Fresh Start Women’s Foundation is not only one of Arizona’s largest non-profit organizations but continues to be one of our city’s most influential charitable institutions. The organization, which aids in the empowerment and success of women from all walks of life through engagement, educational programs, mentorship, counseling, job training and placement, serves around 30,000 women and their families a year and is quickly attaining national recognition – as evident by their partnership with Ralph Lauren, who will give a runway show featuring looks from Spring 2012 for the 2012 Fresh Start Fashion Gala at the Biltmore. Recently, we sat down with Fresh Start’s new CEO Susan Berman to discuss the Gala and the foundation’s extensive, highly-impactful presence in the Valley.

DLT: Describe for us the mission of Fresh Start:
Susan Berman: Fresh Start was created to address women’s issues and to help empower, encourage and educate women. We started the resource center – which is entering its 10^th year of operations – to bring together resources under one roof. We want to empower women to help empower themselves. We look at her as a holistic individual, [helping her with] career enhancement, development, self-esteem issues, women’s dress and professional wear, legal issues, financial issues, action planning and development. We have a very rigorous and robust mentoring program. We look at different educational opportunities and funding and we have opportunities to provide scholarships to different women.

How large is the area that the organization serves?
The organization is focused on Maricopa County primarily, but we have no boundaries. We also have a national presence on our national website, which is a new initiative that is designed to address women’s needs for anyone anywhere in the nation.

Many of the women the organization serves have children. How does Fresh Start impact the lives of these children?

As a matter of fact, by addressing women’s issues and helping her become self-sufficient, we are impacting the entire community, but mostly, her children. We have programs on site called Child Watch that are free for a woman to use while she’s using our services. If we enable her to move out of chaos and destructive behaviors, then we are also helping her children.

Which efforts of Fresh Start seem to need the most help?
To be honest with you, we have a really strong volunteer base that we use to provide a number of services and we are cutting-edge in expertise, [but] there’s an opportunity in any of the focus areas because the need is so great. Any of our areas need help. We have a whole esteem program where we have yoga classes to makeovers to wardrobe, etc. People can volunteer, donate professional-wear clothing, come and help with the wardrobe effort at Fresh Start Treasures [thrift store] – all of that is so welcome and so appreciated. We are never full of support from our community. Also, volunteers must be 18 or older.

Does the need vary per different times of the year? Such as in summer, when jobs slow down, or near the holidays?
You know, actually, yes, the summer gets very busy here in part because kids are out of school and women are looking for the next step. They bring their children with them. Around the holidays, things change; life gets a little more traumatic. Any time around the holiday things can be particularly difficult for a lot of people, especially dealing with a lack of income issues and family issues. On an individual basis, we see about 6,000 women here in Phoenix per year. We are looking for opportunities in the Westside area, though, because it’s a very underserved area.

You became CEO of the organization last September and you came from working as the Director of Programs for Childhelp. Have you made any changes and if so, would you describe them?
One of the things I’m doing is delving into processing and making sure everything is as streamlined as possible. We’re focusing a lot on developing our granting opportunities and to do that we have to have significant outcomes. One of the things I really love about working for Fresh Start is that it’s the real McCoy – there’s no smoke and mirrors. We do what we want to do. Were in the middle of developing measures on how we impact women each year, [which] puts us in the position to get better future granting opportunities. It’s my belief we are making an impact in our society and our community from the standpoint that the woman is the person who spends money locally – at the grocery, in stores, etc. –and that in addition, she is a quality employee. With a less aggravated household, she can really be successful.

There is a really high-powered board that sees the progression of our east valley location, which has had a slow programmatic start. They’re very concerned and interested in seeing that our services are there. It has become my priority to make sure we’re out there full-time and have our doors open to certify that anyone can walk in and use our services just as much as they would [at the Women’s Center] in Phoenix. Also, I’ve basically been in a unique position where most of our management team is now new, and that is kind of an exciting place to start. We’re starting altogether, we have a new Vice President who’s taken on our gala and we have a new WRC director who has an extremely strong background.

Fresh Start recently opened Fresh Start Treasures, a resale boutique in Phoenix. How successful was the opening and how successful has the store been so far? How has the opening aided the efforts of the organization?
I almost can’t go over there because I am their biggest customer; I’ve really found some really nice things! We certainly are eager. Our first week open we brought in more money than we anticipated and it is now really starting to grow. As word of mouth gets out there and people experience it, they see it’s a really nice environment, that the clothes are top-notch and that it’s very clean and well put together. Our hopes and anticipation are very high for the resale boutique; we anticipate by next year it’ll be fully self-supporting. It is designed to meet several needs – revenue, job training for our clients. We’re excited to be able to use the center to benefit our clients, too. Some women who may not have worked in years just need to re-acclimate to a working environment and take those skills to other environments. They are able to work there (full-time, with pay) on an official on-the-job training capacity and walk out with a certificate of completion.  Also, here is now a place where we can send our clients to find pieces that they might need for the work environment. The store is really growing now and it’s starting to show that it’s needed in the [east Phoenix] area.

Tell us about the Inspired Leadership class that began in January:
This is one of the most quality series that we have. It’s really an excellent event for the mid-management career woman looking to work up the career path and speak with topic experts without having to travel because the location is so central. SRP sent four individuals last year and they said after four sessions they could see a big difference.

And of course, the Fresh Start 16^th Annual Fashion Gala on February 25: what are your goals for the event regarding attendance, funds raised and speakers? What can attendees expect to see?
The event is known for being the event of the year. We’re very excited about this year’s gala and it will be held at the Biltmore. The major sponsors are Saks Fifth Avenue, Blue Cross Blue Shield and Fresh Start. Joelle Hadley, one of our board members, is MC-ing this year. She’s a leading instructor and she’ll be phenomenal.

This is going to be a very large event; we anticipate having about eight hundred attendees. The attendees are from all walks of life and are all types of individuals from the local area. I can’t stress enough that one thing that I looked for when I was looking for a position was accountability and that the organization is actually doing its mission. So, for individuals coming to the gala and providing the funds to buy a ticket, they can be assured their money is going to very good use this next year by serving our clients.

In addition, Ralph Lauren is providing the Ralph Lauren Spring 2012 series for the runway. We’re really excited! Our founder Pat Petznick flew to New York and was able to meet with him and Oprah Winfrey when Oprah was doing her interview with him. [Afterwards], Pat was invited to speak with them briefly. She made a huge impact on him! After the fashion show, we will move into Club Jewell, named for our facility’s founder, Jewell McFarland-Lewis. That is a very fun after-party with lots of dancing. Fun is part of the evening!

For the entire month of February, you can choose Fresh Start to be your charity of choice.  Every time you shop with your Saks credit card (or open a new account) at the Saks Fifth Avenue store at Biltmore Fashion Park, 5% of your purchases will go back to Fresh Start!  See store for restrictions.

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