#23 ~ MMM ~ Insight into Money Making Emma Burke

I am Emma Burke 39 (eek nearly 40 years old) mother of 2 teenage boys and business owner. I  have been self-employed since I was 20. I trained as a veterinary nurse and still love being around animals to this day but when I met my husband who was a property developer I knew that I wanted to be my own boss. I didn't have a clue what I wanted to do except not work for anybody else.  My husband said that his company was having difficulty finding reliable cleaning contractors who would do the work on time and return the keys etc so I started a cleaning company. Initially, this was just me in my car and a henry hoover doing the work myself although this quickly grew and I had approximately 60 members of staff. During the  credit crunch of 2008, my husband lost his property development business  and became personally bankrupt, the cleaning business was literally our  lifeline putting food on the table, at this time I had a toddler and a  newborn baby We rebuilt his business together and I closed the cleaning company in 2012. We owned a building that had an empty shop front so I set up a baby goods agency, reselling used quality items and taking a fee, this was my first retail business. I  later closed this when a really good tenant wanted to take the shop premise giving me the chance to have my weekends back with the boys rather than being in the shop. I have continued to build my own property portfolio which I managed myself at the time. In  October 2016 the idea of Laceeze was born, my business partner Paula  and I were at a football match where we saw a parent put an elastic band  around a child's boot to stop the laces from coming undone! Paula went  home and thought that there was potentially a business to be had Fast  forward to today and we have a patented product which has sold over  50,000 pairs of bands, we created some additional clothing items and  this has formed the brand "Defiance clothing" which is sportswear for  kids that is useful (gloves, snoods, compressions etc) My goal is to have a sports brand for children which is recognised globally. Connect with me on LinkedIn  https://www.linkedin.com/in/karla-edwards-9ba043189/ Connect with me on Instagram  https://www.instagram.com/money_making_mothers/    Connect with me on Facebook  https://www.facebook.com/karlamoneymakingmothers Check our website too! www.theprotectionparent.co.uk