Sweta Doshi | Embracing A Pause & The Play by Play For Launching A Product
by Neha Ruch
Sweta Doshi makes rain look good. She walked into our first meeting with a flouncy felt hat and hair gorgeous underneath which let us get to business quickly, trading stories about our Indian mothers and their devotion to coconut oil on our hair when we were kids. Her presence is disarming with a demeanor as sweet and authentic as you’d expect if you are familiar with her coconut based baby skincare line, Bubbsi, which I just restocked on to combat my kids winter skin. Prior to Bubbsi and her babies, she built her career in consulting, then ten years in retail (Victoria Secret and Bath & Body Works) before family. She’s the poster child for how a pause can pivot you into more meaning so of course I had to share our conversation and her wealth of insight here. She is as open and generous in sharing her experience and learning as I hoped so this is one to take notes.
1. Bubbsi is such a beautiful segue from your previous career in skincare. I know you took a pause in between after having your son - what gave you the push and confidence to do that?
My decision to leave my previous career was equally personal and professional. I loved my role and team at Bath & Body Works, but wanted a new challenge. At the same time, I had a one-year-old son who was starting to hit all the fun milestones and I wanted the flexibility to experience his childhood first-hand.
I did some very deliberate diligence as I was thinking about what to do next. I talked to several mom friends in my industry (and their friends) who had been faced with the same competing priorities and who I perceived to be finding the right mix of career fulfillment and motherhood. I began to understand the ups & downs of taking on a less structured career path (in my case, to become an independent consultant), and as I talked to these women, the unknowns became less scary.
My incredibly supportive husband was the one who really gave me the final confidence to make a move. I vividly remember expressing my anxieties over dinner one night. I was worried that if I stalled my career and stopped making money for a while, I’d be directionless and not be a contributor to our family anymore. He said something along the lines of “you contribute to this family in more ways than you can imagine. You hold us together. You don’t need to make money to still be important to this family”. Somehow, I needed the reassurance that my worth extended much beyond my career to take the leap and find a more fulfilling equilibrium.
I also acknowledge that I’m incredibly fortunate to be able to take a pause (with no real salary in sight) and even more so now that I’ve started a business. Many women don’t have the option to do this and I’m truly grateful that I do.
2. How long was your pause and how did you feel? What advice would you share on feeling connected and creative during that time?
Truly, my pause only lasted about 3 months. The timing was perfect - I spent all summer with my son and by August I was craving a project again. I launched my own website as an independent strategy & marketing consultant, started networking and landed my first part-time role a few months later.
Beyond just the personal aspect, that summer was one of the most fulfilling for me professionally. For the first time in years, I had the bandwidth to be truly curious about my career. Until then, “networking” had such an intimidating connotation for me, but I started talking to anyone that had interesting, relevant jobs and sought out their networks too. I had countless coffee / drinks dates to simply learn about what other people did at their jobs. In the short-term it helped me land consulting gigs, but in the longer term, it opened my mind to exploring different avenues (like entrepreneurship) and built my confidence. I didn’t realize the level of knowledge and the skills I had gained over my career until I started talking about my experience with others.
My advice to anyone taking a pause is to use the time to get out of your comfort zone and be curious - actively seek out experiences and people that share your interests. Build new relationships. You never know where it will lead.
Looking back, I wasn’t as successful at channeling my creativity - in fact, I didn’t realize that I needed to. I threw myself into elaborate projects for my kids (like over-the-top birthday parties!) and I also had my daughter during this timeframe. Ultimately, once I started to work on the Bubbsi idea, I realized that I had been searching for a creative outlet for a while!
3. Many mothers in our community are noodling on concepts, what were the steps from idea to launch?
Concept. First, I put my idea for a clean + fun skincare line for babies on paper and started showing it to a few people who I was close to. I think this phase was incredibly helpful - forcing myself to articulate an ambiguous idea, brainstorming copy, finding imagery to support it, treating it like a pitch (even though I wasn’t looking for money), and refining the idea based on feedback and market research.
