2024 Receipts
What if I’m not feeling reflective?
According to Substack, I published 65 newsletters in 2024. This, my final newsletter of the year, will be 66. I don’t even want to know how many words I put down on paper, but those of you who regularly read this newsletter know it’s a lot. Your girl doesn’t usually struggle to find something to say.
And yet today, I am. Perhaps I was overambitious in thinking I would publish right up until the end of the year, squeezing in one more newsletter amid the holiday madness. Usually, I love to be reflective and nostalgic, but this year I just feel an urge to keep moving forward. I’m not sure how I feel about 2024. I worked hard; saw some big wins; missed out on some big goals I set for myself; celebrated one year of self-employment, eight years of motherhood, 15 years of marriage, and 44 years of living. It wasn’t my favorite year, but it also wasn’t the worst. Perhaps that’s why I’m not feeling particularly introspective.
But in order to move forward, it is important to consider what worked and what didn’t in the past 12 months. So with that in mind, here are the 2024 highlights. It was a year!
January 2024
Started the month with 900 free subscribers
The highlights
I hit the ground running in the new year.
I moved The Purse to Substack!
I launched Home Economics!
Substack featured the first Home Economics in Substack Reads. It felt a bit like going viral, though the numbers are nothing like what I used to see at Refinery29 or CNBC. As a result, I got more than 3,000 new (free) subscribers from the single newsletter.
I launched Division of Labor by asking Ken to participate in sharing a day in our lives in Brooklyn.
I wrapped up January, and my time at the CUNY Entrepreneurial Journalism Creators Program, with the publication of my manifesto about the state of women’s media and my plans for The Purse. It was scary to put out into the world, but a year later, I stand by every word.
February 2024
Started the month with 4,338 free subscribers
The highlights
I launched In Her Purse by featuring the lovely
!
I wrote about Dave Ramsey shaming a couple who are spending $80,000 on childcare. This was one of my favorite posts of 2024.
I started taking financial planning classes at NYU. A year later, it still feels strange to be back at school! But in the last 12 months, I finished three classes, and I’m so proud of myself for not quitting, especially after the tax class nearly killed me.
March 2024
Started the month with 5,604 free subscribers
The highlights
I wrote about salary transparency and how complicated it can be to talk about money. And without much fanfare (a paragraph at the end of a very long essay), I announced I was turning on paid subscriptions. While I had many friends who had “pledged” their support before I turned on paid, the initial post earned me just three new paid subscribers, which felt very anticlimactic.
April 2024
Started the month with 6,316 free subscribers and 39 paid subscribers
The highlights
I know I shouldn’t play favorites with Home Economics, but I absolutely loved April’s edition featuring a divorced 63-year-old freelance writer who lives in Colorado and has only $50,000 in retirement savings. The writer was just so open and honest about her experience, and the comment section was so vibrant. These are exactly the kinds of stories I want to tell on The Purse, and I will be forever grateful to the author for sharing her story.
I also wrote a very heartfelt newsletter asking readers to upgrade to paid. It was terrifying! I remember hitting send and then leaving the house to do an errand just so I wouldn’t sit at my desk and hit refresh on my email to see if people were reading and upgrading. The response was incredible: I got 91 new paid subscribers, and what’s more, I heard from so many people that it inspired them to speak up for themselves.
May 2024
Started the month with 6,657 free subscribers and 155 paid subscribers
The highlights
Just as I try not to play favorites with Home Ec, I feel a bit guilty having a favorite Division of Labor. Still, I cannot deny my love for May’s edition featuring my friend
and her husband, Warren Margolies. Perhaps it’s because I’ve known Rebecca since our Girl Scout days, or maybe it’s because she and Warren were so frank about their true division of labor, but I think this is one of the most interesting editions of DoL.
I also wrote about how much I love being a mom in a widely shared newsletter that was one of the most popular of 2024. More than 100 people left comments sharing their own motherhood experiences, and reading them made me feel so happy.
June 2024
Started the month with 7,204 free subscribers and 179 paid subscribers
The highlights
June marked one year of The Purse, and I didn’t shy away from talking about the good and the bad of entrepreneurship in my anniversary newsletter. Boy, I did not expect people to be so excited about this post where I was so open about jealousy and loneliness and my financial situation. The newsletter earned me more than 200 new free subscribers and 41 new paid subs. More than 100 people left comments, and only a few of them told me to suck it up. 🙃
I also launched the first paid edition of Home Economics featuring a very cool family in Kansas City, MO, who are focused on achieving financial independence but doing it on their own terms.
On June 20 (yes, I had to check my calendar!), I had coffee with
. It was supposed to be a catchup and coworking day—we had rescheduled this meetup three times (working mom schedules, LOL)—but it turned into something else entirely as we started brainstorming what The Purse would look like if she joined the team. Definitely a 2024 highlight!The last week of June, Substack included The Purse as a featured publication, and as a result, I got more than 1,000 new free subscribers in a week. Nuts!
July 2024
Started the month with 7,976 free subscribers and 271 paid
The highlights
I wrote about the cost of friendship, which included interviews with
and , whose newsletter is one of my favorites.
In early August,
of included the Cost of Friendship newsletter in her Substack Reads roundup!
August 2024
Started the month with 9,466 free subscribers and 271 paid
The highlights
Erika and I officially announced our partnership in a special edition of In Her Purse!
