When she was detained by TSA after a business trip and asked to drain the ice around her carry-on breast milk bag before she could enter the plane, Kate Torgersen knew she had to do something. Kate knew she wasn’t the only working mom dealing with this. She’d heard horror stories about moms in broom closets at the office pumping milk and she saw the need.
The day after that disastrous event, Kate Torgersen decided to create Milk Stork, the FIRST and ONLY breast milk travel solution for working moms. She called her dad with the business idea to provide a service to help mothers easily ship their breast milk home, and with that, the idea was born.
Kate’s mom-led innovation and entrepreneurship have been chronicled in publications such as the Harvard Business Review, New York Magazine, Lifehacker, Fortune and Travel + Leisure.
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My north star for the whole thing was that it had to be a two minute experience for moms in the hotel room and it had to be a two-minute experience placing an order.” – Kate Torgersen
Show Notes:
- Kate knew she needed a “2-minute experience” for her idea to work
- How she took her “DISRUPTIVE” idea and broke it down into manageable pieces in the beginning
- The moment she knew she was on to something….it was right after she “flipped the switch”
- Milk Stork was a side hustle for three years….she kept her day job at Cliff Bar for a long time (true inspiration for women who have a business idea but they aren’t quite ready to leave their day job)
- The surprise phone call Kate received while in her mini-van that changed EVERYTHING
- How Milk Stork tapped into an ENTERPRISE market
- The KEY to gaining TRACTION
- What it means to be a “painkiller not a vitamin” – BRILLIANT
- Her Cash Flow Metaphor – GENIUS
- What Kate does to recover from entrepreneurial fatigue
- WHY she went about hiring differently than most other companies
- The BIG Difference in having a career and owning a business
- The advice she wished someone would have shared with her early on
If you don’t have good operations in place, traction can become a problem.” – Kate Torgersen
Connect with Kate Torgersen:
Facebook | Instagram | LinkedIn | Milk Stork
Once we launched and got that first order, I knew that was never going to be quitting. There was no quitting because once you get traction you can’t quit. It is kind of like being a parent. Once you give birth, there is not really an ‘out’.” – Kate Torgersen
I’m really excited to have Gail Becker, founder and CEO of CAULIPOWER, on the show today!
whose kidney was failing, so that he would enjoy a more vital, healthy life. On December 1, we both were admitted to UCLA Medical Center. Everything went well regarding the surgery, however, when I woke up in the recovery room later that day and became aware of my surroundings, I felt restrained and an overall feeling of loss of control. As the hours went by (and the pain meds began to wear off!) I realized there were 4 “obstacles” that I needed to overcome in my journey to again feel in control of my life. The 4 “obstacles” were: forced oxygen, a catheter, an IV in my arm, and being strong enough to stand up and walk without assistance. This got me thinking about how Smart Women need to overcome the “obstacles” in their lives in order for them to be in control of their destiny.