Diligence. Once the idea felt somewhat solid, I needed to understand how much investment was required to get it off the ground. We built a basic financial model and I started to meet with suppliers to understand things like product development costs, safety testing requirements, packaging needs, minimum order quantities, etc. This is where the networking skills came in - I spent months leveraging my beauty industry connections and cold-calling to eventually find suppliers that would work with me. I had to pitch my idea over and over again to prove that it was worthwhile to them. These conversations helped me evolve the product idea and refine the financial model. By the end of this 4-5 months, I had a list of potential suppliers and a good sense of what the investment would look like.
Fear is typically rooted in the unknown. If you’ve gone through a thorough diligence phase, you should feel fairly confident moving into your execution phase.
Execution / Product Development. For me, this was an 8 month period of formula and package development and safety testing. I didn’t realize how tough executing my vision would be. You’re faced with tradeoffs and decisions at every step of product development. They all feel like life-or-death decisions, but it forces you to prioritize and stick to your values. Don’t fight every battle. Find the most optimal solution on most things, and fight to make sure you protect your vision on the things that are most important. It’s also necessary to just keep moving, even when it feels like everything is against you. Time is money and you will be the only person who has a sense of urgency around your idea. I’ve definitely been (and continue to be) a stalker with some of my vendors to get things moving faster and better, but I don’t regret making people uncomfortable sometimes to get things done.
Launch: My toughest learning in this phase was that something will go wrong. But it’s important to be patient and not sacrifice the quality of your vision. I had to throw out a full batch of Shampoo + Wash (our highest demand product) during my initial production due to slight imperfections, but I absolutely could not let product go out that didn’t meet my high standards - even if it meant delaying the launch by 4 months.
4. Now you have two little ones and Bubbsi which is so exciting. Tactically, what are the tools and routines that let you give the time you want to the various buckets?
This is still VERY much a work in progress (and probably always will be). I’m trying to set boundaries that force me to be present wherever I am. I try to keep 9am to 6pm as my strict “office hours” and have to resist the urge to attend every drop-off or play date during that time. I’m trying to put my phone away from 6-8pm every day so I can be fully present with the kids; however, my success at that varies drastically week to week.
My husband (yes, that incredibly supportive one that I talked about earlier) definitely gets the short end of the stick. I’m usually so exhausted giving my all to my kids and to Bubbsi that I don’t have much energy left over for him. I am trying to be more present and prioritize him as well.
I used to think I could do it all, but now I lean more heavily on others for help. I lean on our nanny not only to care for the kids all day, but also for household organization, groceries, and meal prep. I’m constantly reminding myself that there are limited hours in the day, so you have to choose what to focus on at any given time.
Entrepreneurship comes with (literally) a never-ending to-do list, so for me, the biggest “tool” is to keep reminding myself that it’s a marathon, not a sprint. There will never be enough hours in the day for me to feel like I’ve gotten everything done. I need to maintain my health and happiness (and that of my family) and I’m doing the best I can.
5. You are super creative in loads of ways beyond Bubbsi. Do you have favorite projects or activities that you do with your kids or as a family?
I love cooking (for fun), so I try to be creative with the kids’ lunches, do cooking projects with them, experiment with new recipes and host friends in the summer. I don’t have a lot of time for it, but it makes me happy.
Other than that, I try to show my kids to be curious and creative in everyday ways - through Lego building, small science experiments, art together, making halloween costumes, drawing banners for birthday parties, etc. I want them to know that they can put their signature on anything because I think this is one of the character qualities that led me to being an entrepreneur.
6. I'm always amazed by your presence and productivity. I know productivity is very personal but what are your favorite tools, apps, etc for making this stage of life simpler?
I wish I had more groundbreaking advice here! I use some fairly basic items to keep my personal life in order. We use a small whiteboard calendar to plan meals and activities with each week, and an Instant Pot to make SO many one-pot meals.
For work, I love Slack to communicate efficiently with my team of freelancers and Later to plan out Bubbsi’s Instagram feed. I typically use Notes on my Mac to manage my to-do lists, but I’ve recently started using Trello, which is great!
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