Stephanie Spangler was a brand new mom with a four-month-old daughter and a job she dreaded going back to.

Her sister Christie Brinley was coming back from her OWN maternity leave with a growing feeling that she needed something that was HERS.

Both of them wanted the same thing — a space where they could actually get work done while their babies were safely cared for right next door.

A coworking space with on-site childcare. A real one. Beautifully designed. Flexible. Built around the actual reality of being a working mother.

That place did not exist in their part of Southern California.

So The Cove sisters built it. 💛

In this episode, Brittany sits down with Stephanie and Christie — the sisters behind The Cove in Carlsbad, California — to talk about what it actually took to open the doors of a brick-and-mortar business in five months with their own money, their own hands, and no marketing budget.

Here is Stephanie’s version of the launch, almost word for word:

“We did not have the money, we did not have a designer, we did not have a marketing budget. We had our own garages piled up with furniture, our parents handing out flyers on windshields, and we had our vision. Five months later we opened the doors.”

Five months, mama. From “we should open one of these” to turning the key.

Plus — the chamber of commerce move most entrepreneurs skip, the Lamborghini owner who called to complain about a flyer on his windshield, why in-person legwork beats digital ads for brick-and-mortar every time, the “say yes era” of local collaboration that fills a space without a marketing budget, the family-like staff of mamas-with-their-own-kids who run the Cove alongside the sisters, the flexible membership model that respects real mom life, and Christie’s quiet reflection on why building something that is HERS mattered more than anything after a life change she did not see coming.

I visited The Cove during the Money Hungry Mama Tour. These sisters opened their doors to our community. Now we open our audience to them.

For every mama who has been quietly waiting for someone else to build the thing she needs. The person building it next might as well be you. 💛

Find The Cove: @thecovecarlsbad on Instagram | thecove.work

Every woman you have ever watched command a room has one.

Leslie Jesperson’s is a pair of glitter boots.
Mine is a pair of heart glasses.
Yours might be a lipstick. A pair of earrings. A certain blazer. A ring you only wear when you need to channel the version of you who does not flinch.

The Activator.

Leslie teaches it. I live it. And this week on the podcast, we had the conversation I did not know I needed about why some women light up a room the second they walk in — and the specific, intentional, embodied practice behind it.

Leslie Jesperson is a speaking coach. A 30-year performer. The founder of The Everyday Celebrity. She has been paid to be on stages since she was NINE years old. And she teaches women how to be undeniable in rooms where they used to feel invisible.

Here is the sentence she dropped on me that I have been thinking about every day since:

“You don’t ask to be chosen. You position yourself to be the undeniable choice.”

In this episode we unpack what that actually means. The Activator — the physical signal to your nervous system that YOU are her now. The somatic work that happens BEFORE you walk into the room (because your body does not know there is no tiger, and breathing is not enough). The alter ego practice that lets you show up on your worst, most bloated, most emotionally depleted day and still command the stage.

Plus — the unhinged thing Leslie did to get invited to speak at a major conference (she bought a ticket to an event she did not need, drove herself to New York City, picked up a speaker she had never met from her hotel, and became her plus-one — and it worked). The difference between SPEAKING as service and trauma-dumping as introduction. Why you have to be able to watch yourself back before you can expect anyone else to. And what it actually took Leslie to build the business she has today, after a hurricane, a corporate job that paid fourteen dollars an hour, and starting over with nothing but her mom’s basement and Facebook Live. 💛

For every mama who has ever walked into a room feeling like a smaller version of herself. The woman you want to be is already in you. The Activator is how you turn her on.

Find Leslie: @lesliejespersen on Instagram | theeverydaycelebrity.com | her book, The Everyday Celebrity, available for pre-order now.

Beth and her co-founder, work wife, and co-author Victoria have built AND sold two consulting businesses together.

They are also the authors of Entrepreneur Like a Mother — one of the first serious business books written for mothers who want to build, scale, and sell real companies.

The book is out in the world now. And on this week’s episode, Brittany sits down with Beth to talk shop — one author six weeks post-launch, the other a month into hers, both honest about what it actually takes to write a book while raising kids, keeping businesses alive, and refusing to pretend any of it is easy.

If you have ever quietly wondered if you have a book in you, this episode is your masterclass.

Here is what Beth said that stopped me cold:

“A hundred and eighty rejections for five yeses. I got rejected by people I knew very well. I got ghosted. I got sent to other people. I’ve never been rejected more in my life. I cold-called a thousand clients once. I think the rejection rate on launching this book was still higher.”

That is the real math. And nobody tells you that at the start.

In this episode, Beth and Brittany break down the actual tactics behind a book launch that works. Bulk buys and how to turn a speaking fee into 500 copies sold. The advanced reader copy strategy and the four asks that make it real. Why bookstore signings are usually not the move and what to do instead. The 12,000 copies in one week truth about bestseller lists. Why mission-based books outperform ambition-based books. And the book proposal exercise that reveals whether you really have a book in you.

