The Boss of You

Before we jump into a pro­file of Luna­pads, I would like to take a moment for some full dis­clo­sure. One of the things we are most excited about with this whole project (the web­site and book) is the oppor­tu­nity to meet other busi­ness women, this pro­file how­ever is of some very dear friends. In fact, these gals are more than friends they are also clients, men­tors and a real inspi­ra­tion. Given that we’re so fond of them and admire and sup­port their busi­ness so whole-heartedly, I can’t really think of a bet­ter busi­ness for our first profile.

Any­way, you don’t want to know all about how fab­u­lous I think they are when you can read some excel­lent advice from straight from the source. And so, with no fur­ther ado, we are proud to present our first Boss Lady pro­file, with Madeleine Shaw and Suzanne Siemens of Luna­pads Prod­ucts International:

1. How many years have you been in business?

We incor­po­rated in 2000.

2. In your own words, how would you describe your business?

We make and sell eco-friendly men­strual prod­ucts that help women feel great about their cycles.

3. What kind of expe­ri­ence do you have/did you have before start­ing your business?

Madeleine: A Women’s Stud­ies degree, a pas­sion­ate per­son­al­ity, a love of fash­ion and tex­tiles, a strong desire to do some­thing unusual for a career, topped off with pro­found intol­er­ance for work­ing envi­ron­ments that involve being far away from the ground, panty­hose and win­dows that don’t open.

Suzanne: a uni­ver­sity busi­ness degree (com­merce) and Char­tered Accoun­tant des­ig­na­tion. Fif­teen years work­ing expe­ri­ence in busi­nesses as an accoun­tant, finan­cial plan­ner, con­troller and team leader.

4. What was the best piece of advice you have been given as a busi­ness person?

Madeleine: Don’t feel like you have to be able to do every­thing in your busi­ness. Part of your skill as a busi­nessper­son will be get­ting clear about what you’re not up for and find­ing oth­ers to do it.

Suzanne: Cash flow is king/queen. Keep an eye on your cash flow: make sure you have enough to keep your busi­ness run­ning smoothly. Always be on the look out for more equity (cash for your busi­ness), even when you think you don’t need it.

5. What has sur­prised you the most about being your own boss (own­ing your own business)?

Madeleine: That I could actu­ally be a busi­nessper­son and like it. I didn’t have a busi­ness back­ground and never had entre­pre­neur­ial aspi­ra­tions, but it’s been the per­fect vehi­cle for my polit­i­cal “agenda”, and has helped me to learn and grow immensely as a person.

Suzanne: It is a great indi­ca­tor of what you are capa­ble of doing and learn­ing about your­self. Run­ning a busi­ness is much like rais­ing chil­dren; you care for it with a pas­sion and it gives back what you put in.

6. What busi­ness advice have you received that you feel is best ignored? and/or What is the worst busi­ness advice you’ve received?

Madeleine: I have an instinc­tive mis­trust of any­thing that imputes its “truth” by work­ing its way into a pat acronym (Together Every­one Achieves More), being overly allit­er­a­tive (The 5 Ps of Mar­ket­ing) or hav­ing an arbi­trar­ily pre­scribed num­ber of steps or com­po­nents (The 7 Habits of Highly Effec­tive Peo­ple), but that’s just me.

Suzanne: I hate it when busi­nesses put prof­its before peo­ple, but unfor­tu­nately, that is the stan­dard busi­ness model, par­tic­u­larly for pub­licly traded com­pa­nies. I also don’t believe it when peo­ple make the gen­eral com­ment that busi­nesses that have a strong social or envi­ron­men­tal foun­da­tion will not be suc­cess­ful and that investors aren’t inter­ested in these types of ven­tures because they don’t make enough money. It is not all about profits!

7. What are your top three mea­sures of suc­cess? (That is, how do you define suc­cess for your business?)

Madeleine: At first, sales. Next comes prof­itabil­ity. But you’re not any­where unless what you’re doing is mak­ing the world a bet­ter place, includ­ing hap­pier peo­ple; you, your employ­ees and cus­tomers being foremost.

Suzanne: same… sales, prof­itabil­ity and being respected for what you do and how you do it.

8. Was there a moment you knew you were mak­ing the right deci­sion to do your own thing?

Madeleine: From the first sec­ond that I decided to start a busi­ness it just felt right. Meet­ing my busi­ness part­ner was also a major con­fir­ma­tion of being in the flow.

Suzanne: Tak­ing the risk of leav­ing the finan­cial secu­rity of the tra­di­tional busi­ness world was incred­i­bly lib­er­at­ing. Once I did, I achieved a great sense of free­dom and empow­er­ment to do what I wanted, or explore what was possible.

9. What keeps you going on the tough days?

Madeleine: Love for what we do. This is what I always tell peo­ple who are think­ing about start­ing a busi­ness: choose some­thing that you are gen­uinely pas­sion­ate about, because there will be hard times, and it’s that feel­ing that will keep you going. Also peo­ple: our employ­ees and cus­tomers are so won­der­ful, just a few pos­i­tive words from them can make all the difference.

Suzanne: Same, plus know­ing what we are doing really mat­ters… to the planet, to women, to the peo­ple we touch.

10. What is the wildest suc­cess story you can imag­ine for your business’s future?

Madeleine: Big­ger pic­ture, peri­ods and wash­able pads becom­ing cool to the point where women talked about it all the time, com­pared and bragged about their pad col­lec­tions. Luna­pads would col­lab­o­rate with celebrity women to cre­ate Pink and J Lo and Hay­ley Wick­en­heiser etc. spe­cial edi­tion pads. Com­men­su­rately, hav­ing your period would also become known as a woman’s “wicked” time of the month, when you get your best ideas and take spe­cial care of your­self. There would be won­der­ful cel­e­bra­tions held for girls when they reach menar­che – it would even has its own sec­tion in card and gift stores. Mil­lions and mil­lions of dol­lars in sales (with good mar­gins!) Luna­pads could become a fran­chised chain of women’s self-care cen­tres, sort of mod­ern “Red Tents” where women can go for a mas­sage or pedi­cure, yoga class, rit­ual, or just a quiet cup of tea with other women in their com­mu­nity. A lot of menar­che rit­ual par­ties would take place at them. Women could of course buy all kinds of beau­ti­ful pads and other prod­ucts to sup­port their well­be­ing. I’d also really like to develop a com­po­nent to the busi­ness’ mis­sion that offers work and train­ing oppor­tu­ni­ties to at-risk girls and women. Oh – con­nect­ing with other women around the world in cre­ative ways would also be very excit­ing, whether on a strictly busi­ness level or through find­ing ways of sup­port­ing women in devel­op­ing countries.

Suzanne: Yes! Plus: being on Oprah with the likes of Eve Ensler, Inga Mus­cio, and other rad fem­i­nist. Hav­ing Oprah say gosh, I wish I had known about these prod­ucts when I was still bleed­ing. She would tell the story of how shame­ful or dirty she felt when she was bleed­ing, and that what we are doing for women is so impor­tant. The audi­ence would be full of like minded women and not the shal­low ones you often see!