Mum Means Business

It’s half term and like the vast majority of you, we’re muddling through: juggling childcare, trying to bank memories worth having with the kids and feeling guilty about not banking enough of them!
It seemed like a good moment to talk about the village, the one it takes to raise a child, and why the extent to which you have one makes such a difference to your ability to work and parent well.
In this solo episode, I reflect on how parenting has shifted from the freedom of my own cul-de-sac childhood to a culture that favours supervision and why that means so much more work for parents. I share what it felt like to be a village of one when my eldest was a newborn, with my partner stuck abroad for three and a half months during the third lockdown.
I also revisit Sunaina Sinha Haldea’s honest answer from episode 86 when women asked how she was doing it all: “I’m not.” Inspired by Sunaina, I pull back the curtain on how our own village has evolved, from two years of maternity leave with each of my girls to nursery days, a day with each set of grandparents and the lanes my partner and I have naturally settled into. 
In this episode, I reflect on:
✨ Why the village matters for your time, your mental wellbeing and your sense that someone has your back
✨ How childhood has changed from playing out until dinner to a culture of supervision, and the extra administration that places on parents
✨ What it felt like to be a village of one with a newborn, and what that taught me about mothers raising children alone
✨ Why Sunaina’s answer of “I’m not” is such a gift, and why we cannot kill it at work and be fully present with our children at the same time
✨ A behind-the-scenes look at our village: four grandparents, nursery days, shared lanes at drop-off and pickup, and the privilege that affords me space to pursue my ambition
✨ Why we should be mindful of each other’s support before comparing our progress, and why even with all of this, there still aren’t enough hours in the day
Takeaway for Mums in Business:
"We cannot parent in isolation and expect to build a thriving business. We all need a village."
About The Host:
I’m Victoria Phipps – a Mum of two, analogue family photographer, personal brand photographer, educator, charity co-founder, marketer and now podcaster! 🎙️
I was raised by a nurturing Mother and an entrepreneurial Father and have inherited traits from both, so the tension between ambition and motherhood is one I grapple with on a daily basis!
I’m fascinated to hear the stories of other women on a similar path, who are striving to build thriving businesses whilst being present for their children. It's a tough juggle, but I hope the conversations shared on this podcast help Mums in business feel less alone and inspired to keep going in pursuit of their dreams.
Head to the Mum Means Business Podcast website for full show notes.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the topics discussed in this conversation, so please do let me know on Instagram where I'm @victoriaphippsmbe or @mummeansbusinesspodcast.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a 5* rating and review!

Sallie King trained as a lawyer, realised corporate life was not for her and started a furniture business from a tiny Greenwich flat. She sketched the stylish small-space pieces she could not find on the high street, and her first product was a floating bedside table sold on Etsy at a rate of one a month.
Ten years later she was selling hundreds a month, with a warehouse, a wider team and a loyal following on Instagram. In January 2025 she made the decision to close the company. As a single mum of two, Sallie then had to administrate the closure, manage the emotions that came with it and find a new path quickly, all while carrying the daily mental load of motherhood.
Eighteen months on, she is a London property stager, transforming small spaces into beautiful homes that feel bigger, lighter and designed to support how people really live. In this conversation, Sallie shares the whole story with remarkable honesty: the slow brick-by-brick growth, the pandemic boom and the series of changes that quietly eroded the business afterwards.
She talks about burying her head in the sand, how hard it was to tell the people who relied on her and the therapist who told her to make a plan. She also explains how a networking event showed her what to do next. It is a conversation about failure, grace and making peace with slower growth when your children come first.
