This week, we have Donna Hunnewell joining us as our Mompreneur. She runs a charity calledThe Wish Project, which helps moms like you and me with basic needs. This is the first charity that we´ve featured here on At Home Mom and I hope you are all inspired by this woman´s giving heart.
1. What is your business?
It is an Internet-based charity goods bank (similar to a regional food bank but we bring home and baby goods to more than 105 charities in the region for cost efficiency). Since all referrals, confirmations and weekly E-newsletters are done online, we are considered as an online-based charity. Members of our financial team live in four different towns so we rely heavily on the Internet to communicate.
2. How did you get started?
I left high tech when I got pregnant at 35 and finally had time for charity work. After a year of volunteering with many agencies (the time when my first child was born), I ended up on the City of Lowell’s Hunger/Homeless Commission which I am now chairperson of. I was a new mom when I started this and the only way I could run a charity was on the Internet so the online version of QuickBooks was great! I can do invoices at midnight and our book keeper and chief financial officer always have the latest updates on what I am doing without having lots of meetings.
A bird’s eye view of all the homeless shelters and pantries each month showed me a hole in the system that I could fix. We needed a big free warehouse where 500+ caseworkers could come to get home goods, furniture, baby gear, backpacks, toiletries, and diapers — everything their clients needed. By adding a new layer of support to the entire social service system, we help them work much more efficiently. Now they can all focus on helping clients instead of spending half of their time securing basic goods like cribs for babies.
3 . What mistakes did you make when you were starting out? What did you learn from them?
I used a cell phone, got a minivan and jumped right in to help, with my babies in the back. I sold my own stuff on eBay to fund our first year. If I had just taken my business plan to some bankers, I might not have needed to chase funding so hard these three years. As a woman and mom, people saw me as a zealous mom and had no idea that the business would grow so big and so fast. We now help 23,000 clients annually in our third year and have a 13,000 sq ft warehouse with eight staff.
Originally, we started out using Excel for book keeping which only got us one year’s of entries in. The first time somebody sorted improperly, our records were garbled and we had to re-enter everything. That was when we moved to using QuickBooks Online.
4. How long have you been working from home? (was this your first business or have you had others where you worked from home?)
All my adult life, I have worked from home one way or another. Firt, as a remote sales rep then later as a corporate trainer at medical and engineering companies. I did spend five years traveling and giving trainings. As a result, I am very familiar with doing expenses and budgets weekly remotely. That is why I love the QuickBooks Online software.
5. What are your tricks for balancing work, kids and household chores?
My husband and I married late in life so we are both used to doing it all. We both really appreciate anything that the other has time to do. We both made serious career choices to be there for our kids. Our kids come first - jobs second (except for a few cases of really big speaking engagements or awards that I had to attend).
The fact that QuickBooks lets me work late at night on the grants, budgets and other financial information - when the kids are in bed suits me fine. And, with the financial software, we hold fewer meetings. Most of the time, we will settle a financial related question over a phone conference where we are all log in. That really helps when our board members and our volunteer staff hate meetings.
I am okay with the fact that I will not be the most organized mom. Last night, my son had a cub scout cake baking exercise. I got the award for most inappropriate cake because it was like a big Lego and had plastic toys on top (non edible). My son though that was fantastic! I have the time to have fun with my kids and they have my odd sense of humor.
6. How many children do you have? How old are they?
I have two children. My girl is five years old and my boy is seven, and they are at kindergarten and 1st grade respectively. This is the first year that both are in school all day. I built a $300,000/year charity while changing diapers etc. over the last seven years.
7. When do you usually work?
Much of my time is spent on the computer at night. I work 80 hours a week but always rely on multi-tasking. My cell phone is my lifeline; caseworkers, clients and the chairman of the board are used to talking to me while I’m grocery shopping, driving, and handling doctor’s appointments (I draw the line at OB). I work frequently on the laptop while cooking and waiting for the kids to get off the bus.
8. What is the best part of being a mompreneur? And the worst?
The only downside is not having health insurance. That is a killer. We spend $20,000 a year out of our net pay to have health insurance. Other than that I love my life. The Internet has helped in making the business a reality. I would not have been able to start this charity if I can’t sell things on eBay, exchange emails with caseworkers at night and handle the financial work on the PC. With kids, you just can’t get much done on the phone.
9. What are your plans for the future of your business?
We are working on a strategic plan using Business Plan Pro software. That plan is critical to us in order to launch a capital campaign to raise money to own our own building someday. The high rent for the 13,000 sq ft warehouse is a budget breaker. With any luck, we hope to download our financials from QuickBooks into that to get it done fast.
Charity founders have a lifecycle of about three years. By the fifth year, the board wants you to go away. So I am thinking that my next career may be in politics (behind the scenes) or I may start a new school system based on ‘ethics’ that will work better than our current public school system.
10. What advice would you give new work at home moms?
Work smarter, not harder at what you love. Find something only you can do really well. The pay and benefits may be awful but use this time to really love what you are doing with your life. Do not ever think that having a kid means you do not exist. Not at all! Throw in an art class, a writing class… build your spirituality; whatever will give you more balance in life. During the first weeks of being a new mom, when I felt like I had lost myself in diapers and really missed my expense account - I would do daddy maintenance. Just grab your purse and leave the kid with your husband or relative. Dads can learn to build their own confidence in parenting and everybody wins! I have seen too many moms investing everything into their kids with no sense of perspective.
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