Your Name: Danielle Gletow

Business Name: One Simple Wish, a program that grants wishes to foster children

Type of Business: Social Enterprise

Business Location: Trenton, New Jersey, United States

Website www.onesimplewish.org
Twitter www.twitter.com/onesimplewish
Facebook www.facebook.com/onesimplewish

Reason for starting
In 2006, my husband Joe and I became foster parents. After a year of fostering and after the placement of our now adopted daughter, we vowed to create a way for more people to support children at such a confusing and vulnerable time in their lives. We knew that if more people knew how to help and what the children needed, they would definitely get involved. Children in foster care are so often forgotten in our society and we wanted to create a way for their voices to be heard and for them to believe that despite hardships and obstacles in life, wishes do come true.

How do you define success?
I wake up every day and I am excited to get going. To me, that is the ultimate definition of success. When you love what you do and you can’t wait to do it every single day, that is an amazing feeling. No amount of money or fame or recognition will ever beat that.

Biggest Success
So far I think our biggest media success has been getting the attention of NBC Nightly News and being featured on their program on December 3, 2012. But I truly believe that the biggest success was making it past the one year mark during a during economy when starting a charity was a huge risk.

What is your top challenge and how have you addressed it?
Our biggest challenge right now is finding the right people to hire to ensure the continued growth of the company. Nonprofit jobs don’t pay as well as for profits and we’re also still a fairly new organization at just four years old so we struggle to find people who want to put in the time, energy and passion for a small salary. But we’re getting there!

Who is your most important role model?
As strange as it may sound, I don’t really have one. I admire many people in my life for different reasons but I wouldn’t call any one of them a role model. I admire my mother’s kindness and willingness to help anyone. I admire my father’s charisma and ability to command a room. I admire my husband’s stability and calm manner of handling difficult circumstances. I admire my children’s imaginations. I admire my best friend’s sense of style and grace. I take a little bit from everyone.