Meet the Founder: Kirsten Craven, Kidzta
Here, we chat with Kirsten Craven founder of Kidzta making meaningful gifting for kids easy.
Kirsten joined the Atto Academy in our beta group from March 2021, and Kidzta will be joining the Atto Accelerator 2021 batch.
Learn more about Kirsten, how they came up with the business idea, their wins, big lessons, and what to look forward to from Kidzta.
Where did you get the idea for Kidzta?
Average gifts and excessive consumerism has become standard practice in kids’ gifting. My other mum friends and I talk about it every time a birthday or Christmas comes around.
But one present kicked me into action. My daughter Cleo received a Christmas present from Grandma that was doing my head in. It was soft toy that ‘lived’ in an ill-fitting plastic egg. The amount of cupboard space it took up, plus the impossibility of getting it back in the egg was simply ridiculous. I couldn’t believe it was in our house and that my well-intentioned mum had wasted her money on it. I was desperate to throw it out, but felt terrible that yet another poorly-made, plastic toy was ending up in landfill.
Knowing this was the norm for most families, I decided I was in a unique position to help change gifting behaviour to benefit kids and parents everywhere.
No one else was fixing it in a meaningful way, so I would do something about it.
What problem is Kidzta solving?
Kidzta takes the guess work out of buying kids’ gifts. It’s a gift registry for kids that helps put kids and parents back in control of meaningful, quality gift giving. Kidzta makes it easy to collaborate with other gifters to buy one amazing gift, rather than 20 average toys which collect dust in the cupboard, and ultimately end up in landfill.
What were you doing prior to starting your business? Did you start it as a side project or did you go all-in from the get-go?
I run my own marketing consultancy, Flock Effect. Kidzta is still a side project. But the benefit of both being my own business is I can flex time up and down as required to make sure that Kidzta becomes a reality, whilst still ensuring I provide for my family.
What was the first thing you did to get Kidzta up and running?
Scribbled down on paper a loose business strategy and conducted market research to verify market size potential.
Was being a startup founder always part of your career plan? If not, what was?
It wasn’t. But in hindsight, I think I was always heading in this direction. My Pa started his own business, a business that is still run by my family. He was a natural entrepreneur who became a game changer in his industry. He taught me what an individual can achieve if they put their mind to it and normalised business ownership.
In the lead up to Kidzta, I’ve been a career marketer. I’ve worked at both creative agency and client side, obsessing about solving customer problems and creating powerful brands that resonate and drive positive commercial outcomes. It would be easy to keep doing - I enjoy it. But over time, I’ve realised how much I want to make a positive impact on the world and make a difference. I’ve progressively found I’m leaning into more purpose driven opportunities.
Kidzta gives me the chance to pursue something I’m passionate about; leveraging what I’m good at in a meaningful way.
And most rewarding is that it’s in the context of my own business.
What would be the one piece of advice you’d give to other female founders looking to take the leap?
The start-up world is a very generous one, be brave and start talking about your idea.
People are ready and waiting to help you make it happen.
What’s been your biggest lesson so far?
Life throws big curveballs (like COVID!), and yet despite this I still can’t stop thinking about Kidzta. I’ve learnt how passionate I am about the business and that I won’t be satisfied if I never see it through.
What’s been the biggest win so far?
Kidzta made it to the grand final of a startup pitch competition. It was great receiving that eternal validation and confidence boost so early in our start-up journey.
What’s next for Kidzta?
Our MVP will go live soon! We’re strapped in and excited to prove product market fit, building the Kidzta community around this different buying behaviour for kids.
How has Atto helped you with the Kidzta journey?
I’m someone who gets passionate about THE vision. There’s so many parts of the business that will make Kidzta what we intend it to be, but Atto has helped ground that vision to make it achievable.
Atto has helped give us focus, invaluable reality checks and guidance from seasoned start-up and business experts, proven in their own right.
Personally, I’ve also benefited from simply being a member of the Atto community. Being a part of a group of other passionate and motivated female start-up founders has been inspiring and a constant source of motivation. Everyone is willing to offer advice, connections and encouragement. You have your own cheer squad that are going on the journey with you.