La Roxy in Forbes!

I've started writing a column for Forbes about women and negotiation. The first piece, about bargaining for counterfeit purses in a dangerous street market in Naples, is out today!

Learning The Art Of 'Barguing'

Halfway between Naples and the island of Ischia, on a ferry speeding toward the mainland over the choppy Mediterranean, I was in the bathroom looping my thin black bra through my engagement ring. I figured the crevice closest to my heart was the safest place to hide it. If anyone reached for that region he'd have bigger problems to deal with than an attempted robbery. I'd heard too many stories about robberies in that city and had experienced my own share of bad luck on previous trips. I removed my earrings and watch too.

I was heading to a street market in Naples, willing to face those perils to gain access to some of the finest counterfeits in the world: Gucci, Fendi and Louis Vuitton bags, belts and wallets, possibly siphoned off from the local factories and sold at rock-bottom prices to she who knows how to negotiate. Retail started at $80 a purse, and these were vere finte, or "true fakes."

The rest is here: http://www.forbes.com/2010/10/19/negotiation-bargaining-barguing-forbes-woman-leadership-women.html.

The column, titled She Negotiates, is a joint enterprise between four women: Vickie Pynchon and Lisa Gates (who run the She Negotiates seminar I recently took, which dramatically opened my horizons from asking to negotiation), Katie Phillips (a graduate of NYU's theater program who's working on a screenplay in LA) and yours truly. Together we're going to tackle different angles of asking, negotiation and gender from a Boomer and Generation Y perspective.

Of course, you realize what this means.

Forbes doesn't like anonymous columnists.

So it's time to shed the mystery.

Because the era of anonymity is over.

Who is The Daily Asker?

All dirty details, in the next post.