💡 “Businesses at the beginning are messy, they’re a little bit embarrassing, they’re not that good. But the only way they’ll get better is if you just keep doing it.” - Sallie King
In this conversation, we explore:
✨ Why Sallie left a legal career and how a tiny Greenwich flat and a floating bedside table became the start of a furniture business
✨ The slow reality of growth, from one sale a month to hundreds, and why there was never a single viral moment
✨ What it was like to grow a heavy product business while pregnant and then with a newborn, including the call to her website designers from the hospital that took three months to follow up
✨ The turning points that helped the business scale: honest feedback from Not On The High Street, Instagram and paid ads, and a warehouse that freed up her time for strategy
✨ How the pandemic boom and the changes that followed, from Brexit to shifts in online advertising and spending, wore the business down by a thousand cuts
✨ Why Sallie believes she did not adapt quickly enough, and what she would do differently, from pop-ups to never relying on one way of doing things
✨ The emotional reality of closing a business: telling the factory and the team, administrating the closure and putting on a cheerful persona for her children
✨ How a property staging event at the end of January showed her that her styling and photoshoot experience could become a new career
✨ Starting again in your forties, the comparison trap at the school gates and why being a beginner can be a second wind
About the Guest:
Sallie King is a London property stager who transforms small spaces into homes that feel bigger, lighter and suited to how people live today. A former lawyer, she founded a furniture company in 2015 and grew it over ten years before closing it in January 2025. She retrained into property staging, which draws on the styling, photoshoot and product experience she built along the way. Sallie is a mum of two.
You can follow Sallie’s projects on Instagram @salliekinginteriors.
About The Host:
I’m Victoria Phipps – a Mum of two, analogue family photographer, personal brand photographer, educator, charity co-founder, marketer and now podcaster! 🎙️
I was raised by a nurturing Mother and an entrepreneurial Father and have inherited traits from both, so the tension between ambition and motherhood is one I grapple with on a daily basis!
I’m fascinated to hear the stories of other women on a similar path, who are striving to build thriving businesses whilst being present for their children. It's a tough juggle, but I hope the conversations shared on this podcast help Mums in business feel less alone and inspired to keep going in pursuit of their dreams.
Head to the Mum Means Business Podcast website for full show notes.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the topics discussed in this conversation, so please do let me know on Instagram where I'm @victoriaphippsmbe or @mummeansbusinesspodcast.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a 5* rating and review!
 

I have spent a couple of years grappling with the same question: how do I piece together all the different elements of my business and communicate what I offer? I am a multi-passionate woman with ADHD tendencies, I love everything I do and I cannot bring myself to niche!
This week, after the conversations at Wilder: Live, the brand narrative workshop with Mums Who Build and the deep work inside Pippa Goulden’s Get Known Sprint, it all started tumbling around in my head. In this solo episode, I share what finally clicked. Whether it is this podcast, my maternity and family photography, my portraits for female founders or the courses and mentoring I offer photographers, the thread running through all of it is the same: I help mums feel seen.
I talk about what it is like to be a mother in 2026, how easily we lose ourselves in the early days and why I have such a beef with the word “just”. I also tell you about a decision that feels a bit scary. After months of resisting advice from Nicky Denson-Elliott, I am moving away from running two separate Instagram accounts and stepping into my own personal brand. It is about taking up space, and I cannot ask other mums to do that if I am not willing to do it myself.
In this episode, I reflect on:
✨ Why I cannot bring myself to niche and why I have decided that money is not the only measure of success
✨ The single thread that ties the podcast, the photography and the education work together: helping mums feel seen, believe in themselves and chase their dreams
✨ What it is like to be a mother in 2026, and how our perceived value and confidence can nosedive just when we are at our most vulnerable
✨ Why I have been far more comfortable posting on behalf of a podcast or a charity than posting as myself, and what Nicky Denson-Elliott helped me see from the outside
✨ The baby step I am taking now, and the fear behind it that people will not like me if I take up space in my own name
Takeaway for Mums in Business:
“It’s hard to be a mother in 2026, but we can do hard things. If the conversations I’ve had on this podcast are anything to go by, and they are, we can do amazing things.”
If you are carrying stories about being too much, or finding it easier to show up on behalf of a brand than as yourself, you are not alone. Take the baby step and let it feel scary.
