The copy below was originally printed in the Jacksonville Business Journal on July 16, 2010.

By Dolly Penland

They say necessity is the mother of invention. In Jennifer Marko’s case, it spawned an Internet search. Marko was the owner of a public relations firm when she had a baby in 2006. She took only two weeks’ maternity leave.

“I had an image of myself working at my desk as usual and the baby quietly sleeping in the bassinet behind me,” said Marko, president of Marko Holdings, DBA Bottle Snugglers. However, “Max, my son, would not stay in the bassinet at all. So, I only had one hand to work with. And when he had to eat, I had a bottle in one hand and a baby in the other. Feeding time would last 20 minutes. So up to four times a day I was unproductive. I would find myself so stressed.”

Thinking she couldn’t be the only one with this problem, Marko searched online for a product to help. She found three. “Only one worked and it was a Bottle Tender,” Marko said. “It was like magic. I could hold the baby and it would hold the bottle, and I could still finish the report I was doing or send an e-mail. That lightened my stress level immensely.”

Marko later tried to place another order, but she kept getting a “sold out” message. “I finally called the owners and said, ‘What’s happening? I love the product and want to buy another.’ They said they both had other jobs and were busy. It was a mom and dad who created and patented the product, but never optimized it and never advertised. [My husband and I] made an offer to buy it,” for $100,000.

In 2008, Marko transitioned out of PR while planning the new company, renamed Bottle Snugglers. Entirely self-financed, the business officially opened in January 2009. “In January of 2009, you couldn’t get a loan,” she said. “We just believed in it and knew there was a niche in the market, so we put our own dollars behind it.”

Although Marko said it is worth it, she was initially surprised to learn about the different costs associated with operating a goods-based business versus the service-based business she had successfully run. They included costs associated with design and engineering, safety certifications, industry trade shows and insurance.

“We spent $25,000 in the first year in legal fees alone,” she said.

Bottle Snugglers are sold on the company’s website and in baby boutiques.

“A lot of people come in looking for them and a lot of people register for them,” said Kacey Roache, owner of the baby boutique lulu. “They are just a cute, practical gift.”

People bought 1,000 Bottle Snugglers in 2009 and more than 650 so far this year. Marko is now trying to get them into big-box retail stores.

“The previous owners sold several thousand over five or six years,” Marko said. “We sold 50 percent more in 2009 than they sold in their best year ever because we changed it to make it more marketable.”

To help get her business going, Marko sought advice from another business owner in the industry who not only shared his insights into the retail industry, but also introduced her to a local importer. “I owned a business, my husband owns a business, but the retail industry and particularly baby retail is very different from PR,” Marko said. “There are so many things you can’t know until you come across a problem.”

She also joined one of the Jacksonville Women’s Business Center’s business advisory councils. The councils are made up of small groups of women business owners with similar annual gross revenue who share their experiences, advice and best practices.

“Each of the women is really the sum of her own experiences, and all that comes to the table for the benefit of the other members,” said Linda Nottingham, a council facilitator. “We deal with any challenges or problems or issues that one business owner is facing and it can be anything. It can be as simple as what kind of gift to buy a client to something as complicated as dealing with employees.”

Marko said she enjoys learning from others and is happy to share her experience as well.

“It’s OK to ask for help,” she said. “I think it shows strength, not weakness, when you ask for help. Everything is not common sense. I have never had anyone turn me down when I asked for advice or a meeting to pick their brain, and in return I have never turned anyone down. If I learned a lesson, I will pass that on to you and we’ll both move forward.”

Read more: Stress gave birth to a new business – Jacksonville Business Journal

Every relative, no matter how far away they live, wants to see the new baby, right? So when you decide to take the leap into traveling long distance with baby, there’s a lot of planning to do (not to mention shopping, organizing, packing…whew!)

There are a few really ingenious web-based businesses that have popped up lately which will help tremendously when you have baby in one arm, luggage over the shoulder, Bottle Snuggler is holding the bottle and boarding passes are in the free hand. Now, if you forget something at home, you can have it delivered to your destination with the click of a mouse.

Speaking of forgetting things, www.seejanefly.com has downloadable checklists to help even the most frazzled Mommy keep it all together. I love check lists. They make my life work. Seriously.

Definitely visit www.jetsetbabies.com. They are a national service which will ship all of your baby supplies to your destination in a tidy little package. You just go to the website, click on what you want to buy (or rent), and your goodies will be there when you arrive. No more lugging everything through the airport or packing the car like the Clampett clan. I say take the help where you can get it!