Woven throughout — the universal business lessons that apply to every mama building anything. Beth and Victoria’s macro and micro pivot rule: when a problem isn’t moving, do the exact opposite of what you have been doing. The one hard thing a day rule for drowning mompreneurs. And the rejection is redirection reframe that keeps you going when the no’s are stacking.

For every mama carrying a book-shaped dream in her chest. And every mama sick of the overnight-success lie, ready to hear what the real work actually looks like. 💛

Find Beth and Victoria: femalemavericks.com | Entrepreneur Like a Mother available wherever books are sold | Beth’s Substack: Sellable

Money Hungry Mama Book - https://www.amazon.com/Money-Hungry-Mama-Ultimate-Looking/dp/B0FTLRBSLF

Samantha spent her first year in business selling five-dollar-a-month idea packs for parents who wanted alternatives to screen time.

Plenty of subscribers. Not enough to self-sustain.

So when she got laid off and had to decide — go all-in on the dream or go find another job — she did something most entrepreneurs refuse to do.

She went back to her actual customers and asked: what do you really want?

And here is what they told her: "We do not want more ideas. We want things DONE for us."

That answer is the entire reason Beyond the Screen Families exists in the form it does today.

In this episode, Brittany sits down with Samantha — a 20+ year educator (teacher, administrator, higher ed, educational publishing professional) and the founder of Beyond the Screen Families — to unpack the pivot that transformed her entire business.

She sunset the five-dollar idea pack entirely. She built an in-person after-school enrichment program that is now the premier offering in her part of Southern California. And she created activity boxes designed around prompts instead of instructions — because the real learning happens in the trial and error, not in following step-by-step directions.

Here is the business lesson every mompreneur listening needs to hear:

Your customer does not want more learning. She wants transformation delivered.

Plus: why Samantha had to let go of her control factor and let other teachers run her enrichment programs (the weight that lifted the moment she stopped teaching every class herself), how 20+ years of lived education experience became the foundation of her business (a reinforcement of The Skill You're Standing On), the story of her daughter's "clay class" where the teacher just sat and watched an iPad teach the kids, why in-person service businesses are the one thing AI can't take, and the networking play that unlocked her entire business.

For every mama whose current offer isn't landing. The answer isn't more ideas. 💛

Find Samantha: @beyondthescreenfamilies on Instagram

If you are 38 and quietly wondering if you missed your window —
If you are 43 and thinking "this cannot be all I was built for" —
If you are 51 and looking around at the life you built one brick at a time, feeling the pull of more —
If you are 55 and starting to whisper "what if I just... began again?" —

Mama, this episode is for you.

Emily Keltz did not expect to start over at 43. She had three children. Fifteen years at home with the kids. A marriage. A life she had been building one brick at a time for two decades.

And then, as happens for so many women somewhere between 35 and 55, something inside her said "this is not it."

What Emily did next — the career tries, the pivots that didn't stick, the certifications earned slowly, the quiet patient work of rebuilding her own power — became the entire foundation of her business today.

She is now the founder of Empowered by Emily, an NLP practitioner, a certified life coach, a certified relationship coach, and the creator of The Divorce Detox — a program for women navigating midlife reinvention, whether they are staying in a season, leaving one, or just quietly stuck.

Note Emily's own words, carefully: "I'm not advocating that route for anybody. I support women in finding their power within and channeling that — whether they're staying, whether they're leaving, whether they're just feeling stuck or unfulfilled."

In this episode, Brittany sits down with Emily to unpack the slow, patient work of reinvention. The career tries that didn't stick. The ones that did. The grace required to build a business on top of lived experience. The science of why healing takes time. And the truth Emily carries into every session:

You can rewrite the next chapter at any age. Starting right now.

Plus: why Emily teaches women to look for GREEN flags in relationships (not just red ones), the surprisingly simple sales reframe Brittany teaches live on the episode (stop using I and me in your captions), how Emily built an entire coaching business on top of 20+ years of lived expertise, the first three to five years of business as the real survival window, and why Emily is wary of coaches who gloat about numbers and promise magical results.

For every mama 35 to 55 who has been quietly wondering if it is too late. It is not. 💛

Find Emily: @empowered.byemily on Instagram | thedivorcedetox.com

Money Hungry Mama BOOK - https://a.co/d/04HXaEwG

Kathleen and Melanie were maid-of-honor-level best friends BEFORE they started a business together.

Then they started Explore the Americas — a custom Latin America travel company built from a scuba certification, a shared love of the Ava Brothers, and a decision to leap during the hardest possible moment to launch a travel business.

And here is what nobody in the mompreneur space tells you: partnering with your best friend can either be the smartest thing you ever do, or the fastest way to lose both the business AND the friendship.

Kathleen and Melanie figured out the difference.

In this episode, Brittany sits down with both of them to unpack the surprisingly practical playbook that has protected their friendship AND their company at the same time. Slack for business, WhatsApp for friendship. Different channels. Explicit permission before crossing them. Weekly team meetings where they play Two Truths and a Lie. Virtual yoga taught by their Bolivia-based team member. Culture of joy on purpose.

