Bethenny Frankel started at the bottom.
The reality-TV star and entrepreneur revealed she was paid a measly $7,250 for the entire first season of “The Real Housewives of New York” in 2008.
“I shouldn’t have been taken seriously in the beginning; I had no value,” Frankel, 47, told InStyle about her finances. “Or I didn’t know the value I would have yet. I was a person that Bravo was hiring for $7,250 for the entire first season of [‘Real Housewives’].”
Despite the low-ball offer from Bravo, Frankel managed to get the better end of the deal by adding a very special clause to her contract.
“But I knew what I wanted, which was to keep anything that I did in business,” she explained. “If you go on a reality show, you have to give a percentage [of any business you promote on the show] to the network — but I never did that. The industry ended up calling it ‘The Bethenny Clause.'”
Frankel, who created and then sold Skinnygirl Cocktails for a reported $100 million, said the clause became used throughout the industry, causing much destruction.
Elsewhere in the open interview about money, Frankel shared her one financial regret. No, she didn’t splurge on an unnecessary car or fancy house, but rather it all had to do with paperwork.
“My biggest money mistake was not checking the right box on a contract about whether my company was an LLC or an S Corp,” she said.
Frankel, who has her fingers in many different businesses, said the mistake affected her bottom line.
“It cost me millions of dollars when I sold,” she said. “But that’s just a mistake. [It’s important to have] the right business managers and accountants and all that type of stuff.”