Entrepreneurship

I started a business at home during my breast cancer diagnosis and treatment. Nearly 4 years later, it has become my full time job and I still love it. A couple of words of caution, however.

*Don't let this be your full time income. The markets are unpredictable.

*Taxes will eat you alive

*Prepare to spend 10-18 hours a day at it, even weekends

*Know your limits physically and financially

* Try not to go into debt to grow your business

* Get creative about marketing ideas

*Do trades or giveaways to advertise

Good luck!

I originally created my product, the beaubeau head scarf, not as product, but for myself. So it was and is the my own personal solution to an appearance challenge that was otherwise ruining my life. So the idea didn't start as a business idea, but a self-help idea. Upon realizing others liked my idea, I worked on perfecting my design. That was fun and not so difficult. Building the business around the product, now that is the challenging part. Starting from nothing and building up is a slow, steady process requiring non-stop attention. What helps me most in getting over all the bumps is constant research and input and support from competent and caring people.

Even though I'm not the founder of the Inflammatory Breast Cancer Research Foundation, I have been involved from the very early beginnings back in 1999. I think one of the most important aspects to consider when starting an organization is determining if there is a need for the organization.

As a group, we looked at what breast cancer information/education was 'out there' and realized there was next to nothing about inflammatory breast cancer and there was very little research focus. For those reasons we opted to keep our focus quite narrow. There are great organizations doing a wonderful job with information and support for standard breast cancer and we have no desire to duplicate what they are doing. We keep our focus on inflammatory breast cancer (IBC) and try to make our website and other information specific to the needs of the IBC community and those seeking IBC information. IBC research was extremely limited so we knew that needed to be a primary focus.

Funding is always a challenge. By remaining focused, not having a walk-in office, or paid staff we are able to keep our administrative expenses to about 7% of our budget. This allows us to put well over 90% of received funds into the mission and goals. In these economic times it can be difficult to function solely on private donations but we've been fortunate to have people who believe in what we are doing and contribute as they can.

In recent years we've partnered with a private foundation on some grants so we are able to support more research projects with their support. Often more can be accomplished if we find ways to work together.

Ultimately it is all about passion. You can't do this kind of work unless you have a passion for it. We aren't in it for recognition, personal gain, and certainly not for financial gain! Each of us involved with the Inflammatory Breast Cancer Research Foundation does so because the disease has touched our lives in some way and as a result we've realized we must act. No longer is it about "us"...it is about all those who have been touched by IBC and trying to build a future without this disease.

Well., I woke up put of my sleep at 2 am and went to my computer. I wrote the entire book in under 20 minutes. I tell everyone that had to be God. Since it is a children's book the hardest part was communicating my vision for the book so that the illustrator would capture the message I wanted for mothers and their young children. Which is that no matter what changes take place, chemo, radiation, hair loss, masectomy, nothing will change mommy.

The most difficult part of starting a nonprofit was the funding. I knew I had to have a specialized website to be able to do the search and connection in the database and to keep all information private. A friend of mine who's a web entrepreneur helped me put together a sitemap that I used to approach web designers and programmers for quotes. At the same time, I applied for nonprofit status and when I rec'd it, I sent out a letter to my family and close friends asking for money. I raised about $9,000 which helped offset some of the initial programming expenses.

You have to be passionate about what you want to do. I knew that I had a great idea in connecting survivors online. You have to remember that this was before online social networking became big. I had the idea at the beginning of 2005, before Facebook, YouTube and Blogging! But I knew that there had to be a way that breast cancer survivors could find each other online and get the support they needed. One of the challenges was the feedback I rec'd from the medical community. I spoke to my oncologist and surgeon about it and they were supportive, but you could tell that they didn't really believe in it. Dr. Susan Love was a mom at my daughter's school so I called her up. She basically said, "don't bother, because I'm going to eradicate breast cancer within 10 years." I thought,"that's fantastic, but there will STILL be survivors!" You HAVE to be passionate!

This is a great question. When I completed treatment I had a passion to help others. I wanted to start volunteering somewhere local to help other survivors. When the idea for Pink-Link popped into my head, "connect survivors with each other online", I knew I had to go for it. It's hard to start any kind of new venture, but I took baby steps and focused on what I needed to do each day. If you have the passion, then you'll be successful!