And when I asked them what the biggest risk they had ever taken was, Kathleen said the answer I did not expect:

"Starting a travel business in the middle of a global pandemic. But there is no reward without risk."

This is the conversation for the mama who has been quietly considering going into business with her best friend, her sister, her cousin, her neighbor. And for the mama who has been considering it and BACKING away because she is scared of the friendship blowing up.

Both fears are valid. Kathleen and Melanie's playbook makes both fears solvable.

Plus: how they built the whole business standing on their existing tourism expertise (a beautiful reinforcement of The Skill You're Standing On), why their biggest clients are busy professional moms who want the ease of a Disney trip but the meaning of Latin America travel, the trade-show networking play that turned into their entire supplier network, why word-of-mouth built the whole business before they spent a dollar on ads, and the "you cannot Google your way to expertise — you have to actually GO there" advice for anyone selling anything experiential.

For every mama with a business dream she cannot start alone. 💛

Find Kathleen and Melanie: @explorethamericastravel on Instagram | exploretheamericastravel.com

Grab the Money Hungry Mama Guide - https://a.co/d/06eazQVu

Every mompreneur has an ask she has been afraid to send.

The DM to the dream brand. The pitch to the local business. The email to the podcast host. The request to the school district. The sponsorship inquiry to the neighborhood pizzeria.

And most of us never send it. Because we walk into the ask thinking about what we NEED — and forget to think about what we can OFFER.

Mandy is here to fix that.

Mandy is a sports mom, a 20+ year magazine publishing and marketing pro, and the founder of Sponsor My Athlete — a 60-minute online course teaching parents how to get local businesses to sponsor their kids' athletic expenses. Not through fundraisers. Not through popcorn sales. Not through donations.

Through marketing partnerships.

In this episode of The Money Hungry Mama Podcast, Brittany sits down with Mandy to break down the ask-reframe that changes everything:

"Don't walk in and say, can you give us $250 for our season. Walk in and say, here's what we can offer YOU."

That single shift is the difference between crickets and $4,000-a-month recurring sponsorship deals for kids' teams.

And here's the thing, mama — it applies far beyond sports.

If you have ever wanted to pitch a brand collaboration, ask a local business to sponsor your event, land a podcast guest spot, get featured in a magazine, or make ANY ask that felt too big — Mandy's framework works. Because the psychology of the ask is universal.

Plus: how Mandy built the whole business using her existing PR skillset (proof of The Skill You're Standing On), the 20-minutes-a-day method that lands sponsorships between carpool runs, why she priced her course at $249 on purpose (Brittany affirms this with her own Money Hungry Mama Table story), the chamber-and-BNI networking play that gets you in front of decision-makers, why in-person asks with your kid present are near-impossible to turn down, and the money lessons Mandy is teaching her 11-year-old through this exact process.

For every mama sitting on an ask she's been too scared to send — reframe it. And send it. 💛

Find Mandy: @carpoolstocontracts on Instagram | sponsormyathlete.com

Grab a copy of The Money Hungry Mama- https://www.amazon.com/Money-Hungry-Mama-Ultimate-Looking/dp/B0FTLRBSLF

Every wellness voice in the mompreneur space will tell you to practice self-care. Take a bath. Put your phone away. Tune out.

Jyoti calls it something completely different. And once you hear it, you cannot un-hear it.

"I don't call it self-care. I call it presence with yourself. It's not about tuning out. It's about tuning in — to what you actually need, not the noise of what everybody else needs."

Jyoti is the founder of The Beauty Way — a clean, non-toxic body care line paired with daily mantras designed for busy mamas who cannot commit to 30-minute meditations or weekly yoga classes but who desperately need a moment of themselves in the day.

She built the whole company as a stay-at-home mom with a one-year-old daughter and a three-year-old son. She started while showering. She built while nap-timing. And she launched with an audience she had spent SIX MONTHS quietly cultivating before the products were even ready.

In this episode of The Money Hungry Mama Podcast, Brittany sits down with Jyoti to talk about the daily practice that changes everything: the shower ritual with a mantra, the "Sunday reset" that goes on the family calendar, the difference between martyr-mom self-care and the kind of presence that actually feeds you.

Plus: how Jyoti's mom modeled radical self-care in the 80s and 90s before anyone was talking about it, why she emailed Oprah Daily's director and got a response within 30 minutes (the audacious ask lives on), the six-month audience buildup that made her launch actually LAND, why she refuses to make fear-based decisions, and why she believes women building wealth is one of the most powerful movements happening in the world right now.

For every mama who has been told to "practice self-care" and quietly wondered why it never actually feels like a break. 💛

Find Jyoti: @thebeautyway_co on Instagram | thebeautywayco.com

Grab your copy of The Money Hungry Mama Guide - https://a.co/d/04HXaEwG