In today’s FemalExperts Role Model Interview, we are very pleased to introduce Nina Bott, entrepreneur, presenter, cookbook author and recent store owner(Easy-Peasy by Nina Bott).
1. dear Mrs. Bott, first of all: congratulations on the new online store! Our editorial team has already diligently looked in and found, in addition to your cookbooks, other beautiful and useful kitchen utensils for themselves and the children. How did this exciting store idea come about?
Thank you very much! I’ve been meaning to redesign my website ninabott.de for a while and offer more to my community there. With my new cookbook “Nina’s Easy-Peasy Family Cookbook” came the idea to offer matching products and to open my own online store. We cook a lot together as a family and that’s why I’m always on the lookout for things myself that make cooking and also everyday life with kids easier and more fun. I also want to share such little helpers with my community.
2. in your opinion, what are the biggest challenges when running your own online store?
I think in retail in general, slow-moving items are the biggest risk. Even if I was convinced of a certain product, I asked myself: Does this also go down well with my community? As a trader, do I meet their taste? Here, a partner who keeps the financial risk small for me was crucial for my store opening. I work with the online wholesale platform Faire.com, which offers merchants free returns and a 60-day payment target. If a brand does not sell at all, I can return the first order free of charge. This way I can test which items work for me and my store with little risk. Another challenge for me is, of course, balancing our family life and my other projects. Time flexibility is very important to me for this. The ability to shop on the Faire platform while mobile and at any time is a major advantage. In my busy family life, it would otherwise be difficult to coordinate with brands by phone and mail during their business hours. Instead, I can also order products via the platform when the kids are already in bed or I only have a few minutes to spare. Recently, I was doing some quick research in the parking garage for things for my store.
3. what are the advantages of the partnership with Faire.com for your customers?
In any case, you will benefit from the special selection. Faire is the largest wholesale platform and provides access to over 100,000 brands worldwide. These are independent, small manufacturers with special products. My customers are not looking for mass-produced goods, but for items that add a personal touch to their home. On Faire I not only have the necessary selection for this, various search filters and smart algorithms also help me to select exactly the products that fit my store.
4. I can imagine that many of our readers are amazed at how you, as a mom of four, manage to get another big project off the ground in addition to your acting and hosting jobs and your book projects. What do you think is important when tackling so many projects at once?
Of course, this cannot be done without good support. I am lucky to have Benni by my side, a man who supports me in all my endeavors. Together we organize our everyday life in such a way that we can both pursue our own projects despite hectic family life. But it also depends on the right choice of business partners. For my online store as well as for my cookbooks, jewelry collection or my Easy-Peasy Hoodie I have people around me I can rely on.
5. in this context, is there perhaps even something that your children have taught you in terms of being an entrepreneur?
As a mom, you always try to convey to your kids that anything is possible, they can do anything. For example, I’m totally okay with my boys wanting to wear a dress or nail polish. You yourself are sometimes uncertain when it comes to trying something new. In that sense, having children is almost self-therapy. When my children ask “Mom, why didn’t you dare?”, I don’t have an answer. If you don’t try, you can’t succeed. As an entrepreneur, I have to be bold. Or I just ask people for support when it comes to things I can’t do myself. After all, there’s no shame in giving things away.
6. compatibility is nowadays still predominantly the responsibility of us women. However, to what extent do you actively involve your partner Benjamin Baarz in this responsible area of work?
In a recent YouGov survey conducted by Faire, 58 percent of female entrepreneurs surveyed said they found balancing work and family more challenging than their male counterparts. To ensure that this is not an obstacle for us, or especially for me, we consciously divide up household tasks or childcare. We see ourselves as a team that wants to achieve goals together.
7. I can imagine that not all couples can create such a possibility of support, perhaps also due to different working hours or spatial distance. In your opinion, what does it take to implement such a variety of undertakings, even if the partner cannot play an active role in family and/or company management?
Family support is hard to replace. But a good network can help, at least in part. By networking women or entrepreneurs with each other, exchanging helpful contacts and experiences, we move forward faster. This doesn’t make the work any less, but perhaps makes one or two processes on the job more efficient. Here, I also find it important not only to share business-related tips, but also to talk about work-life balance. Many women have similar experiences and it is good to talk about difficulties together and look for solutions. Women are often expected to be successful at work and still effortlessly manage the entire household. We need to normalize that this is unrealistic and social media often fools us.
8. are there any experiences or insights here that you wish you had known beforehand that you would like to share with our community?
I always try to think everything through to the end and most of the time I succeed. There’s one thing I hadn’t thought about with my online store, and that’s clothing. Often people order garments in multiple sizes because they are not sure which one fits best. This results in a number of returns, which of course involves a certain amount of work. I had not expected that. Nevertheless: I have had few negative experiences. Maybe that I tend to take on too much sometimes. And for a store you have to be very structured.
9. you have over 240,000 followers on Instagram. Would you say that you should build a community in advance before taking the step of starting your own business?
Of course, my Instagram community is a great asset to my store. On the one hand, I have a larger platform to draw attention to my projects, and on the other hand, I know my target group very well through the exchange with my followers. I think the latter in particular is crucial for success. Especially on Instagram, I observe that love brands such as gitti take advantage of the direct exchange via the platform and respond better to the target group with their products.
But you don’t necessarily have to go the Instagram route. You could say that store owners are influencers in their own way, perhaps even being the original influencers, curating products and presenting trends to their customers. As store owners, they also have great means to get to know their target audience, sometimes even more individually than via Instagram.
10. the core theme of our magazine is “Female Empowerment”. What would you wish for the future in this respect, also with regard to your own daughter Luna?
My wish for Luna, but also for my sons, is that later on you simply don’t have to ask this question. Female empowerment is important, but it’s such a shame that people still have to ask such questions. No matter if you are a woman or a man, no matter what your sexual orientation, none of this should be worth mentioning. Fortunately, I don’t have to worry about Luna: she goes her way! She loves pink and romps around outside a lot, getting bruises regularly. bruises.
11. Finally, I’m happy to present our community with a little highlight, because you’ve already revealed in another interview that there will also be pieces of your own design. Can you already give us a little preview here?
It’s just a consideration right now, but maybe I’ll add my jewelry collection to the online store. I designed it together with the wonderful Luisa Rotetzki and her independent label LLR STUDIOS. Everything is made of sustainable materials and kept very timeless. The project is also very close to my heart.
Dear Nina Bott, thank you very much for the interview!
About the author
Kinga Bartczak advises, coaches and writes on female empowerment, new work culture, organizational development, systemic coaching and personal branding. She is also the managing director of UnternehmerRebellen GmbH and publisher of the FemalExperts magazine .
