I started selling Gatoraid gum on the schoolbus in kindergarten.  It was a surprisingly great business model and I made enough money to tell my parents to shove their 25 cent weekly allowance and I'll live with my unmade bed, thank you very much. 

My next business venture was selling golf balls back to golfers.  This was an even better business model because unlike the gum, I didn't even have to buy the golf balls, I just had to collect them from the back slope in a big bucket.  I charged 25 cents a white ball and 75 cents for the colored balls because they were much rarer. 

I started making personalized gifts in 3rd grade for Mother's Day and was so successful that I had a Christmas sale that same year.  I made enough during Christmas to buy my mother a fancy new camera which beat the crap out of Dad's lousy gift and I became a family hero.

I augmented the gift business in 7th grade with a burgeoning new product line in the late eighties known as the scrunchie.  With very inexpensive labor costs (Mom and Grandma) I managed to expand the line into several fabrics and materials and later added a bejeweled option.  Gold mine.  I bought all the porcelain collectors dolls I could find.

I graduated high school, went to college and took some time off from business.  Cut my teeth as a graphic designer and web developer and eventually found my way into software interface design.

I started The Younique Boutique in 2001 out of my garage and grew it to 5.5M in sales by year 9.  Making gifts had always been my passion and ecommerce coupled with custom gifts was a winning combo.

But alas, I grew bored.  I also had two kids.  I saved everything my son wore and tried desperately to trade it for a collection of girl's clothing when I became prego with girl baby.  I had zero luck finding the ideal trade partner and so a little idea was sparked in my head.

Several months later, girl baby was finally sleeping through the night in her own room and it became time for Mama to make her trading dreams a reality.  Human kind has traded goods since the dawn of man but strangely, the concept has not been well translated to the web.  Enter Stoke Box.

3rd Place Winner of Startup Weekend San Diego, Team Stoke Box is on a mission to revolutionize the way America looks at its unused stuff.  Stay tuned! 

PS I don't live in Colorado

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