I always take enough food, snacks, games, books, meds and wipes as I can comfortably fit in my carry-on, just in case of a delay or lost luggage. If we’re car traveling, we pack a cooler so that we don’t have to stop at a grocery store when we arrive (and we don’t have spoiled dairy in the fridge when we return.) And sometimes, though my husband doesn’t know it, I pack only my son’s bath supplies in a travel-sized bottle, and we all share. It’s just for a few days, and it’s easier than taking separate supplies for everyone. :)

I would love to hear your suggestions and tricks for traveling with baby. Heaven knows we can all use a good time- and sanity-saving tip these days.

As parents, we do our best to keep our babies’ environments safe and clear of the things that we know can hurt them. We use non-toxic chemicals to clean our house (our tile floors now get mopped with vinegar and water, and our counters get wiped with alcohol and water!), and we buy organic food when possible.

It seems like we learn every day of some new danger that’s lurking around the corner. Today, I saw a mention of Bisphenol A, or BPA, so it’s on my mind. (As a seller of a baby bottle holder, bottles are on my mind a lot, actually.) BPA is a chemical that is used to make hard plastic products, like cups, food storage containers and baby bottles. In the past couple of years, we have been notified that BPA is very toxic to humans, and babies seem to be especially susceptible to harm. In my research, even low doses of exposure to BPA can contribute to several different cancers, impaired immune function, early onset of puberty, obesity, diabetes and hyperactivity, to name only a few.

Now to find out that this toxic chemical is in our babies’ bottles is horrifying. My son is now 4, and we didn’t know of BPA then, so I am pretty positive his bottles were affected. That is unsettling, to say the least. Many of the more established  bottle companies have started lines of BPA-Free bottles, and several newer bottle companies have popped up lately offering BPA-free bottles and accessories.

A few notable bottles that do not contain BPA are: Green to Grow, Adiri, Born Free, Thinkbaby, Medela and MAM by Sassy. If I buy bottles for baby shower gifts from now on, I will likely select from one of these new alternatives. Of course, glass bottles are naturally BPA-free, and they are a great choice. And remember to never microwave a plastic bottle, even if it is BPA-Free.

Just walk into a big box baby store now, and there are HUGE WALLS FULL of nothing but bottles! It’s overwhelming to a newbie, I know. So if you have a little experience, pass on the knowledge to a friend who is newly pregnant. She has many other things to stress about! 

Thanks for supporting the Bottle Snugglers blog. Let me know how we can help you!

I have said before that my son is a first class picky eater. He hates everything that isn’t sweet, mushy or drizzled with honey. In my mission to get more green veggies into his little body, I have discovered a little trick that I’m really proud of: adding spinach to his juice!

We have a juicer, and I use it every day. Max, my four-year-old, likes to operate it. (It’s very safe!) So I cut up the apples for him, and he pushes them through and watches the juice drip into his cup. One day, I decided to put a few spinach leaves in the juicer before he loaded the first apple slice. And guess what? He didn’t even notice! He kept saying how delicious his green juice was. Mark one in the Win column for Mommy.

Now, he actually puts the spinach into the juicer himself, and he’s so proud. We have also used kale, and it was just as undetectable. It’s a small victory, but at least I know he’s getting some green juice into his diet every day. I have used other green leafy veggies, too, like beet tops and swiss chard, and they hardly have any taste when added to apple or carrot juice. 

We still try to get him to actually EAT the green vegetables, but in the mean time, I am thrilled when I see him enjoying his green juice drink in the afternoon. Let me know if you decide to try this and how it works!

This post strays a little from the norm here, I know, but indulge me. :)

I recently wrote a column for Small Business Advantage Magazine here in Jacksonville, Florida about making your product stand out from the competition. It’s got some great tips for small business owners (like me), and I wanted to post it here, along with the link.  Hope it helps!

Hi again from sunny Florida!

We know that our customers love Bottle Snugglers because we get constant emails and calls saying so. (Thank you all!) But did you know that there are many celebrities who have Bottle Snugglers, too? It’s true.  There are SO MANY celebs who own Bottle Snugglers, but we aren’t allowed to mention their names unless they’ve sent us a thank you note. Bummer, I know!

But here are a few of our favorites who were kind enough to drop a line of thanks for their new “third hand” Bottle Snugglers. My dream is to see a picture of a star eating lunch at a cafe with a friend and holding her baby while Baby happily takes a bottle from his Bottle Snuggler.  Ahhh. Until then, these simple thank you’s will have to do!