About The Host:
I’m Victoria Phipps – a Mum of two, analogue family photographer, personal brand photographer, educator, charity co-founder, marketer and now podcaster! 🎙️
I was raised by a nurturing Mother and an entrepreneurial Father and have inherited traits from both, so the tension between ambition and motherhood is one I grapple with on a daily basis!
I’m fascinated to hear the stories of other women on a similar path, who are striving to build thriving businesses whilst being present for their children. It's a tough juggle, but I hope the conversations shared on this podcast help Mums in business feel less alone and inspired to keep going in pursuit of their dreams.
Head to the Mum Means Business Podcast website for full show notes.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the topics discussed in this conversation, so please do let me know on Instagram where I'm @victoriaphippsmbe or @mummeansbusinesspodcast.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a 5* rating and review!
 

Sunaina Sinha Haldea founded Cebile Capital in 2011, boldly entering the heavily male dominated world of private equity advisory at the age of thirty.
She built a diverse business where more than half of the employees were women or minorities, and her work earned her repeated spots on the Dow Jones list of the 50 Most Influential People in Private Equity. In 2021 Cebile was acquired by Raymond James, which built a brand new global division around it and named Sunaina Global Head of Private Capital Advisory. At the point of acquisition she was the only woman of colour to have completed such a deal in the history of the industry. She did all of this while raising three children, with three under five in quick succession, a global business and no family living nearby.
Today Sunaina is a regular on the BBC and CNBC, holds board seats and chairs a public company board. She is also a passionate advocate for maternal mental wellbeing in the workplace and a firm believer in the power of daily meditation.
In this conversation, Sunaina speaks candidly about the realities behind the headlines: hiding pregnancies from prospective clients, pumping breast milk in airports and negotiating a deal while timing contractions. She shares why her husband taught her to treat childcare as capital expenditure rather than operating expense, why she believes the idea of having it all at once is a myth and how to raise capital when you are an outsider. Throughout, she returns to one idea: we cannot control outcomes, but we can master how we show up.
💡 “You can have it all over the arc of a lifetime. Over the arc of a decade you can look back and say: I did manage to get a lot of stuff in, but just not at the same time.” - Sunaina Sinha Haldea
In this conversation, we explore:
✨ How the entrepreneurial bug bit at Stanford during the first dot-com boom, and why Sunaina chose to start Cebile on her own terms at thirty
✨ Why her husband’s advice to treat spending on help as an investment rather than an ongoing burn changed the way she thought about childcare
✨ The practical systems that held their family together, from two stable nannies to the rule that she and her husband do not travel at the same time
✨ Why Sunaina believes the idea of having it all at once is the biggest disservice women have done themselves, and the advice she received at twenty that you can have it all but not all at once
✨ Choosing where to be present with her children, from breakfast and bedtime to protected weekends, and letting others meet the needs that someone else can meet
✨ The honest memories of early motherhood in a male dominated industry, from hiding pregnancies and pumping milk in airports to a first work call four hours after giving birth
✨ Why it is okay to have days when it all feels too much, and why building a village matters
✨ Three pieces of advice for raising capital: network relentlessly, find trusted mentors including a well-connected man who can open doors and consider joining forces with a connected co-founder
✨ Why every painful moment is here to teach us something, and how Sunaina runs her own lessons learned sessions
✨ Why a daily meditation practice builds the resilience of the mind, and why she believes it is the investment mums are most likely to put off
About the Guest:
Sunaina Sinha Haldea is Global Head of Private Capital Advisory at Raymond James and the founder of Cebile Capital, which she launched in 2011 and which was acquired by Raymond James in 2021. A Stanford University graduate with an MBA from Harvard Business School, she has been named repeatedly to the Dow Jones list of the 50 Most Influential People in Private Equity and is a regular contributor on the BBC and CNBC. She sits on company boards, chairs a public company board and was an early investor in and chair of Mindful Chef. She is a mum of three and an advocate for maternal mental wellbeing in the workplace.
You can connect with Sunaina on LinkedIn, where she is most active.
