Madhavi and Mridula help mums kick off their entrepreneurial journey
Looking after a toddler is a full time occupation. And one that is difficult to juggle with the responsibilities at the work place. There are many times when a working woman would want to stay back home to look after her sick child but wouldn’t be able to do so because of commitments at work.
Likewise, there are times when pressures at work would demand her attention.
Perhaps nobody else but a working mother would best be able to understand this situation. Small wonder then that Madhavi Patil and Mridula Arora decided that it was high time to strike a balance and come up with some innovative ideas. This is their story.
Madhavi Patil from Mumbai started MomzBizz, a dedicated portal for mothers to bring their business
online. Launched this year, quite appropriately on Mother’s Day, Madhavi co-founded the company with Prachi Patankar.Her long stint of 13 years in the IT sector was enough to pass on to her the nuances of corporate success and she decided to ride high on her learning.
“It was easy to relate to mums itching to start something on their own along with raising kids. I myself took a sabbatical after the birth of my son 3.4 years ago and realized soon after that there was an imminent need to startup, and yes, work on getting something creative in place,” says Madhavi.
Word spread about the website soon after and Madhavi took to the social networking site to invite fellow mums to join the online platform.
It was a marketplace model that she adopted where there was no need for mothers to step out of their homes. “This model ensures that mums are informed about the order and they need to get it ready within the comforts of their home while attending to their kids. Our logistical partners pick up the order and deliver it to the concerned buyer,” says Madhavi .
From party supplies to jewellery, home and living to bags and educational toys, everything is up for grabs at the Momzbizz portal.
This platform mostly has women entrepreneurs with children in the 2-5 age group , who are based out of Mumbai, Delhi, Gujarat and Ahmedabad. Soon, Madhavi intends to start incorporating NGOs working with women too into their fold and market the innovative products made by them.
Mridula Arora’s rationale behind starting MyBabyCart was slightly different. “There are so many baby products in the market, but several products of need always seem to be in short supply in the regular
market. Add to that the exorbitant prices even when they are available. I somehow believe that mothers have that special touch which can make any product they design exclusive,” says Mridula.Mridula has been an IT professional for the last 12 years and is aware that most women who took a break from work to raise kids needed that push to bring out their latent creativity. Thus was born MyBabyCart in 2012.
“Soon I realized that helping mums with resources is another area which needs to be addressed. A lot of handholding is required to get them on board,” says Mridula. So the next two years were largely spent on doing that till in 2014, they launched MyBabyCart in its present avatar .
At MyBabyCart, the products are rather innovative – from party accessories to props and personalized return gifts made by mums, to home and furnishing to decorate the kids room.
