Tonight, Bethenny Frankel will receive the Reality Royalty Award at the 2022 MTV Movie & TV Awards: Unscripted for her legendary reality TV career, which was highlighted by a long run on The Real Housewives of New York City.

But Frankel isn’t just a TV star—she’s also a super savvy businessperson. She sold her Skinnygirl cocktail brand for a reported $120 million and has ventured into TV production, philanthropy, and authoring multiple NYT bestselling books.

We chatted with Frankel about her entrepreneurial journey on the Imposters podcast. Here are some choice excerpts.

What was your childhood like?

My childhood was adventurous and filled with uncertainty. I think I went to 13 schools. I had a family all embedded in the thoroughbred horse racing world, which is about highs and lows, having and not having, gambling, action, odds, racetracks all over the country. I had a crazy childhood, but it was fun because there was a lot of action. My personality is a reflection of that journey. I like winning on my own terms, in my own way. Nobody cares about who comes in second in the Kentucky Derby.

Have you had any failed business experiences prior to your Skinnygirl breakthrough?

Well, BethennyBakes was a wheat-, egg-, and dairy-free, low-fat cookie business. We’re talking plant-based 20 years ago. That was ahead of its time, but I also didn’t have the infrastructure or the right packaging partner. I couldn’t get the consistency. I had to fold it.

How did you deal with that failure?

I don’t consider winning to be hitting a home run every time you get up to the plate. I consider winning how you handle it. Or how do you survive and how do you thrive? And I always turn a loss into a win. My first time trying to get on The Apprentice, I think, “I’ve made it” and they tell me, "You didn’t make it.” But then I connected with that same casting director, and went on the Martha Stewart Apprentice. I consider those losses to be case law for my $100 million business now.

How did you end up on Real Housewives of New York?

I was at polo, the sport in the Hamptons. It’s just a place to schmooze, and I was trying to hawk those cookies, the BethennyBakes cookies, and I ran into a woman who was excited about the show and had brought casting directors. The production company was happy with the four women they had; Bravo said they needed a fifth woman. It wasn’t a proven show. It was called Manhattan Moms. They just were like, “Let's pick her,” which makes no sense because they were looking for a mom and someone wealthy. I was broke. I wasn’t a mom.

How have your motivations changed now that you basically have enough money to never work again if you don’t want to?

I want to do the things that I love, that I’m passionate about, that I think are interesting, that I think are in line with who I am as a person, not doing things for alternative goals. Meaning, when I was on reality television, I was having disputes and talking about things that I don’t necessarily care about and in a lot of unnecessary drama that is created by a circumstance on television. That’s not in line with who I am and I don’t have to do that anymore.

This interview has been edited for clarity. Definitely check out the full podcast episode here.

In light of the Sunday Edition’s impending glow up, I’m sad to report that we’ll be boarding up our little advice shop after this week.

For the past 43 weeks, I’ve delighted in my role as “Workplace Whisperer” (pro tip: never accept a title that’s going to raise HR’s eyebrows on your next job app), where we’ve managed to cover everything from the clueless supervisor to the anti-compromiser, and plenty in between. I took on this role with the goal of imparting some actionable advice while perhaps providing a few laughs along the way. Occasionally, those priorities got flipped.

If you were following along, I hope you stumbled across something useful that you were able to apply to your own professional journey. And in doing so, perhaps it made your workplace experience just a bit more agreeable.

Sifting through your sticky workplace situations has become somewhat of a weekly catharsis–I don’t know where I’ll go to fill the void, but I’m told you can find almost anything on Twitter. Anything, that is, except me. Which is why, if you’re interested in staying connected, I’ll invite you to join my LinkedIn network. Brew readers get a 15% off welcome discount.

If I’ve learned one thing from the hours spent poring over your questions and stories, it’s that while we may be spread across a multitude of geographies and industries, we’re all basically dealing with the same nonsense out there and sometimes all it takes is a friendly ear and a fresh perspective to help sort things out.

It’s been an honor to lend that ear and offer that perspective. In the column’s absence, I’d encourage you to look for opportunities to fill that role for each other. It takes a village to “make it work.”

