If you’ve been following my blog for a while, you know that I’ve been with WineShop at Home for over ten years. You also might know that I have two young boys, ages 7 and 2 ½.
Those kids didn’t just appear at my doorstep! If you do the math, you’ll clearly see that I worked through both of my pregnancies and I’m still working, even as I care for my two children.
If you’re pregnant or considering starting a family, it’s no time to stop working your consulting business. In fact, it’s a time to stay consistent and maybe even ramp up your efforts – here’s why…
Being Pregnant Will Help You Get Tastings (Weird, Right?)
It’s always frustrating when a great wine consultant finds out she’s pregnant and BOOM! She falls off the face of the planet.
Of course, I really understand that family time is important, and preparing for a new baby can sure demand a lot of time. From my perspective, I love this business because even if you’re working daily on selling wine, you don’t have to sacrifice family time when you find out you’re expecting.
In fact, when I found out I was pregnant with my first child, my husband had just been deployed and I was living with my parents while he was gone. When people found out I was expecting, they all wanted to host a tasting. Why? Because they wanted to support me. In the same way your girlfriends will throw you a baby shower, people will be very responsive when you ask them to do a tasting.
And by the way, there’s nothing like showing up for a wine tasting with your belly showing and a handful of wine glasses. That’s a tasting your host will never forget!
You Don’t Have to Sacrifice Promotion Opportunities
We women often hear this story about corporate ladder-climbing: a woman may be doing great, on an excellent path toward promotion, but as soon as she takes leave to be with her new baby, other people step in and take over her roles and responsibilities.
When she comes back, she’s lost project opportunities and status, and she has to play catch up to regain her footing.
That sucks! But guess what? With WineShop, you don’t have to deal with that situation. You don’t have to tell your boss you’re going on leave and hope he or she won’t privately think you’re making the wrong choice. You don’t have to sacrifice a promotion, or put your career on hold.
Instead, you can just slow down a bit if you need to. Or you can take advantage of the opportunity to earn extra money before the baby comes, and ramp up your efforts!
The Million-Dollar Month
I’ll just leave you with this final thought: In November of 2015, my team sold $1 million of wine for the very first time. Can you imagine, selling 50,000 bottles of wine in one month?
I’m so proud of them! But when I look back at my career with WineShop, I have to wonder where it would be if I had chosen to step away from my business as soon as I got pregnant. Instead of taking a break, I let the pregnancy be a motivator – and guess what? The year I found out I was pregnant was the year my business hit $100,000.00.