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Issue: September/October 2010

Entrepreneur's Toolkit: Hey, Baby!


Having kids inspired Suzie Gorski to create Zeebabee Designs’ burp cloths and baby products that stimulate infant development.
Suzie Gorski spent a lot of time with her infant sons propped on her shoulder after a feeding or as they slept. It gave her time to think and create.

A designer and otherwise industrious mom, Gorski figured there might be a business in those moments. So after deciding to stay home and care for her children full time in 2006, she launched Zeebabee Designs and a line of graphic burp cloths, totes and T-shirts designed to stimulate babies.
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What skills are missing to complete the picture? Suzie Gorski’s company sells fabric goods, but she’s no seamstress. “I found someone who could sew and keep up with our demand,” she says. A retired seamstress produces all of Zeebabee’s Burp See cloths.

Is there a learning curve to your sale? Gorski learned that point-of-sale marketing was necessary to help consumers understand what differentiates her products.

Who do you know? Gorski connected with other mompreneurs through a networking group spearheaded by Mommy Millionaire author Kim Lavine.

What can you really accomplish in a day’s work? Gorski realizes that running herself into the ground will sap her energy to excel at both of her jobs: mom and entrepreneur. Come 10 p.m., she enjoys some time in front of the TV with a bowl of popcorn. “That time is the one thing I have that keeps me sane,” she relates.

Essentially, Gorski brought a creative angle to an existing concept: Babies like to look at black and white shapes, so why not roll out whimsical burp cloths and mommy shirts that trigger infant development with style?

“I didn’t invent anything new,” says Gorski, who spends days chasing after two boys, 3 and 6, making sales calls to boutiques and other prospects (Nordstrom is her goal), and assembling burp cloths in an extra-bedroom-turned-office in her Avon home. “I took a concept I thought many parents know — and found out that
a lot of parents don’t know — that infants are visually stimulated by black and white.”

Education is a big part of Gorski’s sales pitch to boutiques, such as The Littlest Details in Avon. Twelve other specialty shops across the country and eight online stores also carry her products. The burp cloths sell for $20 for two. Totes start at $54.

To show customers that her products are pretty and productive, she rolled out point-of-sale materials for burp-cloth displays that explain her design philosophy.

“People aren’t always detail-oriented,” Gorski says. A description on product tags wasn’t enough. The benefits had to be more visible.

Stores that put up her black-framed signs describing the benefits (“Research proves high contrast graphics improve baby’s early recognition”) sold a lot more burp cloths. Now every store has the display signage.
Another challenge: fulfilling demand for the products. “I don’t sew,” Gorski admits. But she partnered with a retired commercial seamstress who produces about 200 Burp See cloths per month.

“At first, the designs were my own, but it costs a lot of money to have your artwork put on [cloth],” Gorski explains. She now uses preprinted textiles for the burp cloths, though her Baby See T-shirt is an original screen-printed design.

She learned that cutting costs this way allowed her to still deliver quality products and that customers were buying because of the concept, not because the designs were handmade.

Assembly and shipping happen at home. Gorski packages finished burp cloths — usually while her children play at her feet — and steals time to return e-mails, make phone calls and develop the business during nap time.

She admits that striking a work-life balance is tricky business. “What do I do first: clean the kitchen or work?” she says. A baby-sitter buys her time to work some days. A dedicated office and creative space gives her a work zone.

Meanwhile, relying on a network of supportive mompreneurs has helped focus her marketing efforts and set goals for her home business. After reading Mommy Millionaire, Gorski connected with author Kim Lavine and her online network. “They were so supportive,” Gorski says, recognizing a need for some oomph from the outside. Now she has a website, marketing collateral and a plan to penetrate the California market, where the bulk of
her Internet sales originate.

For Gorski, business growth is one day — one hour — at a time. Last December, she began pitching to boutiques, and already The Littlest Details has reordered three times. Gorski is motivated by these step-by-step wins.

A benefit she never figured into Zeebabee’s plan is the positive example she’s setting for her sons, who are starting to realize that mom runs a business from home. “Mom, are you like, the leader of Zeebabee?” her oldest, Matthew, asked one day.

“He’s starting to put it all together,” Gorski says proudly. 
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