another woman entrepreneur

I had coffee with Stephanie Webster this week who is the entrepreneur behind CTBites.  I loved meeting with Stephanie and our conversation about world food domination in Connecticut.  But at the end of the day what I really loved is her story. 

Stephanie moved back to Connecticut with her husband and three kids from Seattle a few years back.  She had worked in the tech industry.  I believe she worked at Microsoft if my memory is still in tact from last week.  Stephanie grew up in NYC.  She found herself with three kids under the age of 10 years old living in Westport, CT thinking to herself that she needed something to keep her mind occupied particularly between the hours of 10 and 3.  That would be the hours the kids are in school and perhaps after an hour of exercise and the morning errands.  I so know that story.  So she began CTBites. 

She began writing reviews of restaurants in the Fairfield country area.  Soon people found her site and women contacted her to see if she wanted them to send their reviews in to her too.  Before she knew it she had created a community and grew the site into eating in, eating out, kids bites, ingredients, gadgets and food talks.  Not only that, she has 55,000 uniques a month and is growing.  Wow! 

Stephanie came to talk to me about how she should grow the business.  It was a fruitful conversation, no pun intended.  For all the people in Connecticut you will soon see other CT counties grow on the site, more crowd sourcing from her community including weekend events and possibly information on Inns for those coming to CT for a relaxing weekend. 

Before Stephanie knows it, she will have a revenue steam and more viewers than she ever dreamed of.  Maybe a life style business or maybe a business that large media companies might be interested in purchasing.  Regardless, like Jill, we won't be seeing Stephanie at tech networking events because she has 3 kids under 10 and lives in Westport, CT.  Her evenings probably consist of homework, feeding the family and managing everything else for the family that needs to happen.  What is impressive is that during the hours of 10-3 she has created a platform for the Fairfield county community. 

Another women entrepreneur success story....