Christina Milian
Sarah Chalke
Sarah Jane Morris
Lisa Loeb
Rebecca Gayheart and Eric Dane
Shannon Miller (Olympic Gold Medalist)
Neal McDonough
Ashley Jensen

It’s so nice to receive a thank you from those who appreciate a great product! So, if you’re a Bottle Snugglers client, know that you’re in good company. And keep an eye out in People Magazine. We definitely will be!

Have a great weekend! Xoxo

We have the best of intentions when it comes to baby proofing, don’t we?

When my husband and I were decorating our home WAY before we were thinking of getting pregnant, we bought a beautiful cream-colored sofa. Not the best choice for new parents, but we weren’t that forward thinking back then.  Not only was it cream, but it was some special material that couldn’t be scotch-guarded, so we had to promise never to stain it.  Three years later, along came baby, and we were breaking out the Oxi-Clean daily with fingers crossed.

When Max began crawling, we called a local baby proofing company. For a flat rate, they locked up our cabinets, toilets, ovens, dish washer, electrical outlets – you name it, and now it not takes two or three steps to use all of these items!  We put padding on every sharp corner, moved breakables to higher shelves, and switched to all natural cleaning supplies (which were in the newly locked cabinets). It’s amazing just how many changes there are to make when a little one becomes mobile.

Of course, now that Max will be four in a couple of weeks, he knows how to open all of the child-proof locks. That’s just funny to me. The problem now is that in order to take off all those gadgets, we will have to repair all of our cabinets in some way (fill in the holes, sand, stain, etc.), so we are in flux between how annoying it is to need both hands to open a drawer and spending the time and effort to reverse the process. The saga continues in the Marko household…

In surfing for tips on this topic, I did find several sites, which I will pass on here. I hope you have a smooth transition to babyproofing. If nothing else, it will be an enlightening experience!

http://www.savvydaddy.com/content/site/survival-guide/00240/how-baby-proof-your-house

When you’re pregnant or thinking about taking the leap, you start voraciously researching anything baby- or pregnancy-related. Magazines, newspaper articles, anything online…everyone has something to add to the discussion.

I have a few go-to sites when looking for information on baby care, and a new site was launched this year that looks pretty exciting. It is www.pregnancycorner.com, and there you’ll find info on all stages of pregnancy, as well as products that you may find helpful. And, they’ve got an advisory board of impressive professionals to draw from.

I love to pass on these kinds of finds! Hope you find all the information that you are looking for. If you need more info, check out our Resources link for several other great sites.  Happy Early Mother’s Day to all!

In March 2010, Bottle Snugglers was honored to receive the PTPA Media Award!

That stands for Parent Tested-Parent Approved, and this concept is very important to us. It’s one thing to buy an ad and brag about your product, but it’s a whole different shebang to have anonymous Moms use your product in their homes and then vote for you! You can visit the PTPA site by clicking on the link below. Incidentally, you will find MANY other great reviews and awards on that page, too.

http://www.bottlesnugglers.com/news-reviews.php

We are very proud to have this distinction, and we look forward to another great year!

Oh potty training – how I loathed thee. The persuading, begging, demanding, hoping, bribing and crying (by me, mostly) were more than I bargained for. And the length of time that it took to be fully finished with the process was definitely a shocker.

Truth be told, if my son’s preschool hadn’t imposed a deadline by which all of his classmates had to be officially using the potty, we may STILL be in diapers! We went into the process knowing that Max has done mostly everything a little late: walking, talking, eating on his own, etc. So we started the arduous process of potty training around his 3rd birthday, and it was a good 8 weeks of struggle.

Sure, we tried the “fool proof” methods that our friends swore by, like promising a small treat when he did used the potty; sitting him on the potty 30 minutes after a meal and camping out there until he accidentally went; even sitting for an hour or more on the bathroom floor reading stories and singing songs hoping that he would relax and let it flow. Of course, the minute we took him off the potty, he went into his room and “went” in his diaper. Ugh.

What finally worked for us was doing nothing. He just decided that he wanted to use the potty like Daddy, and so he started. Seriously. I’m sure we gave him a good foundation by all of the above strategies (plus a cute potty seat, sticker sets and a DVD of Elmo Goes to the Potty), but ultimately he was in charge. It’s the old adage of “You can lead a toddler to the toilet, but you can’t make him go.” We took all the advice we were offered, and he just took his time.

And speaking of the 2 months of agony that we endured, I discovered a website/book by a woman named Lora Jensen called “3 Day Potty Training.” It has gotten coverage in many legit parenting magazines and other forums, apparently. Here’s the link: http://www.3daypottytraining.com/ I have not personally used this method, but surely it couldn’t hurt to try it. Three days sounds heavenly compared to 2 months.

Whatever your method of potty training, I wish you speedy returns. (and minimal tears!)