Top 50 Mompreneurs, 2011
They cook, they clean and, between naptimes, they run kickass companies. For those who run their own mom-centric firms, the responsibilities of motherhood are only half the battle. Babble is running our first ever salute to the top 50 mompreneurs who pull all-nighters, suffer enormous financial set-backs, and balance business and baby every day to make their entrepreneurial dreams come true. Here's how they did it.
- Christina Couch
1 / 50
1
Julie Aigner-Clark | Baby Einstein
Julie’s Rankings
bright idea
Company: Baby Einstein
Location: Denver, Colorado
Children: Two daughters, 16 and 13 • Age: 44
Inspiration: Aigner-Clark, a high school English and art teacher, came up with her multi-million dollar idea back in 1997, thanks to one big purple dinosaur. “Back then, people were only showing their children Barney all the time,” Aigner-Clark says. “I wanted to expose my daughter to the things that I loved.”
Perspiration: To give babies a dose of culture, Aigner-Clark invested $15,000 of her own money into creating a “video picture book” by recording images of colors and shapes and pairing them with music and poetry soundtracks. She and her husband shot the video in their basement and spent most of their money on music, editing and packaging. Aigner-Clark met a buyer at a trade show in New York, and Baby Einstein became an instant success. “It just flew off shelves,” Aigner-Clark says. “We produced the second video, which was Baby Mozart, and within 3 years we had signed a publishing agreement with Disney to produce books to go with the video. By our fifth year, we had $20 million in sales.”
While Aigner-Clark sidestepped many of the first-year woes mompreneurs face with getting their companies noticed, she says her greatest challenge was being married to her business partner. “When you run a company that’s growing like that, it gets in your house. It gets in every part of your life,” she says. “We would be sitting at dinner, trying to have a decent meal, and my husband’s pissed at me because I don’t like his idea, and I’m pissed at him because he doesn’t like the way I edited a video.” Aigner-Clark and her husband needed to establish communication boundaries, compromise and desperately try to separate work from home life to avoid domestic disaster. “It’s still a little tricky, but it’s much better now,” Aigner-Clark says.
Success: In 2001, Aigner-Clark sold Baby Einstein to the Walt Disney Corporation for over $20 million. Since the sale, Aigner-Clark has survived breast cancer twice, written a children’s book on the subject called You Are the Best Medicine and currently maintains an active consulting role with Baby Einstein.
These women are amazing. Period.
In need of inspiration — check out how these ladies mix it all up.
What an even bigger inspiration to be a part of these great Mompreneurs!
The Carissa Rose clothing line is awesome, machine washable at that.
Why Mompreneurs? There’s no such thing as a dadpreneur? Why the special designation for women?
I have been reading a lot off late to grasp more knowledge on this topic, but after reading your article I realized there is a lot more than I read and you are the only one who could make this happen. You are the only one from whom I could get the entire information on the topic. Thanks!!! You are fantastic
http://www.samrx.com
these moms make me jealous! i wish i had the energy and motivation to start a company while raising my kids! Kudos to all of them!!
I look forward to reading about all of these women!
hmmm…..interesting…
Amazing women!
and bagrging about a 30% approval rating???absolutly PATHETICabsolutly PATHETICremember clinton left with a 75% approval ratigread it and weep cons projecting once morebububbububub 30% bububububub 30%absolutly sadBush is back!! 30%
Following from a blog hop! I’m a new foollwer and would love for you to check out my blog and follow back!