Interview by NPR in Utah

I was interviewed at KCPW - NPR in Utah for "The Bottom Line".  I hadn't met anyone there yet and didn't know what they were going to ask me. I was blown away by how prepared for the interview they were. I was nervous but it was fun!  

Click here to listen: 

NPR Interview with Jana Francis

Kinda Funny

Someone just sent me these and it made me LOL! 

A slice of Steal Network history.

Just over four years ago...

...dreams can come true, people. You just gotta make it happen.

From: Jana Francis 

Date: Sun, Feb 10, 2008 at 10:10 PM

Subject: Website

To: Emily Millard

Hi Emily!

How are you? Are you working at Simmons? I am writing to see if you do freelance websites. I am still at KSL but I am starting my own Internet company this year. On nights and weekends I am working on it and hope to be able to work on it full-time sometime this year. I have told no one at work.

It is a very exciting concept and I am hoping to launch the website by the end of March. The main company will probably be called Steals, Inc. and the first website I’ll launch will be www.babysteals.com. Right now if you go there, I just redirected it to blogspot where I have a write-up about it. I think you will like it!

The past few weeks I have been researching how to build the website – I have almost signed up with Network Solutions ecommerce and Yahoo has one, too. But the templates they have available although customizable, aren’t what I want. I just downloaded Dreamweaver and it’s all greek to me!

Anyway, before I bore you to death with all my chatter, I am wondering if you do any freelance work. If so, let’s discuss! I’ll give you an idea of what I need to have done and we can chat about it.

If all goes well, in a year or so I’ll have quite the company going!

Feel free to call me on my cell phone or email me back! 

Jana

My "Aha Moment"

I was recently invited by Mutual of Omaha to come to the last stop on their nationwide Aha Moment tour in Salt Lake City and record with them my Aha moment. It was really fun meeting them and learning about their tour around the nation. They titled my video "Create the live you want".

One year ago today ....

...was operation "We Send Joy" where my partner Rett and I flew to Canada to surprise some customers in Vancouver BC, Edmonton AB, and Calgary AB at their front doors by hand delivering some of their orders. Here is the blog post and video that details the amazing trip!

what keeps me going

A 2-day contest on BabySteals last summer asked the simple question, "What does BabySteals and our Facebook page mean to you?"

The answers to that question is why I do what I do. This is what I sometimes refer to on late nights or moments of doubt or overwhelm and it keeps me going.  It's hard to pick my favorite from 1 to 3,176, but this quote takes the cake: "Thanks for making it easier to be a mom :)"

 http://babysteals.com/aa50k.php

What I shipped in 2010, Seth Godin style

I worked my tail off in 2010. Not that much different than any other year - I work hard all the time! It was an incredibly busy and phenomenal year for my business yet at the end of it looking back it's hard to remember what was accomplished beyond numbers and impressive stats. I was reading Seth Godin’s blog post challenging people to make a list and post what they ‘shipped’ in 2010. ‘Shipped’ according to Seth is accomplishing something or launching a project that scares you, whether it was a hit or not.

Seth says “it's actually difficult to publish a list like this... maybe that's another reason we hesitate to ship, because we don't want to tout too much. Your turn to post a list somewhere... You'll probably be surprised at how much you accomplished last year. Go ahead and share with your friends, colleagues or the web... don't be shy.”

Alright Seth – off the top of my head here’s some of what shipped in 2010.

• Launched our corporate website StealNetwork.com

• Hired and trained 26 additional employees on our staff

• Fired 3

• Two news appearances on KUTV (1) (2)

• BabySteals.com 2nd anniversary (we party so hard online at Steal Network for anniversaries; so they’re quite the project to pull off)

• Enough live video chats on our ustream channel to result in 12,750 viewers

• Helped my beautiful friend Dunia raise $2,600 for a fan Jess B. to buy a gravestone for her baby. The story in her words part 1 and part 2

• Moved our entire operation from a 5,000 sq foot warehouse to a 15,000 sq foot warehouse

• ScrapbookSteals 1st anniversary

• Traveled around Canada for a 4 day “Operation we send joy” tour, crashing a BabySteals.com “meetup” and surprising fans by hand delivering orders to their door

