Jenn and her husband had always dreamed of starting a business. Originally, Jenn was just keeping some Maya Wraps on hand to sell to anyone who showed an interest in the one she used. They expanded their product line to cloth diapers and began meeting customers in local coffee shops or through online forums. Eventually, they opened a website, and created their own diaper insert and pocket diaper line. Now, they have built a well-respected business which continues to grow because of their creativity and love of their work.

How many children do you have and what are their ages? Please tell us something about each child.
I have two children. Andrew is almost four and was our inspiration for Cotton Babies. We cloth diapered him from birth in prefolds and diaper covers that a friend had very generously given us. Andrew is a ball of energy and would spend all day pretending with his trains if he could!

Oscar, our second child, was born last summer. He is a generally happy little dude. At eight months old, he just likes to do anything his brother is doing.

What is a funny or rewarding experience you've had as a mommy?
The funniest thing I think we’ve had happen with Andrew happened when we were selling our house last year... One day, an agent called and said that she would be there in twenty minutes. We rushed around to get things picked up. In the middle of all that, the phone rang with a customer wanting to place an order.

During that call, someone walked in my kitchen and asked, “Where’s Andrew?”. He’d just been playing in the living room so I walked through the house calling his name. I found him in the master bathroom with a permanent marker that we’d been using to mark boxes. The toilet lid was covered with practice A’s. The actual toilet seat had been turned into a fantastic O. The floor had been decorated with squiggles, Os and Ts. He outlined the pink 50s tile too… in the grout... I was big pregnant with Oscar and emotional and, well, all I could do was stand in the door and laugh/cry while I frantically tried to remember what removes permanent marker...

Rubbing alcohol did the job on the hard surface and scouring powder got most of the marker out of the grout. Ten minutes later, the evidence of the Andrew’s artwork was tough to find. I wish now that I’d stopped to take a picture before cleaning up the mess.

Are you married? What is your husband's name? How did you meet him? Was it love at first sight?
I am married to Jimmy, my best friend and the love of my life. We met at work where we both worked on building and maintaining internet applications. We have continued to work together in some capacity ever since. Jimmy and I are both very entrepreneurially minded. Cotton Babies grew out of a mutual desire to not work in a cubicle.

What did you think you'd be when you grew up?
I wanted to be a nurse and a missionary!

Would your classmates be surprised by who you are now?
You know, my friends might not be surprised at all. I grew up in Montana with my parents and three younger brothers. I was homeschooled through high school and raised in a conservative, natural-living family. My mom cloth diapered three of us. Homeschooling was still very counter-cultural ten years ago. So, we spent lots of time with families who lived interesting and ecclectic lifestyles...

Who were you before Cotton Babies, any interesting jobs or schooling?
Before Cotton Babies, I was a programmer! I did website architecture, interface, graphics, database design, server administration, along with a significant amount of programming...

How did you get started cloth diapering?
We got started cloth diapering because, when Andrew was born, we didn’t have the money to buy diapers. Our parents paid for a diaper service to cover the first three months. Then a very good friend gave us her stash of prefolds and diaper covers. We used prefolds and diaper covers exclusively for a long, long time.

We started Cotton Babies when Andrew was two months old, but initially we just sold baby carriers. As the business grew, we added other product lines and I started trying a few more things myself. Pocket diapers quickly became my favorite and, as we approached potty training age, we gradually switched more of our stash to pockets...

What inspired you to create your business?
Cotton Babies was opened after a trip to Chicago. I was wearing a Maya Wrap and had lots of moms stopping me on Michigan Avenue asking about where I bought my sling. Back then, the initial order for new Maya Wrap distributors was fairly small, so it wasn’t too difficult to get set up. A few weeks later, I started taking new Maya Wraps with me when I left home. This meant that I always had sling with me if someone was interested. We quickly realized that many of the moms who were looking for slings were also into cloth diapering. So, we began adding cloth diapering products to our inventory. We have always treated the business as a “closed system”… any profits were reinvested into more product. So, we grew very slowly, literally one item at a time.

