‘Push through’: Moment 30yo made $400,000 in just 24 hours

A young Aussie had just lost her job when took a risk that has paid off in an unthinkable way.

An Aussie mum turned her redundancy into an opportunity by building an incredibly successful business after uncovering a glaring gap in the market.

Racquel Ferraro, 30, was having a hard time during the pandemic. She was pregnant, had been made redundant, and was living through really uncertain financial times.

She had previously worked as a travel consultant but had “zero drive or motivation”. Before that, she had started a law degree but never finished it.

Ms Ferraro said that she noticed the gap in the market while navigating the “uncertainties” of losing her job, along with everything that comes along with being a new mum.

Racquel Ferraro started her own business after being made redundant. Picture: Supplied

She saw a huge gap in the market and jumped on it. Picture: Supplied

When she started hunting for baby clothes, she found it challenging to find sustainably made and high-quality items.

The idea was pretty simple; she wanted to create a brand that “filled the void”, one where people could buy baby clothes that were timeless and high-quality enough to be passed on through families and friends or kept as keepsakes.

Fast-forward to 2024, and her business Cinnamon Baby is thriving.

The young mum recently posted a video in which you could see the raw emotion on her face as she watched the stock of her latest collection sell out in record time.

“Wow,” she said at one point before explaining that the day’s target was $100,000, which was achieved in the first eight minutes.

“One of our recent launches of a collection made $400,000 in 24 hours,” she said.

Those moments are powerful because the business wasn’t an instant success.

She started the business Cinnamon Baby from her home in Melbourne, and when she launched in 2020, there was “no interest” or traction, and the brand wasn’t going viral.

It would have been easy to give up; she was a new mum and she had the very good excuse of focusing on that before returning to the workforce, but Ms Ferraro decided to stick with it.

“I sat with myself for a week and I decided I had to push through and give it a shot,” she said.

Ms Ferraro said that, while it may sound “stupid” or simplistic, the best advice she can give anyone is “don’t give up”. Perseverance is a huge key to success.

When she started the business and it didn’t take off, she doubted herself, found it “not fun”, and thought she wasn’t “good at it”, but she just kept going.

She’s learnt that the more you push through, the more you learn, the better you get, and eventually, that will lead to success.

That doesn’t mean there won’t be hiccups along the way. She recently went online to share how she “wasted” $10,000 on her business.

She paid $10,000 for a website refresh only to discover after she had paid the cash she had, instead, just paid for an audit of her website.

The 30-year-old said she learnt a big lesson from this experience about making sure she’s holding people accountable.

“Anytime I met someone who specialised or had expertise in an area, I’d always say, ‘I have no idea’ or ‘whatever you think’,” she said.

“I would kind of just act dumb or not really listen and just trust their word.”

Ms Ferraro said the $10,000 fail made her realise you need to be “really careful” with that mentality because people will take “advantage of you” and use your ignorance against you.

“A lot of people don’t know what they’re doing, and you have to be careful trusting people with your money or business,” she said.

She’s also made some mistakes along the way. Picture: TikTok/racquelferraro

The 30-year-old focused on building a community. Picture: Supplied

Ms Ferraro told news.com.au that the biggest lesson she’s learned so far is that she has to leave her ego at the door when it comes to her business.

“Learning to overcome my ego and doing what will make my business the most money, even if that looks different to what I wanted to first achieve when I started,” she said.

The business owner said she’s been guilty of making decisions because she thought they made the business look better.

For instance, in the past, she wanted to have lots of staff or a massive warehouse without accepting that the business might not be ready to take on such fixed costs.

The 30-year-old said that comes from “making business decisions based on what I thought business success looked like instead of doing what was actually best for my business”.

“I’ve definitely had a lot of stress and anxiety through my business journey. I take everything very personally as if my business is a part of me so whenever something goes wrong I take that heavily,” she said.

She built the business up from her house. Picture: Supplied

It's become a massive success story. Picture: Supplied

However, Ms Ferraro stuck with the business, and it slowly but surely built up. She credits so much to her “community” approach with customers.

She wants every customer to have a great experience and to feel that they are not just buying from a brand but also part of a larger community.

“We try and include our community as much as possible. We try and include our community in photo shoots. We’re going to start doing community events, basically, anything our community needs we are there for,” she said.

“We pride ourselves on being customer-focused, always listening and responding to the needs and feedback of our supporters. It’s this connection with our community that has helped us grow and evolve.”

Originally published as ‘Push through’: Moment 30yo made $400,000 in just 24 hours