They say necessity is the mother of invention. Nothing could be truer for Stephanie Conduff, a 35-year-old Cherokee mother of two for whom the need to pump breast milk privately, in public, inspired her to create the Leche Lounge in 2015.
“I was in the law library at school and was pumping breast milk in a side room when the janitor walked in on me. I felt really violated and started thinking about other women,” Conduff recalls her lightbulb moment. “I have family and friends who are hourly employees and don’t have offices or doors to close. And I thought, ‘What are they supposed to do?’”
This tribal lawyer got to work prototyping portable, modular lactation stations, and soon this “side gig” became a full-time, revenue-generating business. “It is really exciting to be providing a solution for women in the workplace and for businesses who want to meet the legal requirements and really empower families,” says Conduff, referring to federal and state requirements for businesses to provide private spaces for women to pump food for their babies.
Read more of the interview over here.