Meghan Markle has been busy juggling multiple roles from podcast host to investor since stepping back from her royal role alongside her husband, Prince Harry, in March 2020.
One year later, the Duke and Duchess of Sussex officially confirmed that they would no longer be senior working royals, which also meant they would no longer keep their patronages (their royal involvement with numerous U.K. charities).
Since then, Meghan and Harry moved to their home in Santa Barbara, California, where they are raising their two children, Archie and Lilibet. The couple have also worked on a number of business ventures to support themselves after they were “cut off” financially from Harry’s family, as he explained during a 2021 interview with Oprah Winfrey.
In addition to working on their nonprofit organization, the Archewell Foundation, Meghan and Harry have inked deals with major companies like Netflix and Spotify.
In March 2024, Meghan announced her newest venture: a lifestyle brand called American Riviera Orchard, which will offer a variety of products from cookbooks to tableware. It also marked her first return to social media since 2020, when the couple made their last update to their @SussexRoyal Instagram page.
The brand is reminiscent of Meghan’s previous lifestyle blog, The Tig, which she shuttered in 2017. The Suits alum started The Tig (named after Italian wine Tignanello) in 2014 and used the platform to write about her favorite food and travel adventures, as well as personal musings.
“After close to three beautiful years on this adventure with you, it’s time to say goodbye to The Tig,” she wrote on the site upon its shuttering. “What began as a passion project (my little engine that could) evolved into an amazing community of inspiration, support, fun and frivolity.”
From starting her own podcast to launching a lifestyle brand, here’s a look at all of Meghan Markle’s business ventures since she stepped away from her royal role.
Harry and Meghan’s nonprofit, the Archewell Foundation
At the same time as they announced they were stepping away from royal duties in March 2020, Harry and Meghan also spearheaded their nonprofit organization, the Archewell Foundation.
“Before SussexRoyal came the idea of ‘arche’ — the Greek word meaning ‘source of action,’ ” they shared in a statement at the time of how the name came to be. “We connected to this concept for the charitable organization we hoped to build one day, and it became the inspiration for our son’s name.”
Six months after the initial announcement, they created a website for the foundation. The couple have since used their nonprofit to raise money for various charities; in 2021, they raised about $13 million and gave approximately $3 million in grants, with plans to distribute the rest of the money in years to come, per their Impact Report.
Throughout 2021 and 2022, the organization also provided millions of COVID-19 vaccines and served over 50,000 meals. Archewell also works with various efforts throughout the year, including a celebration of Black History Month in February 2024. In March 2024, Harry and Meghan personally presented the winner of the NAACP – Archewell Foundation Digital Civil Rights Award with the prize at the SXSW Conference in Austin, Texas.
Since then, the two have became close confidantes, with Markle regularly attending Williams’ tennis matches, and Williams defending her friend from the mountain of negative attention she’s received since 2017.
After Markle’s bombshell interview with Oprah Winfrey, Williams took to Instagram to call her friend “truly noble.”
During the first episode of Markle’s podcast, she called Williams “my girl,” and discussed Williams’ career, her decision to step away from tennis, and shared a harrowing story about her royal tour in South Africa.
