Burch closed her speech with what she described as one of the best pieces of advice she ever received — from her own parents. Throughout her entrepreneurial journey, she faced constant negativity: people told her not to open a retail store, not to mention social responsibility in the same sentence as business, and not to launch with multiple categories or e-commerce. Rather than being discouraged, Burch treated each piece of negative advice as fuel for determination. She founded the Tory Burch Foundation in 2009 to support women entrepreneurs, partnered with Goldman Sachs and Babson to create educational programs for women without formal business training, and launched Elizabeth Street Capital to provide low-cost financing. Ten years after her company's founding, she told graduates that in many ways she felt like she was just beginning — a testament to the power of tuning out the noise and staying committed to a vision.