About The Host:
I’m Victoria Phipps – a Mum of two, analogue family photographer, personal brand photographer, educator, charity co-founder, marketer and now podcaster! 🎙️
I was raised by a nurturing Mother and an entrepreneurial Father and have inherited traits from both, so the tension between ambition and motherhood is one I grapple with on a daily basis!
I’m fascinated to hear the stories of other women on a similar path, who are striving to build thriving businesses whilst being present for their children. It's a tough juggle, but I hope the conversations shared on this podcast help Mums in business feel less alone and inspired to keep going in pursuit of their dreams.
Head to the Mum Means Business Podcast website for full show notes.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the topics discussed in this conversation, so please do let me know on Instagram where I'm @victoriaphippsmbe or @mummeansbusinesspodcast.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a 5* rating and review!
 

I have always had a love-hate relationship with London. I grew up in the Northwest, only glimpsed the capital from a car window on the way to the Dover ferry and was 17 before I properly visited. I later spent my twenties up and down to London like a yo-yo, and a few short months living there in 2014 taught me that the city energises me in small doses and drains me in large ones.
In this solo episode, I reflect on a busy week of networking in London and why I keep going back, even though there are perfectly good events closer to home. The answer is the women. Earlier this week I attended Wilder Live, hosted by Nicky Denson-Elliott, and the following day my first in-person MOB meetup in Stoke Newington. Both left me energised, expansive and surrounded by women who understand what it means to dance between ambition and nurture.
In this episode I reflect on:
✨ Why London still feels like a playground in small doses and a drain in large ones, and why I keep making the trip for the women I find there
✨ What a year changed at Wilder Live: from walking in knowing three or four people to finding myself among friends, and why community over competition was the agenda of the day
✨ What came up in a brand narrative workshop at my first in-person MOB meetup, and the resistance many millennial mothers feel about getting visible and telling their story without centring themselves too much
✨ Why women can be cruel to one another but can also be the greatest support, and why I have seen far more of the latter since becoming a mother
✨ Why being a founder is a lot like being a mother: it is up to us to build our own village
Takeaway for Mums in Business:
We were never meant to parent in isolation, and nor can we build a thriving business in isolation. If nobody in your real life understands what you are building or why, there are women out there who do. Step into a room with them, online or in person, in your local town or 200 miles away. Whatever works for you.
If you’re ready to connect with like-minded women, here are the communities I mentioned:
Wilder Live 2027 ticketsThe Wilder CollectiveDoing It for the KidsMums Who Build
About The Host:
I’m Victoria Phipps – a Mum of two, analogue family photographer, personal brand photographer, educator, charity co-founder, marketer and now podcaster! 🎙️
I was raised by a nurturing Mother and an entrepreneurial Father and have inherited traits from both, so the tension between ambition and motherhood is one I grapple with on a daily basis!
I’m fascinated to hear the stories of other women on a similar path, who are striving to build thriving businesses whilst being present for their children. It's a tough juggle, but I hope the conversations shared on this podcast help Mums in business feel less alone and inspired to keep going in pursuit of their dreams.
Head to the Mum Means Business Podcast website for full show notes.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the topics discussed in this conversation, so please do let me know on Instagram where I'm @victoriaphippsmbe or @mummeansbusinesspodcast.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a 5* rating and review!

Amelia Sordell has been starting businesses since she was 13, when she began buying designer clothes from thrift stores and sample sales and selling them on eBay. At university she baked brownies, cupcakes and cookies for students on their way into lectures and at 21 she founded the fashion brand Eitherside, which grew to 15 international retailers before a series of decisions brought it to an end.
She rebuilt in the recruitment industry, using personal branding to bring in quality leads, and in 2020 she launched Klowt from her bedroom while in lockdown with two children under four. Klowt grew quickly into a team of 17 and an office on New Bond Street. More recently, Amelia made the bold decision to descale, moving from delivery to consulting and building a business that fits her values rather than her ego.
