OylalaKids

With it being mothers day and their not being enough wonderful things to say about my wife, I thought I should bring the story of her own business to life. Last year, we were on a family trip across Europe.  Portland – London – Portugal – London on a combination of visiting family, a vacation, a photoshoot for work and reconnecting with friends.  Whilst in the UK, we had a cute Air BnB in Notting Hill walking distance to some nice parks, some great places for food and the inevitable pub on every corner. One morning, my wife, Mareike woke up and came in whilst I was making the coffee and says “I’ve had a dream about starting a business for kids clothes.  I think I’m going to figure out how to do this”.

Portugal during our European Trip

We had coffee and exchanged ideas and then I headed out to work for the day.  When I came back later that day she had already figured out a name  Oylalakids her new brand, set up the instagram. bought the website domain for, created a logo and had found herself a contact where she could source product.  Remember this is a day when she was also in a tiny Air BnB and looking after two kids of 4 & 1.  They don’t give much time to focus on things like this.  The next day when I came back she had started out building a shopify site for herself.  With no experience in building a commerce site, let alone a website itself.  

I was so blown away and inspired by her motivation and how she came up with everything within a week and just went out and created it for herself.  Soon after we got back to Portland we received the first batch of products and then the next months every Saturday and Sunday she would work on the site, work on the social media side of things, building ads.  Then came launch day and she put it out into the world and the response was phenominal.  It was so good to see so many people posting about it, supporting her and providing positive feedback for her endeavor.

Of course after launching, the next step was probably the most exciting and nervewracking.  Waiting for that first order.  Its all well and good having an Instagram account, a website but getting people to commit to buying something from you is next level.  Within a couple of days, after anxiously waiting we had that first “cha ching” from shopify!  Its working!  Seeing that and then the momentum building has been so rewarding to watch Mareike build her own business from scratch.  She has found a whole new community of people supporting each other with their own respective businesses and I think she has found so much gratification in seeing what she can achieve on her own.

Its easy to look for a job but to create your own is something to behold.  To take the risk.  To put your own point of view out there.  It takes guts, it takes believe and commitment.  The thing which has surprised me the most is how much focus she has which as a parent is always an issue.  When she is working on Oylala, she has a singular focus that I can only dream of.

The other thing that I’ve been amazed by is the quality of what you can achieve through shopify.  The level of data they have made accessible to every person with an internet connection for such a small fee blows my mind.  The ability to be able to retarget people, to partner up with facebook for ads to find that specific niche you have has given everyone with a specific interest or a niche a target market to address. I can see how its revolutionized small direct to consumer businesses and given everyone a platform.

 So 6 months deep into this, Mareike is as passionate as ever, has sold her line to people around the whole world and learnt more than either of us ever thought possible in terms of building her own business.  Whilst she has been doing all that, I have been getting more and more inspired every single day.  Watching her focus, seeing her creativity and her get up and go attitude has given me that added inspirational boost every single day.

 She does all this while looking after the kids, me, our house and all with a smile on her face. Thank you Mareike, Thank you Mom.

Go give her a follow and check out the amazing clothes she is constantly coming out with.

Lilly enjoying the perks of mum having her own brand.