Up and Coming: Miriam Brafman interviews

Introducing Miriam Brafman. This whole interview came about through the wonders of Facebook, after Miriam added me months ago and told me she had been a fan of my work with Devlounge. I always had it planned that if I ever launched another design or development related site, I’d return the favor with an interview because she had her own site. At just 17, Miriam already has her own successful project and bigger plans in store for it in the future.

Q: Hey Miriam, how’s it going? Thanks a bunch for joining me today and being up for an interview. Could you take a minute to introduce yourself to the audience?

I’m a web and graphic designer from Silicon Valley. I’m the founder of a social shopping site, rasba.com and I also do freelance design work.

Q: How and what got you get started in the web design and development field?

I got really interested in the whole “web 2.0″ space in 2007, at first I thought I wanted to be on the business side of things, but then this past year, by chance I was thrown into my schools web design class. I had already started working on Rasba, and after Learning Photoshop, CSS, and Dreamweaver the entire hands on approach to the sites look and feel got me totally hooked and became my most handy skill in my startup process.

Q: Give us some information behind Rasba - what exactly is it, where’d the idea come from, and how long it took to build and launch.

The idea for Rasba came during the summer of 2007 when I was still very interested in launching my own startup. I wanted to launch a sort of ecommerce site, and the idea evolved from there. I thought of brands that use Myspace to promote their products and connect with customers, and wanted to take that to the next level and came up with the rasba concept, which is basically a social shopping marketplace where brands/designers can create easy customizable storefronts while connecting social with our users. Users can then add products they like or have bought on rasba to a profile page where they can earn a commission if someone buys through their page. Our goal is to make it easy to discover the hippest brands and earn a little reward too.It took my developer and I about 6 months to launch the product, but that launch was definitely rushed. The design was amateur, the flow was out of whack, and we launched to the wrong audience.

Q: You’re only 17. Ever find it difficult to be taken “serious” because of your age?

Somewhat, I’m slightly embarrassed about my age and I’m sure plenty of retailers have been hesitant to sell stuff on my site for that reason, but I see it as more of a blessing than a curse. I’ve gotten more attention and connections as a result of my young age.

Q: On the same topic of age, a common misconception is that if your a designer or developer you don’t have “much of a life”. This is especially true the younger you are because many times friends don’t understand how you’re in the field your in. Has this effected you at all? Are you friends understanding and supporting of your role in the web world and do you find time to do other things “offline”?

So far rasba has had no effect on my social life. I still go out every weekend and hangout with my friends. I haven’t even really told a lot of my friends about my startup but most of them know that i do “web design” and “internet stuff” but don’t actually understand that it’s a legit business so they don’t really care.

Q: What are your plans for after graduation? Anything in particular yet you want to focus on in college (if you are going) or in the real world? Can we expect any other projects besides Rasba (and what else is to come for Rasba?)

I hope to go to design school after high school, probably to study graphic design and hopefully in NYC. I believe that design skills are essential to running a business because it gives you a completely fresh perspective on how to create a business. As for rasba, we are planning to launch a new design/new version very soon. We are definitely still in the process of launching and tweaking the site to get it just right. In the future I hope to do more web/ecommerce projects and other non web ventures.

Thanks to Miriam for taking some time out of her summer vacation to answer some questions!