NEW YORK, Feb. 28, 2013 /PRNewswire/ -- Soledad O'Brien, CNN "Starting Point" anchor, was a special guest at the launch of VITAMIN W Media, LLC, a New York-based women's media company delivering "smart Kardashian-free content" that honored O'Brien's foundation with a gift for struggling young women.

O'Brien joined a list of 70 prestigious headliners that included award-winning journalists, investors, and philanthropists at the private Norwood Club on Wednesday, February 27. VITAMIN W's $2,000 donation to the Soledad O'Brien and Brad Raymond Foundation will advance the Foundation's mission of supporting hardworking young women in their educational pursuits.

A women-owned social media enterprise, VITAMIN W is dedicated to creating and curating high quality news for women.  VITAMIN W's editorial also covers women's philanthropy and causes, and profiles women leaders and entrepreneurs. As part of its business model, VITAMIN W directs a portion of its revenue to women-focused nonprofits.

VITAMIN W was founded in 2011 by Amy-Willard Cross, a seasoned editor troubled by a scarcity of women's voices in journalism, citing the statistics that men write 81 percent of all news articles and less than 20 percent of them are focused on women-specific content, according to Global Media Monitoring Project. 

"When I first started there were mommy blogs and feminist blogs and nothing in between," reflected Cross.  "Women are in the midst of a kind of Renaissance. They're starting their own companies, they're crowdfunding their own projects, they're starting nonprofits to fix what they see as the world's problems in large numbers.  There wasn't a vehicle to tell these stories. It was time to create one."

Cross saw that advertising wasn't working either:  women dictate 80 percent of consumer household spending but 91 percent of women feel marketers are not speaking to them. Beginning in 2013, VITAMIN W will run a series of campaigns in partnership with corporations interested in reaching women in new and positive ways.

VITAMIN W targets professional women readers between 25-55 who are actively engaged in social causes.

Founder, Editor Amy-Willard Cross is a magazine editor with 20 years of experience. In her 20s, she developed and founded Living Fit, the first lifestyle magazine for 40-plus women and has also founded the online opinion website Women Make News.

For more information about VITAMIN W, please visit www.vitaminw.co or contact Andrea Rudert, Director of Marketing and Partnership Development at andrea@vitaminw.co, +1-347-746-4208.

SOURCE VITAMIN W Media, LLC