Iris Apfel says young women must grab opportunity

Fashion icon and interior decorator Iris Apfel, at age 95, has some advice for young female entrepreneurs: When opportunity presents itself, take it and run with it.

“Taking opportunity and running is very important, because I never had a business plan in my life. Things just came along and I grabbed them,” Apfel said Friday at the Women’s Entrepreneurship Day conference at the United Nations.

According to organizers, Women’s Entrepreneurship Day (WED) is a day celebrated in 144 countries on Nov. 19. It’s also the name of an organization that seeks to eliminate poverty by empowering, celebrating and supporting women in business worldwide.

WED also announced that it is launching a portal ChooseWomen.org on Nov. 30 that will allow consumers to shop with retailers who support women-owned businesses.

“I’m glad to see all these glass ceilings are being smashed and I know I feel that if women were a little more forceful and stuck to it there wouldn’t be so much of this feeling,” Apfel said. “I know when I started, the dinosaurs were roaming the Earth, I’m 95 and I’ve been working my whole life. It wasn’t easy but if you really want to do it, you can do it.”