after heartbreak. As the main carer for her mother who suffered a stroke 6 years ago, she has had to balance building her business and looking after her mother.
Sadia attributes her 21 year old daughter as the main inspiration for the beingU brand and is keen to ensure her daughter grows up in a world that celebrates women of all shapes, shades and sizes.
beingU is focused on providing high quality lingerie for women of all skin tones with a particularly strong focus on black women and other women of colour and launches officially online in February 2017. Sadia is driven by the idea that women should feel valued in all they experience. An idea heavily influenced by watching her daughter grow into a young lady in an environment where her skin tone is very underrepresented.
beingU is the only lingerie brand that has designed briefs specifically to fit the fuller bottom shape and has five styles of bra that work from a 28 to 44 back and up to an H cup.
beingU has a unique mission: to enable women to embrace their skin colour and body shape, to feel treasured and beautiful, through the wearing of beautiful underwear designed with their body in mind. Making women feel “visible” is at the core of this brand.
“I’ve spent over 30 years searching for gorgeous underwear to suit my skin tone and body shape and this is the first range that addresses these things,” says Sadia. “We know from a survey conducted for beingU that a staggering 82% of women surveyed across the USA and UK said they did not find it easy to find lingerie similar to their skin tone and 94% of respondents said they would buy skin tone lingerie if it was available.”
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