Better Clothes for Babies

(Post: English)
"In 2005, when Leigh Rubio, a Portland (Ore.) stay-at-home mother of two, saw her infant daughter accidentally scratching her face, she wished for a simple solution that she couldn't find: baby shirts with fold-over sleeves."

That only added to what she disliked about the little kid clothes on the market.

Baby pants were too high so their waistbands pressed into tender, healing belly buttons.

Some shirts lacked neckline snaps and were painful to stretch over soft heads. And cloying pastels and duck patterns were everywhere.

So Rubio, now 34, and women's apparel designer Lyn Huffman, 32, teamed up to design a fitted and stylish layette.

Targeting newborns also helped them carve out a niche in the crowded children's apparel market.

They scraped together $75,000 in savings, a $50,000 bank loan, and, says Rubio, "supportive husbands who never second-guessed us" to create their first line.

Since August, they've expanded to offer clothing made in the U.S. for toddlers up to 24 months old.

Within a year they turned a profit and now bring in $5,000 to $10,000 monthly through their online store.

Source: BusinessWeek