Sophie Doyle recalls the torment of being up all night, attempting to soothe her baby son as he refused to sleep.
It didn’t help that she and her husband, Luke, regularly stayed up until midnight to pack orders for her new baby goods business, Alf the Label — making it near-impossible for her to function to her full capacity the next day.
“There was a period where I was like, I don’t think I can do this anymore. I can’t work during the day and then pack orders and not sleep,” she said.
She hadn’t anticipated that it would end up this way. Ms Doyle expected that the business — which sells functional, stylish baby bags — would remain a small side gig that she could run solo.
“When I started, I didn’t set the business up to grow, I set it up to become a hobby,” she said.
The idea for Alf the Label was born out of circumstance six years ago, while Ms Doyle was pregnant with her first child, Ari.
Knowing a baby bag was going to be a necessity when her daughter was born, she went on the hunt for a high-quality baby bag, however, she wasn’t particularly impressed with her options.
“The products that were available were low-quality, sack-looking bags with lots of pockets,” she said.
“There wasn’t much of a market for it in Australia then. I thought, if I’m going to spend money on something that’s going to last, I want something good.”
Ultimately, Ms Doyle lent on her own natural creativity and decided to get her dream baby bag made herself.
I’d like to see more men turn around and say they believe in what we’re doing, and they’re looking at how big the business can grow.
“I had previously had clothes made that I had sketched up myself … I thought maybe I could do it with a baby bag,” she said.
“I went to Indonesia for a friend’s wedding and had a bag made for myself. Lots of other mums asked where I got it and where they could buy one.”
The strong interest from other mothers sent Ms Doyle on a journey to find the right supplier and start getting the baby bags made in bulk.
“All of a sudden, it was my husband and I packing constantly, because I got all of these orders I didn’t expect,” she said.
Fast-forward to July 2022 and Alf the Label has shipped over 26,000 products worldwide and sold $3.3 million in bags and accessories.
Ms Doyle said wanting to be a positive role model for her children was one of her main motivations for running the business.
“I want it to be something generational that they could take on. Having the kids grow up around this is really positive for them,” she said.
While Alf the Label has enjoyed significant growth over the past six years, Ms Doyle said the perception that any company becomes successful overnight was far from the reality.
“Maybe some people think I’m lucky, but it’s really just optics. Unless you know me personally, you wouldn’t know that these have been some of the toughest years of my career,” she said.
Ms Doyle acknowledged that negative societal attitudes towards mothers running their own business while taking care of young children were still prevalent.
“It’s hard to know whether people judge you,” she said.
“I think generally in society people looked at me and thought, well aren’t you just meant to be at home with your kids right now?”
Alf the Label raised about $150,000 through equity funding platform Birchal earlier this month to help expand its product range and grow its team — with the majority of the investors female.
Despite being satisfied with the result, Ms Doyle said she believed male investors held unconscious bias towards female-led companies.
“Investors will still look at females in business and not take it seriously,” she said.
“If you looked at our structure and our financials and you didn’t mention what our products were … it would be interesting to see how that changed things.”
Ms Doyle said it was crucial more male investors stepped up and supported female founders.
“I’d like to see more men turn around and say they believe in what we’re doing, and they’re looking at how big the business can grow,” she said.
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