Clover Letter’s founders on why Brooklyn is the best for ‘avowed non-office workers’

Casey Lewis and Liza Darwin understand what it is like to be at an impressionable age where you yearn to learn more, yet have no idea where to turn to.
That’s why they started Clover Letter, a newsletter geared towards young girls who want to be in touch with the world. Think: Lena Dunham’s Lenny Letter meets Tavi Gevinson’s Rookie.
Subscribe
Ex-editors of Teen Vogue and Nylon, Lewis and Darwin, both 29, teamed up to produce content that strays away from the internet race by avoiding clickbait headlines. They just launched an app, too.
The daily newsletter is delivered into mailboxes every Monday through Friday at 7 a.m. Eastern time. It starts off with the most important news of the day in bite-sized portions written much like a note to a friend, followed by an empowering essay or thoughtful interview. The newsletter ends with cool people on Instagram that readers may enjoy, at times curated by someone from the Clover Collective, which are essentially Clover’s ambassadors.
With only five full months up their sleeves, they’ve already gotten attention from the New York Times and Jezebel. Revenue currently “relies heavily on ad partnerships,” the founders said, but they’re working on other types of revenue streams.
We got to talk to them about the challenges of starting your own newsletter, their favorite coffee shops in Brooklyn and their love for the G train (hi, haters).

###

Walk us through a typical day in Clover Letter HQ.
A typical day at Clover usually entails working separately in our apartments for the mornings — from when we wake up around 7:30 until around 11:30, when we meet up. We use this time to get caught up on emails, post that day’s newsletter on social media and work on longer features. We try to schedule our interviews (with bands, authors, artists and other cool women) during that time too.
Then, around noon, we’ll meet up in one of our neighborhoods. Casey lives in Greenpoint and Liza’s in Clinton Hill, so we’ll gather at one of our apartments or a coffee shop to work on the next day’s letter (our favorite cafes are Peck’s, Budin, Sweetleaf, Urban Vintage and Brewklyn Grind). That takes a few hours and then we’ll spend the rest of the day brainstorming big-picture things like partnerships, ambassador merch and creative ways to get the word out about Clover. Also, we spend hours — so many hours — answering emails.
What’s the first thing you do every day before doing any tech-related work?
Liza: Coffee, then exercise. Whether it’s going for an early morning swim or just running to the outdoor workout center with my dog, I’ve found it’s best to exercise first thing in the morning. That way I don’t have an excuse for not doing it later.
Casey: Ditto, minus the dog part. But I’m working on that, too.
How often do you check your email, and do you use any program to get to “Inbox Zero”?
We each have multiple email addresses (work, personal, and dedicated Clover addresses) so we’re checking email nonstop. We could probably spend all day refreshing various email inboxes and still have unreads. Liza sometimes ambitiously tries to make it to inbox zero, but that rarely happens. Casey would never attempt such a feat.
What are the challenges you face when handling a daily newsletter?
The biggest challenge is technical, without a doubt. We’re both editors, writers and general internet enthusiasts, so it almost feels like we could do the newsletter itself in our sleep (the reality is that we buy so much iced coffee at various Brooklyn coffee shops we actually never sleep). But dealing with coding, formatting and other stuff that a smart tech person who actually went to school for all of that takes up an impossible amount of time.
When you need to take a break, what do you turn to?
We’ll go on a walk around the block and talk about stuff unrelated to Clover, like whether Taylor Swift is *actually* dating Tom Hiddleston. (Editor’s note: Other TSwift questions abound.) Or we’ll blast music. Or we’ll take Liza’s dog out. When the situation is really dire, we’ll change locations. Sometimes you just need a change of scenery.
What is the best work-related advice you’ve received?
We heard that this thing called work-life balance is important, but we haven’t quite figured out how to make it happen. When we do, though, we’re sure we’ll say that’s the best piece of advice we’ve received.
What’s a specific time-saving tip you have?
It sounds counter-intuitive, but multitasking actually makes things take longer. Rather than switching between a bunch of tasks, we’ve found that it’s easier and more productive to focus on one thing at a time. We’re big on giving ourselves time limits — an hour for emails, an hour for writing and so on.
Why Brooklyn?
We firmly believe there’s no better place to do your own thing than in Brooklyn. There are so many coffee shops (and, if we’re being honest, bars) with plenty of outlets, WiFi and patios. Also, parks! So many parks. Even though we spend the majority of our waking hours together working on our business, we’re always switching up where we’re working from. As avowed non-office people, this is so important to us. The G train gets a lot of hate, but we would be nothing without it. Of course, when you don’t have an office, you’re never late for an office.