Savannah James and her longtime friend and business partner April McDaniel are launching a company called Signed that will house their growing portfolio of women-focused businesses and media ventures.
Signed will act as a holding company for the creative agency Crown+Conquer (founded by McDaniel in 2016), the membership-based women’s community Let It Break (founded in 2024), and the pair’s podcast Everybody’s Crazy, which also began in 2024. The founders—James is the wife of LeBron James—have hired Christopher Gray as chief creative officer, bringing in his extensive experience at both Nike and Wieden+Kennedy London.
The new company is launched in partnership with MarcyPen Capital Partners, a private equity and venture capital firm cofounded by Jay-Z. Its goal is to use these three founding companies as a core for new brands under the Signed umbrella.
McDaniel says that the idea for the new company came from her and James, seeing how these three existing brands were so similar in their purpose to celebrate and grow female-owned businesses.
“Once we really homed in on the purpose, it made us realize that we were sitting on something way bigger than we even imagined,” says McDaniel. “Then it was about finding the best use of our superpowers and where we needed support and visionaries to help us scale to the next level.”
That support is now there through their partnership with MarcyPen, and bringing in talent like Gray. “I’ve always been a champion of experts,” says James. “There’s always somebody that’s smarter. There’s always somebody who’s more efficient. So if I can place those people around us, that’s what we’re going to do.”
Creative, media, community
The most compelling part of this new company is how it will already have a lineup that many larger, more established firms are aiming to build. The combination of creative agency (Crown+Conquer), media IP and distribution (Everybody’s Crazy), and community (Let It Break) is the hat trick every modern marketer is trying to build in some way, shape or form.
Take Fanatics, which launched Fanatics Studios earlier this year to tie into its collectibles, retail, and gaming empire. Or Alex Cooper’s Unwell, which launched a creative agency to complement its podcast network.
It’s not difficult to imagine Crown+Conquer—which created a campaign for Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) earlier this year—working with a major brand to partner with the Everybody’s Crazy podcast on an event and workshop hosted by Let It Break.
James says she’s excited about how Signed gives them the ability to grow these brands with intention, with partnerships and experiences that reflect their values. She and McDaniel recently took over Everybody’s Crazy themselves, after their deal with Dear Media expired, to have full control over what brands they work with.
“When we were leaving Dear Media, we got a pretty substantial offer to go in-house somewhere, but we bet on ourselves,” says McDaniel. “We’re building our own studio, and we’re really building the opportunity to own the narrative. We don’t want to be on our podcast selling everything under the kitchen sink.”
The name of the new company—Signed—comes from the idea that James and McDaniel back whatever the company does.
“It’s so important for us because we know that the consumer is watching,” says McDaniel. “We’re aware that we are trusted in what we say and what we cosign. And there is a level of responsibility that comes with utilizing your voice. So Signed is coming with that responsibility, that reputation, and also the possibility of doing what you love can really work out in the end. And that is, for me, a beautiful thing because many businesses do not come from that place.”