In this conversation, she shares the story behind each of those chapters with characteristic honesty. She explains why she jumped off the cliff having already built the boat, how small uncomfortable moments build the confidence for the big ones and why embarrassment is simply the price of entry. We talk about why women hold themselves back, what money makes possible and why the best personal brands are really about the audience. It is a conversation about doing it messy and doing it anyway.
💡 “You quitting your job and starting a business or standing on stage or doing a podcast aren’t actually the moments that make you confident. It’s all the little moments of courage that you did before that moment.” - Amelia Sordell
In this conversation, we explore:
✨ Why Amelia describes herself as unemployable and how a lifelong appetite for opportunity led to businesses at 13, at university and at 21
✨ Launching Klowt in lockdown with £1,400 in the bank, a mortgage, two children in nursery and a plan she had already tested while employed
✨ Why she believes the usual advice about saving six months of runway is flawed, and why learning on someone else’s dime is the smarter foundation
✨ Big red button moments, and why confidence is built through small uncomfortable acts long before the big leap
✨ Why embarrassment is the price of entry, and what her daughter’s fall from a horse taught them both about getting back on
✨ The gap she sees between how men and women approach visibility, qualifications and talking about money, and why she believes so much of the holding back is self-imposed
✨ Growing a team of 17, taking an office on New Bond Street and the birthday morning that made her ask what the point of it all was
✨ Why she now calls it founder-led marketing, why the best personal brands put the spotlight on other people and what she would tell her eight-year-old self
About the Guest:
Amelia Sordell is the founder of Klowt, a personal branding agency that helps founders, executives and their teams build revenue-generating personal brands. A serial entrepreneur who started her first business at 13, she previously founded the fashion brand Eitherside before building a career in recruitment and launching Klowt in 2020.
She has since descaled the business and moved from delivery to consulting, working with founders on brand, offer and positioning. Amelia is a mum of two.
Search for Amelia Sordell on any social media platform and you'll find her! She is particularly active on LinkedIn.
About The Host:
I’m Victoria Phipps – a Mum of two, analogue family photographer, personal brand photographer, educator, charity co-founder, marketer and now podcaster! 🎙️
I was raised by a nurturing Mother and an entrepreneurial Father and have inherited traits from both, so the tension between ambition and motherhood is one I grapple with on a daily basis!
I’m fascinated to hear the stories of other women on a similar path, who are striving to build thriving businesses whilst being present for their children. It's a tough juggle, but I hope the conversations shared on this podcast help Mums in business feel less alone and inspired to keep going in pursuit of their dreams.
Head to the Mum Means Business Podcast website for full show notes.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the topics discussed in this conversation, so please do let me know on Instagram where I'm @victoriaphippsmbe or @mummeansbusinesspodcast.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a 5* rating and review!

I have been binge-listening to the Mambition podcast on the recommendation of episode 46 guest and fellow podcaster Fiorenza Rossini. An interview with Lauren Currie MBE, founder of Upfront, got me thinking about confidence, visibility and the resistance so many of us feel to taking up space. I was turning it over all day.
In this solo episode I reflect on where my own confidence comes from and the moment the patriarchy added a "too" in front of the word "confident" - teaching me to read every room and make myself more likeable.
In this episode, I reflect on:
✨ Where my confidence comes from: parents who worked hard, backed each other and took us along for the ride of their lives while still making us feel safe and wanted
✨ The "too" that the patriarchy added: too bossy, too outspoken, too big for my boots, and the habit of assessing every room and adapting to be liked
✨ Why the resistance to taking up space, hitting publish and pitching never fully disappears, and why it deserves some respect for the energy it takes to keep knocking it back
✨ How my visibility and PR work follows my energy, why showing up on Instagram every day did not work for me and what I hope to learn from Pippa Goulden's Get Known sprint
✨ Why confidence is not a fixed state, how a loving childhood can still be dented by later experiences and why the point is to keep working on it
Takeaway for Mums in Business:
"Confidence is not a fixed state. You can have it one day and notice it fall off a cliff the next."
