PK TURNS ONE TODAY!
ONE YEAR! WOW - One year! Happy Birthday Potty Kit!!
One year ago I launched my first Kickstarter Campaign in the hopes of gaining insight into if Potty Kit was a viable product or not. The short of it? It seemed as though yes, there was enough interest! Though my first sales came from the Kickstarter campaign in November 2022, the idea for Potty Kit came to me TWO entire years before the Kickstarter campaign.
In the fall of 2020, starting to come out of the Covid bubble as a new family of four (with my nearly 2 and a half year old, and my 6 week old), we ventured out into the world to an art studio. My older daughter loves art, so it seemed like a great first activity for our family to do together. She was potty training pretty well at home at the time, and this would also be my first time out of the house during those early potty training weeks. After we settled into our art projects, she sure enough turned to me and said she needed to go potty. I took her to the restroom and quickly realized that I was completely unprepared for the experience. But I needed to act fast to avoid an accident! So I started layering toilet paper for her on the toilet, held her on the toilet and had to bend down so that both she and I could balance! I kept telling her “ew ew don’t touch anything!” Maybe in the height of Covid but also being in a public restroom, it all just felt dirty! Ew. So gross.
The end story? She went potty, we avoided an accident. That part was a success. But the stress of it! As soon as I got home, I started searching online for items that might make our outings and public restroom experiences easier, cleaner, and better. But all I could find were a mishmash of items, not an all in one combination of the things you needed the most. So the wheels started turning…
Fast forward about a month, I had put together my own impropmtu “kit” for when we were on family outings; a foldable toilet seat, toilet seat covers, sticky notes to cover the toilet sensor and cleaning materials. On one particular outing, we all went into a family restroom and I started setting up my “kit” for my daughter, when my husband saw me unpack all these items and said “you need all that?” To which I replied “well how else are you going to take her potty?” And he looked at me and told me that I was right. He just didn’t know he “needed” those items until he saw them! And maybe I could make “kits” like these for other parents who needed some help in public restrooms with their kids.
And voila, a concept was born! I spent the next couple of years researching, prototyping, connecting with manufacturers, entrepreneurs, and anyone in the business of starting their own business to teach myself as much as I could about this before officially launching last November.
My main takeaways through this experience?
1. You have something to learn from everyone! Each person and each experience is a learning opportunity. I would take notes (and still do!) from each and every meeting with a new businessowner.
2. You are your own biggest advocate, and you need to be. If you don’t believe in your product or business, how can you expect anyone else to? I learned this lesson from a friend of mine, who put it to me quite bluntly, and she was right. I used to walk around saying “I’m not a salesperson…” but you know what, when you start your own business, you need to be.
3. Moms and parents are amazing entrepreneurs! We know what solutions we need to make our lives easier as parents, and we are the first to create the solutions for them!
4. As a mom, you can’t have it all. But you can have the things that matter the most to you. Starting my own business gave me a new purpose and direction which I was so craving after having two kids. My girls know that when I work, I work on “Potty Kit” and that my goals are to help other families by making their lives easier!
5. Gratitude is everything. Rome wasn’t built in a day, and it takes time and patience building a business. But I am grateful every step of the way and would not have been able to do any of this without the support of my husband, my family, and my wonderful friends.
Thank you everyone so much for your support! My mission has been to empower parents through the craziness that is “The Potty Training Journey” and provide a bit of comfort and ease in Public Restrooms with Potty Kit! I can’t believe it’s been a year… cheers to many more!
Love to you all, xx
Inbar