Ainul Aishah, an actress, an entrepreneur and content creator is here on #AdeleChowPodcast to talk about how she started her business, Ainul Cookies & Coffee and how she deals with hate comments as a public figure.
Adele: Hi Ainul.
Ainul: Hi, my name is Ainul Aishah, I’m an actress and also an entrepreneur. I have a cafe at Tropicana Gardens Mall PJ. It’s Ainul’s Cookies & Coffee, I’m married, I’m 38 years old this year.
Adele: You don’t look like that at all, yeah, I’m just very curious, you know, to kickstart your business journey like why do you choose cookies?
Ainul: I didn’t choose cookies, it just came out accidentally. I started the business back in 2013 so back then, I think I started to learn cooking back in 2011, 2012 and there was YouTube so that’s how I learned to cook and to bake so there is one time, I started to bake some cookies and I gave it to all my friends, it was just for fun actually but they started to have bazaars, my friend saw one of my posts so she asked me, can you put some of the cookies on my table? I joined one bazaar and she had like cupcakes and some other desserts but she needs more. So I’m just helping out for her to fill in the table. People start asking me for more, they said like oh, my mom wants this, she really likes it and then my friend wants it too so suddenly, people started to order from me and I was thinking I’m not going to bake cookies like every day, it’s crazy that time but my friends keeps on pushing me, they force me to do my own Instagram, which is Ainul’s Cookie & Coffee so I didn’t want to do it but in the end they created for me.
Adele: How long have you been you know in the entertainment industry like actress and like that kind of stuff?
Ainul: I started acting when I was 20.
Adele: I would say your journey is more like you were acting and then after that you chose to pivot and like fully focus on the business.
Ainul: Yeah but the transition was quite confusing and a bit a struggle for me because I’ve been doing acting for so long and I have all my networks and my producers and artists, my fellow actresses. When I was at my early 20s, I really enjoyed acting but I discovered myself more as you grow older. That’s normal, right?
Adele: I’m sure that journey wasn’t like super smooth sailing, maybe let’s start with the transition right when you transition into F&B, what were the struggles that you face? And obviously you overcame it, how did you overcame them?
Ainul: I think is what pays my bills and I don’t come from a rich family, just average so I don’t have like parents funding to help me to grow the business so when I’m already comfortable having money from my acting, especially when I don’t know much about financing, it was a bit hard for me because I have to learn from scratch and I learned all by myself. When my partner came, which is my husband now that’s when it becomes clearer and better because he was the one who was there to focus and to help me one by one, we have like a partnership and also a mentor many many many things about finance for me. I just know how to do sales, I know how to bake, I know how to do the branding and all that but financial wise I need help.
Adele: Speaking of that, you are obviously now also a content creator, influencer with a following, what is the most common like hate comments if you have any, like not so nice comment that people say about you? What do you have to say and how do you feel about this thing?
Ainul: When I started acting right, so you know, public figure, always the one who get affected first. We’re always the one like people can just point fingers at you and say you’re wrong, you’re this and that so I actually experienced it when I was at such a young age which was 20 years old and 20 something lah basically. It got to me like I was hurt, I took everything and I absorbed all the words which is funny back then because I shouldn’t be doing that. So over the years, I learned about loving yourself and nowadays I see that everyone is pretty much a celebrity or influencer and they have their own followings as you can see haters are everywhere.
Adele: People can comment behind screens because there is no price to pay.
Ainul: We cannot stop them. Right now, if I got hate comments I would just like ignore like literally ignore, it doesn’t get to me at all like it’s kind of funny just to read and sometimes just laugh it off. It’s the same thing like people will just point fingers on your flaws like people always say about your skin tone, your small boobs whatever like the words that can kill me you know like something that they have but I don’t have.
Adele: The key point here is not about just being beautiful but it’s also being confident and really think that the naysayers and haters they just want to do whatever it takes to bring your confidence down, they just want to do what it takes to crush you in a negative way right.
Ainul: Focus on what we want to achieve rather than you know be sad or emo.
Adele: I can see how much you love and appreciate your husband like he does the paperwork right, the numbers so last year you got married so what was your first impression of Khalid when you first like met him?
Ainul: Khalid is a kind and soft hearted guy. He is very responsible guy and he cares for his family and friends and he’s very persistent and consistent as well in showing his love to everyone. I’ve met many guys who are very unkind, I think he’s the only one who is very kind and very persistent to show that he really wants to be with me and he always helped me going through tough times and women can be so emotional so when I started to give up on the relationship, he never give up
Adele: How long have you guys been together?
Ainul: Five years together and we couldn’t plan the wedding because I really want like a nice wedding, not a grand wedding but just a nice wedding but just my friends and family come lah.
Adele: I think like in your life, who is the strongest person you know that inspired you to become who you are today?
Ainul: In this social media world right, it is based on many people that I vet through that I feel that they’re very inspiring to me. They have their own stories. So I don’t actually have one particular person in mind but I do take all the good things, the inspiration from all the successful people around the world.
Adele: Yeah, it’s okay, if there’s one thing that you can share with everybody listening to this today like what would that one advice be?
Ainul: Be true to yourself, stay humble, and don’t take people’s money because if you take people’s money and you’re in debt, you’ll always be in trouble and you won’t get to live in a peace of mind. If you want to be successful at being, this is one of the advice that my husband sent to me, he told me that manage your stress better, the more stress you can handle, the more successful you will become.
Adele: I really love that, the more problems you can solve, the more stress you can handle, the more successful you will become. Our mental capacity and physical capacity and emotional capacity, it’s a growing tank. Of course when I’m younger my tank is probably just this cup right? And when I’m older, my tank become this. One day, my tank can just grow and grow and grow and I’m not saying that I’m asking you to torture yourself, no, that’s not what I mean. It’s just having the ability to enlarge your tank and to be able to handle unexpected situations.
Ainul: I’m still trying to handle my stress every day. I’m still learning, I’m still trying to process everything so that’s why my husband sent it to me to make sure that I identified my problems. So actually, I need to know how to maintain and handle my stress, my emotion and all. When we first started to open the cafe, it was like a roller coaster to me, I never went through this experience, I am learning after one year, I become more stable compared to last year. Last year was like crazy. You cannot say all the good things all the time right?
Adele: Yeah yeah.
Ainul: Admit your strengths and weaknesses because I have my weaknesses as well.
Adele: One of the things people always say is that oh, you’re the boss, you make all the money you know but the truth is actually I don’t have to be a boss to make all the money you know, I like I can work in an MLM company and be a salesperson, I can make the same if not more. The fulfilment level is different, I guess that’s what all entrepreneurs want to change something a part of your life. Everything in life, there is a price to pay and it’s the power of choice and decision that we make.
Ainul: And we humans, we always make mistakes and sometimes we didn’t realise that we make the wrong choices but that is life.
Adele: Thank you so much Ainul. For all of you if you like this podcast, be sure to share it with someone and follow Aishah and we’ll see you guys in the next one, bye!
Ainul: Okay, bye, thank you Adele.