About The Host:
I’m Victoria Phipps – a Mum of two, analogue family photographer, personal brand photographer, educator, charity co-founder, marketer and now podcaster! 🎙️
I was raised by a nurturing Mother and an entrepreneurial Father and have inherited traits from both, so the tension between ambition and motherhood is one I grapple with on a daily basis!
I’m fascinated to hear the stories of other women on a similar path, who are striving to build thriving businesses whilst being present for their children. It's a tough juggle, but I hope the conversations shared on this podcast help Mums in business feel less alone and inspired to keep going in pursuit of their dreams.
Head to the Mum Means Business Podcast website for full show notes.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the topics discussed in this conversation, so please do let me know on Instagram where I'm @victoriaphippsmbe or @mummeansbusinesspodcast.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a 5* rating and review!
 

Sophie Catto spent years at Condé Nast Britain, rising from Branded Content Director at Tatler to Associate Publisher of The World of Interiors and House & Garden. By the end of that chapter she was navigating life as a working mother in senior corporate leadership.
In March 2020 she also took the leap into entrepreneurship, co-founding Catto & Co alongside her husband, combining his construction experience with her commercial expertise and aesthetic vision from years in luxury home publishing. Launching a business in early parenthood is a challenge in itself, and doing it at the outbreak of a global pandemic brought a whole new wave of surprises.
In this episode, Sophie shares what it was like to return from maternity leave just as lockdown began, grieving her father-in-law while launching a business, and why having children created an ambition she had never felt before. We talk about the workplaces that still need to change, the questions investors ask female founders and the Motherless Mothers charity she supports as a trustee. Throughout, Sophie keeps coming back to the same message: motherhood adds far more to your CV than it takes away.
💡 "There's so much negativity in the press around the motherhood penalty and everything you lose. What we wanted to do with Motherhood Works is champion all of the incredible skills that you pick up as a mother: the resilience, the negotiation skills, being able to manage your time incredibly effectively." - Sophie Catto
In this conversation, we explore:
✨ Sophie's return from her first maternity leave just before lockdown, and the wobble of leaving her son for full days while needing her work to be purposeful enough to justify it
✨ Founding Catto & Co with her husband the week before lockdown, and the unusual experience of building a family business while holding down a senior corporate role
✨ Moving in with her mother-in-law the day her father-in-law passed in March 2020, and the strange comfort of a multigenerational household passing a one-year-old around between meetings
✨ How having children changed what Sophie wanted from her work, and why spending her days pushing consumerism in publishing no longer felt purposeful once her own priorities had shifted
✨ The decision to leave Condé Nast for AllBright, and what it has meant to help lead a business acquired and combined with everywoman, which champions women in male-dominated industries
✨ The honest admission that she did not love maternity leave, and why it is perfectly okay to say so out loud
✨ What came out of the research behind Motherhood Works, from the nervousness women feel about returning to work through to the very different challenges of mothering teenagers and young adults
✨ Why so many women need to feel they have permission to set their own rules, from leaving the office on time for nursery pick-up to asking line managers for the support they need
✨ The questions investors ask female founders about whether they plan to have children, and what that reveals about the challenges entrepreneurs face outside the protection of corporate HR policy
✨ Why everyone is winging it all the time, and what it has taught Sophie about saying no and prioritising
✨ Her involvement with the Motherless Mothers charity, the community it has built and why she believes so strongly in supporting women who are mothering without their own mum
About the Guest:
Sophie Catto is Joint Managing Director of AllBright everywoman and a Non-Executive Director of Catto & Co - the design, architecture and construction business she co-founded with her husband in 2020. After more than a decade in luxury publishing at Condé Nast Britain, she joined AllBright in 2022, where she now oversees community, events, digital platform and brand partnerships for a network supporting women at every stage of career and life. She is also a trustee of the Motherless Mothers charity and a mum of two sons.
You can connect with Sophie on LinkedIn, find AllBright everywoman at allbrighteverywoman.com, and discover more about Catto & Co's design, architecture and construction work across London and the Home Counties.