• Spoke at 2 Conferences

• Took BabySteals.com to two steals per day – 9am and 9pm

• #3 in StartupNation’s leading moms in business

• KidSteals 1st anniversary

• Completely changed backend systems for our websites to a custom interface (don't fool yourself- this was Rett & Marco)

• Attended 6 Industry tradeshows including CHA, OR (twice), Kidshow, Magic and ABC

• One of 10 finalists for “Best Entrepreneur - Service Business” Stevie Awards for Women in Business

• Launched KidCrawl.com Read about it here

• “Today’s Steal” iPhone app – available in the iTunes store

Seth says “I didn't do all this myself... far from it.” And neither did I. Thanks to a truly unbelievable business partner (Rett) and a great staff that help make these projects come to fruition.

Here's to a successful 2011 - luckily I've already started on many things that will 'ship' soon! And as Seth says...GO make something happen!

we're legit

let me just say it's surreal driving down the freeway at night, looking over and thinking, "hey that logo is pretty legit". then realizing, "holy crap- that's mine".

steal network. we send joy.

I Need a Vacation!

Day 3- I've been meaning and meaning to post updates on BabySteals, but I'm very sleep deprived and have minute brain capacity. For a business update, go here: www.babysteals.com/blog

For a kid update, here's what's up:

Baby Jane:

• Princess Baby Jane turns TWO tomorrow! How, may I ask, did that happen? I'm literally tearing up just thinking about it. More on my reflections on her tomorrow. I'm taking the day off from KSL to have a special day with her. We're going to get her haircut and maybe a photo shoot at my mom's. (I haven't asked you yet Mom, is that ok? Or maybe Saturday) We're having her birthday party Strawberry Shortcake style tomorrow night at 7pm. Everyone is invited!
• Jane was picked among lots of awesome baby signers to film for the next series of Baby Signing Time! See the video bar below for some of our outtakes from her audition videos, as well as the one we finally had to use because she wasn't in a signing mood when we were shooting the original audition footage.
• Right after being chosen to film for this, Jane fell on the tile and chipped a good part of her front left tooth off at an angle! It was so heartbreaking because she was in a lot of pain. We of course took her immediately to our dentist who immediately referred us to a pediatric dentist who tried to fix it right then. Unfortunately she screamed uncontrollably and would not hold still even a little. They told us the only way was to take her to Primary Children's on their allocated surgery date, and have her put under for the procedure. Knowing it was our only option we booked the date but I was sick about it. Day after day it didn't feel right so the day before I chickened out and cancelled it. I couldn't bare to have her 'put under' to fix a tooth. We scheduled another attempt for Tuesday to try again at the pediatric dentist. We made very sure she was exhausted before and would be totally asleep. She was completely asleep for the beginning and we were sure it would work. The dentist even did. About 25% into it she jolted awake and freaked. Failed miserably - we'll try again in 2 months. Poor thing.
  

Brandon:

• Brandon is playing Taylorsville Baseball with boys from our neighborhood. Boy can that child hit a ball! At his game last night he came about 1 inch from catching a hit right above third.
  
• He's upset today because most of the kids in his school are going to Hollywood Connection for a work completion reward. He can't go because there was one assignment he forgot to turn in. I feel for him today because he is devastated. I almost kept him home this morning from school in protest but wasn't sure that would send him the right message about responsibility.
• Brandon is loving skateboarding and has some natural talent. He is very coordinated and gets very excited when he masters a new trick!
  

Easton:

• Easton is completely obsessed right now with two things:
  
• building and rebuilding skateboards, and like Brandon, mastering new tricks.
• Solving Rubix cubes. With his eyes closed and his arms in the air. Literally.
• I can't believe he is an 8th grader and is almost done with school this year. The kid is way taller than me and has the thickest arms. He has a body just like his dad.
  
• Everyone confuses Easton and Eric's voice now. They can pose as each other on the phone easily and consistently trick people. Be skeptical if you call.
  

Something is coming.....

Monday, 9am MST. Be there or lose out!
www.babysteals.com