I felt like this month’s paid Home Economics was the most underread of the year. It featured a couple in Texas who are insurance adjusters and live full-time in their RV as they travel the state for their jobs. The author is such a wonderful storyteller, and I love all the details she shared about their experience paying off $30,000 in debt.
August was also notable because The Purse crossed the 10,000 free subscriber mark!
September 2024
Started the month with 10,168 free subscribers and 334 paid
The highlights
I kicked off the month with a guest post from
about the mental load of feeding our families.
And then Katherine and I announced our fundraising campaign for North Carolina Democrats. Together we raised more than $7,000! (I lost a lot of free and paid subscribers as a result, but I regret nothing!)
I launched the first monthly roundup newsletter, September Receipts, where I shared a bit more about life running The Purse.
October 2024
Started the month with 10,595 subscribers and 337 paid subscribers
The highlights
October is always one of my favorite months of the year because it feels like a month when you can really get shit done. And I really did get shit done! We did everything this month!
I wrote about kids and money and all the weird questions my son asks me that I don’t have answers to. (TBH, I’m still not over the commenter who scolded me for taking my kid to McDonald’s and Target!)
I mixed things up in Division of Labor and featured my friend Anna Davies, who’s a single mom by choice. Raising a child looks very different when you don’t have a partner. Anna showed readers just how important it is to have a village.
We also hosted our first event, in partnership with Astor. Gathering more than 60 women in a cute Brooklyn bar for an evening of intimate conversations about life and money was definitely one of my top 10 moments of 2024!
And to end the month, I wrote about how Instagram has broken my brain and it feels like everyone but me is taking $10,000 vacations. I loved getting a chance to interview
for this piece. She offered some good advice on how to plan amazing vacations without breaking the bank or falling victim to social media trends.
November 2024
Started the month with 11,105 free subscribers and 422 paid
The highlights
This was definitely a difficult month, and I’m still not sure how I woke up on November 6 and found the wherewithal to write an essay about my disappointment in the presidential election results. Two months later, I still feel sad but determined.
An antidote to fear and sadness is to lean into community, and I was so grateful that Argent hosted Purse readers for a lovely evening at the Soho store. It was so special to meet so many of you in person, and I can’t wait for more Purse events in the new year.
I wrote a very personal essay about aging and beauty and the siren call of spending thousands on cosmeceuticals. I had such interesting interviews with
, Jessica Cruel (Elle), and for this piece.
I loved collaborating with
and her newsletter for a Home Ec featuring a laid-off communications professional in the Midwest. I think Melanie is building one of the smartest and most essential communities out there!
December 2024
Started the month with 11,852 subscribers and 474 paid
The highlights
It was fun to tap so many amazing writers to share how they’re infusing more joy into their holiday season. My favorite part of joining Substack this year is all the friends I’ve made.
I loved hearing from Keris Fox and Michelle Teheux for the final edition of In Her Purse.
And I thought the paid Home Economics was another sleeper hit. I have such a soft spot for this young woman who’s prioritizing saving without missing out on having fun in L.A.
What was your favorite Purse read of 2024? Truly, I’m dying to know!
And that’s it. That brings us to the end of 2024. I need a nap!
But first, there are a few people I want to thank for their help this year. First and foremost, Ken, who reads every word of these newsletters and has been endlessly supportive of this creative and entrepreneurial endeavor. It’s no joke to say there would be no Purse without him. (Well, maybe there would be, but there would be so many more typos and errant commas!)
I’m so grateful and excited to get to work with Erika, and I cannot wait for all the fun and amazing things we’re going to do in 2025. She’s a dream partner, and I have no doubt we’ll go far as a team.
This was the first year The Purse had sponsors, and their support for this newsletter means so much! A big thank you to Ellevest, Winne, Argent, Astor, and Fruitful.
I’m so lucky to have found an amazing community of writers on Substack, and it’s impossible to mention everyone here. Still, I want to shout out
, , , , , , Michelle Texheux, , , and —thank you for all your support, creativity, and inspiration! (Also, I highly recommend subscribing to their newsletters!)Off Substack, I’m lucky to have so many friends who are supportive of The Purse and frequently share their time and expertise (or just generally cheerlead when I’m having a rough go): Jacob Lewis, Dennis Cohen, Issy Stinnette, Meg D’Incecco, Priya Malani, Nicole Bestard, Heather Boneparth, Chris Daly, Jean Smart, Dan Oshinsky, Alison Morris, Jennifer Prestigiacomo, and Alicia Adamczyk—just to name a few! And of course, my parents, who are huge Purse supporters and put up with me oversharing every week on the Internet.
But the biggest thanks goes to you wonderful readers. I feel like I gained 11,000 friends this year! Thank you for reading, sharing, leaving comments, and sending me emails. You’re the very best!
I’ll be back next Tuesday—new year, new publishing day!—to share a preview of what’s coming up in 2025. Needless to say, I’m very excited!
Thanks for the great roundup! I started reading The Purse later in the year (I think probably due to a Michelle Teheux rec?) so I really appreciated the catch-up here!
I used to read a TON of Money Diaries, and this is way better! I’m hoping to submit my Purse diary in 2025 🤞🏻(writing it down to hold myself accountable). This is such a valuable space for women/femmes, and I am glad to take part in it. Thank you!
Congratulations on an amazing year! I loved this recap format ❤️