Toni Lee Jimenez

Upon graduating from Loyola Marymount University, Toni Jimenez has proven her dedication to changing the world around her to help not only her own Latin community and Latina sisters, but those outside of it as well. At the young age of 23, Toni started her first business: ChicaGirl Magazine. Founded in 2007, ChicaGirl was the first digital magazine of its kind. Moreover, in traditional Toni Jimenez fashion, the entire operation was dedicated to women empowerment and philanthropy. Toni and the ChicaGirl team raised over $300,000 in scholarships dedicated to helping girls receive a college education. Toni’s current business is Chica Beauty, which she co-founded with her sister, Mei-Lon. 

The two started Chica Beauty with ChicaGirl’s mission in mind; creating a beauty brand with a mission to empower girls to be confident in their most authentic selves and giving back fiscally to the community with their Chica Gives program, which partners with nonprofits like Girls Inc. and donates to them with every purchase made from Chica Beauty! Not to mention the Chica Beauty team, who come from different countries, were raised with different cultures and background, are proud of their different ethnicities, and bring knowledge from different generations starting as young as current high school students and ranging all the way to Toni and Mei-Lon’s grandmother, who inspired many aspects of the brand and acted as an honest critic to the brand and its products. 

The inclusivity of Chica Beauty means a lot to Toni as a founder. It is important to her that her businesses represent a demographic often overlooked, especially in the beauty industry. The way she sees it, being a Latina founder alone can create a positive impact for younger generations to see that their potential to own and create a business is tangible…therefore creating an inclusive environment and showing the importance of diversity. Toni has volunteered her time speaking at over 300 middle schools and various other speaking engagements to show girls and women that they too can do it. She remembers feeling overwhelmingly happy when schools would invite her, saying that they would like their students to see that someone “like them” was able to make a difference and be successful. It is Toni’s mission to lead by example and show the world that being a minority is a strength, and that the most important aspect of business-ownership is ensuring that your business reflects your values in all of its many facets, through and through. 

Toni says about her and her sister founding Chica Beauty: “As Women we are also stepping up and creating awareness that women-owned businesses can be successful as leaders whose mission is about empowering and giving back to our community while providing quality products to our consumers. As women and sisters entering the beauty industry we are also creating a new sense of environment that is inclusive. We are breaking the mold by providing new possibilities for our team and customers. We encourage all women to feel beautiful in their own skin and that in it of itself is creating inclusion and bringing women together. We want women to feel confident and beautiful in their own skin and create a community where diversity is welcomed with open arms.”