Did you run into any obstacles in starting it?
Our biggest obstacle has been the commitment to avoid business debt. We have millions of ideas and want to do them all ‘right now’, but we have to be patient. While this has slowed our growth somewhat, it also means our foundation is very firm.

What did your family say when you told them you were going to be an entrepreneur?
We’ve talked about having our own business for a long time. We had tried several other ideas that all flopped. So, family was a little skeptical, especially when we told them that we were selling slings and cloth diapers. But really, we didn’t head into Cotton Babies planning to run a big business. Cotton Babies grew out of selling a few slings here, some shoes there and a few diapers somewhere else. For a long time, I was meeting customers at a Starbucks down the road from where we lived! We continued to grow through a few local sales, some internet forums, then the website happened. A year later I was shipping a few packages a day. Three years later we’ve grown out of our basement and into a shipping center with a retail store next door.

How did you start sewing your own diapers?
Making our own inserts was just a business decision. Our supplier was out of stock and we needed something to sell to our customers!

...In keeping with the saying, “necessity is the mother of invention”, all of our products have been designed out of a need for something different. The Cotton Babies One-Size Microfiber Insert happened one night when I was sewing some inserts up for a customer. I had a snap press in the laundry room and late one night, totally on a whim, I added a snap to the insert to try making it shorter. I still remember walking out of the laundry room, showing Jimmy the insert and asking him what he thought! He loved it and we were off and running. We both thought it made sense to design a diaper to work with our insert. The demands of a growing business and having another baby meant that it took some time for that dream to become reality. When it did though, bumGenius! was born.

What's your favorite product from another WAHM/WAHD?
The things I love were all designed by WAHMs, but they aren’t WAHMs anymore because they designed a great product and their business grew. If I had to pick one thing, I’d have to go back to the roots of Cotton Babies and say that my Maya Wrap sling, designed by Susan Gmeiner, is by far, my favorite product that I own.

If you could do any kind of work you wanted, other than the business you now have, what would you be doing?
I don’t think I could ever go back to the workplace.

If you have time for hobbies, or outside interests, what are they?
My hobby is the creative and business gymnastics behind Cotton Babies. I really, really enjoy what I do. It is strategic, challenging and just plain FUN. In my free time though, I love to read. I love to go for walks with Jimmy and our boys. I like to drink coffee with my friends. I like to enjoy the sun. I like to just sit and watch the traffic outside our house in the evenings. Pretty boring, huh? :)

Who, living or dead, real or fictional, would you like to have lunch with and what would you discuss?
I’d love to meet Oprah. We’d probably talk about how wonderful cloth diapers are and how she should really feature them on her show.

What is your favorite dessert?
Triple chocolate cake, a recipe we acquired from Jimmy’s grandmother. (A box of chocolate cake mix, mixed with one large box of cooked chocolate pudding, chocolate chips and chocolate icing). A piece of this cake paired with a good cup of real Kona coffee, is my ultimate favorite dessert.

What place would you love to travel to?
Growing up in Montana meant that I spent a lot of time exposed to the mountains. The air is clean. People are generally polite and everybody drives real trucks. I really miss western Montana and treasure every opportunity I have to go home and see my family.

What one thing have you always wanted to try/do/learn, but have not had the time or resources to do?
...I would absolutely love to learn to paint with watercolors. If I could paint, our walls would be well decorated instead of blank!

What's something that no one would ever guess about you?
I have twelve years of classical piano training and played a concerto with a local orchestra a few years back.

Anything else you think would be fun for others to know about you?
My husband is a cyclist and, before we had Andrew, he convinced me to do a 500 mile bike ride across Missouri in six days. And, yes, I did it! :)

http://www.cottonbabies.com
Products Include: bumGenius! one-size pocket diapers; Cotton Babies one-size microfiber inserts; Cotton Babies diapering accessories (doublers, wipes, liners); Hemp Babies; and Juji Bags.