About The Host:
I’m Victoria Phipps – a Mum of two, analogue family photographer, personal brand photographer, educator, charity co-founder, marketer and now podcaster! 🎙️
I was raised by a nurturing Mother and an entrepreneurial Father and have inherited traits from both, so the tension between ambition and motherhood is one I grapple with on a daily basis!
I’m fascinated to hear the stories of other women on a similar path, who are striving to build thriving businesses whilst being present for their children. It's a tough juggle, but I hope the conversations shared on this podcast help Mums in business feel less alone and inspired to keep going in pursuit of their dreams.
Head to the Mum Means Business Podcast website for full show notes.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the topics discussed in this conversation, so please do let me know on Instagram where I'm @victoriaphippsmbe or @mummeansbusinesspodcast.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a 5* rating and review!

This week's solo episode was recorded on International Podcast Day, which feels fitting, because four episodes from podcasts I guested on over the summer all landed within days of each other last week. And with that came the familiar, uneasy feeling: people are going to be sick of me.
So I wanted to talk honestly about those four very different conversations, the stories my brain still tells me about taking up too much space and the genuinely ironic realisation that even though I teach photographers a sales strategy, marketing myself still feels stretchy in a way that chatting about motherhood never does.
In this episode, I reflect on:
✨ A quick tour of the four podcasts - Liz Mosley's Building Your Brand on the rebrand process, a podcast swap with Amanda Reidy on matrescence and identity, A Thought I Kept with Claire Fitzsimmons and The Lifted Lens with fellow photographer Sophie Bowdler on in-person sales
✨ Why the same old story about being too much still shows up, even after a year of practising taking up space on this podcast
✨ The noticeable difference in how it feels to talk about motherhood, where I am happy to chat for days and consider myself the ultimate authority on my own experience, versus talking about what I actually sell
✨ The irony of teaching in-person sales, a strategy I have refined through years of mistakes and genuinely believe in, while still finding it harder to position myself as an authority than almost anything else
✨ Why in-person sales does not feel like selling to me, it feels like chatting, guiding and giving clients exactly what they have already said they want, much like asking a waiter to recommend a wine
✨ The reminder that being sold to, when done well, is a genuinely positive experience, and why photographers so often assume a passive digital gallery feels less salesy when actually it is simply passive
✨ Why I never set out to use this podcast as a typical top of funnel strategy, and why connecting with other women building businesses alongside raising children has turned out to be the whole point
✨ How the conversations on this podcast have shifted me from frantic impatience to genuine faith in the process, trusting that small, aligned actions will move me forward even when I cannot see the whole path
✨ The ongoing, honest acknowledgement that there is still work to do in every part of my business, and that neither I nor my business will ever be a finished product
Takeaway for Mums in Business:
Being sold to can be a genuinely positive experience when it is done right. Whether it is a waiter recommending wine or a photographer guiding you towards the right print, good guidance is not something to be afraid of offering.
About The Host:
I’m Victoria Phipps – a Mum of two, analogue family photographer, personal brand photographer, educator, charity co-founder, marketer and now podcaster! 🎙️
I was raised by a nurturing Mother and an entrepreneurial Father and have inherited traits from both, so the tension between ambition and motherhood is one I grapple with on a daily basis!
I’m fascinated to hear the stories of other women on a similar path, who are striving to build thriving businesses whilst being present for their children. It's a tough juggle, but I hope the conversations shared on this podcast help Mums in business feel less alone and inspired to keep going in pursuit of their dreams.
Head to the Mum Means Business Podcast website for full show notes.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the topics discussed in this conversation, so please do let me know on Instagram where I'm @victoriaphippsmbe or @mummeansbusinesspodcast.
If you enjoyed this episode, please leave a 5* rating and review!

Sonica Beckmann is a British Asian qualified solicitor, entrepreneur, UK 40 Under 40 winner and mum of two. Raised in a low income migrant household, she was the first in her family to attend university and went on to build a distinguished legal career across major multinational organisations.