Whispering farewell (but not in a weird way),

Shane

NASA’s first crewed trip to the moon since 1972 was originally slated for 2024. But last year the trip got delayed to 2025 or later—and “or later” is looking highly likely. One major reason for the holdup is that the necessary spacesuits won’t be ready on time.

Hoping to finally fix its spacesuit production snags, NASA announced this week that it awarded contracts to two teams led by private companies, Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace, to make its suits. NASA’s outsourcing is a tacit admission that its own work developing lunar suits in-house for 15 years has been too costly and time-consuming: As of August 2021, NASA’s spacesuit production schedule has suffered more than 20 months of delays.

What’s the holdup, exactly?

First, we should caveat that these suits are basically superflexible Gundams: They have to keep astronauts safe and mobile in an environment that’s low-gravity, offers no breathable air, and is full of sharp dust particles that can quickly destroy materials. It’s not the Riviera.

So, constructing a spacesuit is a Sisyphean task to start with, and NASA faced major hurdles trying to produce them in-house:

1. Spacesuit designers are working under immense pressure. That’s caused human error as well as difficulties aligning various timelines. The suits’ components are sourced from 27 separate contractors and vendors, which…imagine if 27 of your friends tried to coordinate on literally anything.

2. The government is about as consistent as pancake batter when it comes to funding. Last year, NASA only received 77% of the funding it requested for part of the lunar program, resulting in a $69 million budget shortfall for suit development and a delay of at least three months.

• At more than $1 billion, the total projected cost of the suits blows any Met Gala look out of the water; how much funding NASA gets—and when—hinges on unpredictable political agendas.

In the end, the whole endeavor was such a slog that NASA finally decided to bring in Axiom Space and Collins Aerospace to help outfit its astronauts.

These two private companies signed contracts worth up to $3.5 billion to supply suits for NASA through 2034. NASA will test the companies’ suits in 2025, and then decide whether to fund one or both designs.

• The Collins Aerospace team has the advantage. It’s been a leading aerospace supplier for decades and has supplied spacesuits to NASA before.
• Meanwhile, newcomer Axiom Space was founded in 2016 with the goal of building the first private space station.

Despite the resume differences, both Collins and Axiom said this week that their suit development processes have already reached advanced stages, meaning astronauts could have an outfit for dancing in the moonlight soon.

Looking ahead…even if NASA astronauts get the right gear to go to the moon in time, the lunar mission has to overcome several other major obstacles. Construction of the rocket and the lunar lander have been set back by Covid-19 supply and labor challenges, as well as a legal scuffle between NASA and Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin after NASA chose Elon Musk’s SpaceX to build the lander. Billionaires. *sigh*—JW

Welcome to Open House, the only newsletter section that needs parking for two yachts. We’ll give you a few facts about a listing and you try to guess the price.

Today’s home is so big it needs five sets of French doors. This almost 15,000 square-foot mansion, built in 1996 on Mercer Island in the middle of Lake Washington, straddles the line between tacky and “Are lion statues actually camp now?” Amenities include:

• 5 beds, 11 bathrooms
• Indoor racquetball court
• Putting green and sand trap
• Big fish on the walls to point to and tell guests, “Fought for my life reeling in that one.”

How much to live on Butterworth Road?

1. The young, rich, anti-capitalist capitalists. (Recode)
2. Why crypto crashed, and what happens next. (Morning Brew)
3. A once in a lifetime bird. (The Verge)
4. How to rescue the world’s biggest cargo ships. (BBC)
5. After millennia of agricultural expansion, the world has passed “peak agricultural land.” (Our World in Data)
6. Elon Musk’s younger sister is the force behind a streaming service dedicated to adaptations of romance novels and erotic fan fiction. (New York Times)
7. The watch that came in from the cold. (Hodinkee)
8. How to buy a chicken sandwich in Shenzhen. (Rest of World)
9. Should you feed child guests dinner? What #Swedengate tells us about food culture and social expectations. (The Conversation)
10. The best weekend getaways this summer. (Morning Brew)

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Welcome back to Morning Brew’s Meme Competition, where we crown a single memelord every Sunday.

Today’s winner: Si from Verde Valley, AZ

This week’s challenge: That’s all, folks! Thanks for the memeories!