Lola Banjo

Lola Banjo is the founder and Chief Executive of Silver & Riley, an independent global luxury leather goods and accessories brand she founded in 2019. An engineer, strategist and entrepreneur, Banjo brings more than 15 years of experience in corporate strategy, consulting and executive leadership to building the company.

Before becoming a full-time entrepreneur, Banjo held senior leadership roles at Salesforce, including Vice President of Go-to-Market Strategy, where she oversaw strategy for an approximately $7 billion portfolio. Earlier in her career, she worked at Deloitte and Accenture and advised Fortune 500 companies across consumer, retail, technology and other industries. She left Salesforce at the end of 2023 to focus on Silver & Riley full time.

Banjo’s global perspective is central to both her life and her work. She has lived in four countries and traveled to more than 100, drawing inspiration from the cultures, architecture, landscapes and people she encounters around the world. That perspective informs Silver & Riley’s products and storytelling, while her engineering and strategy background shapes her approach to design, customer experience and building an enduring luxury business.

Under Banjo’s leadership, Silver & Riley has grown into a multimillion-dollar business serving customers across 27 countries, with more than 50% of customers purchasing again. The brand’s leather goods are handcrafted in Italy and Spain, and its signature New Yorker handbag has sold out 11 times since its introduction in 2023.

Banjo is also passionate about using entrepreneurship as a vehicle for economic opportunity. Through Silver & Riley’s Buy 1, Give 5 program, the company allocates 5% of revenue to supporting women entrepreneurs. She has an ambitious goal to support 1,000 women entrepreneurs by 2030.

Banjo has shared her experience and perspective at organizations and institutions including Forbes, Goldman Sachs, Columbia Business School, NYU Stern, Chicago Booth, Rice University and Emory University’s Goizueta Business School. Her areas of expertise include entrepreneurship, luxury and consumer brands, customer strategy, brand building, retail, e-commerce, career transitions and building a company while navigating the realities of entrepreneurship.