By the age of 31 she had been appointed Head of Legal at a multi-billion dollar company. In 2023, Sonica made the decision to diversify from law and pursue a long held vision, founding the London based womenswear brand House of Kind. Blending affordable luxury tailoring with a values driven ethos, House of Kind is rooted in the belief that kindness is a powerful form of leadership.
In this episode, Sonica shares the harrowing story from her early days in law that shaped her entire mission and how that experience, alongside years spent navigating rigid, hierarchical corporate cultures across three countries, led her to build a brand grounded in something radically simple: kindness. It is a conversation about grief, resilience, corporate culture, motherhood and why putting humanity back into leadership should never have been considered unconventional in the first place.
💡 "We need a global marker of a good human being. A reminder to be kind and that we're of the same kind." - Sonica Beckmann
In this conversation, we explore:
✨ The devastating story of Sonica's first six weeks as a trainee solicitor, kept in the office until 2am the same week her father passed away, and the archived files that never needed to be touched
✨ How that experience, alongside her mother's stroke a month later, forged a determination to complete her training contract no matter the personal cost, because qualifying meant no one could ever take that from her
✨ Why clothing became such a powerful symbol for Sonica, from arriving at Chancery Lane in a hand-me-down suit that quietly signalled she did not fit in, to founding a brand built around a different kind of uniform altogether
✨ The founding vision behind House of Kind, clothing with subtle details that allow women to recognise an ally the moment they walk into a room
✨ Why the mismatch between the school day and the working day is so fundamentally broken, and why flexibility built on trust rather than suspicion consistently produces happier, more productive teams
✨ The honest reality of returning to the UK after a decade in Kuwait, Dubai and Singapore, and the shock of rediscovering how difficult everyday systems, from healthcare to childcare costs, had become
✨ How House of Kind launched through Sonica's own network in the fashion industry, and why she believes showing genuine kindness throughout her career, without ever expecting anything back, is what made people so willing to help when she finally asked
✨ The partnership with 50:50 Parliament and the Seat at the Table T-shirt, and Sonica's belief that getting more women into rooms where decisions are made is one of the most powerful levers for lasting change
✨ Why Sonica believes fear and competition, whether between women in a boardroom or across wider society, all stem from the same root, and why community and solidarity offer a genuinely different way forward
✨ Turning 40 and the full circle realisation that after decades spent desperately trying to fit in, she has finally reached a place of not caring whether her message of kindness is considered conventional at all
About the Guest:
Sonica Beckmann is a qualified solicitor, entrepreneur and founder of House of Kind, a London based womenswear brand blending affordable luxury tailoring with a values driven ethos rooted in kindness. A UK 40 Under 40 winner with a distinguished legal career spanning multiple countries and major multinational organisations, she now channels that experience into building a brand and a movement that champions female solidarity, inclusivity and representation. House of Kind partners with Dress for Success Greater London, UN Women, Women for Women International, Stonewall UK and 50:50 Parliament. Sonica is also a mum of two.
You can find House of Kind at houseofkind.london, on Instagram, Facebook and Linkedin where you can also connect with Sonica directly. House of Kind is also stocked in a number of Surrey based boutiques and on Wolf and Badger.
About The Host:
I’m Victoria Phipps – a Mum of two, analogue family photographer, personal brand photographer, educator, charity co-founder, marketer and now podcaster! 🎙️
I was raised by a nurturing Mother and an entrepreneurial Father and have inherited traits from both, so the tension between ambition and motherhood is one I grapple with on a daily basis!
I’m fascinated to hear the stories of other women on a similar path, who are striving to build thriving businesses whilst being present for their children. It's a tough juggle, but I hope the conversations shared on this podcast help Mums in business feel less alone and inspired to keep going in pursuit of their dreams.
Head to the Mum Means Business Podcast website for full show notes.
I would love to hear your thoughts on the topics discussed in this conversation, so please do let me know on Instagram where I'm @victoriaphippsmbe or @mummeansbusinesspodcast.
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