Your Name: Sandy & Stevie D’Andrea
Business Name: Jewels For Hope, a handmade jewelry company that donates to different charities
Type of Business: Clothing & Accessories
Business Location: Stamford, Connecticut, United States
Website www.jewelsforhope.net
Twitter @jewelsforhopect
Facebook www.facebook.com/Jewels4Hope
Pinterest www.pinterest.com/jewelsforhope/
Reason for starting
My mom (Sandy) started this company when she was a caregiver to my grandmother. She stayed at home with her for years, so during that time she started making jewelry and giving it to the Hospice nurses who came to our house. After my grandmother passed, she started selling the jewelry online & donating to Hospice. I joined less than a year later and since then we have grown to donate to 20+ organizations.
How do you define success?
We define success by making someone’s day. We like to make other people happy with our creations and donations. Being happy is key for us- we do what we love and “going to work” everyday is the best. We put our hearts and souls into our creations and when we can make someone smile from wearing our charity jewels- that’s the biggest success we can ask for.
Biggest Success
I think my mom and I would both agree, our biggest success right now is that we doubled our donations from last year. Each year we want to be able to donate more- and we accomplished it this year! Which we are so grateful for!!
What is your top challenge and how have you addressed it?
Our top challenge is definitely the “business” side of the business. We are both creative types so doing the bookkeeping and business side is difficult for us. We both read up on as much as we can and really try to sit down everyday to learn more and focus on the business end rather than sitting and making jewels.
Who is your most important role model?
I’m (Stevie) going to answer this one – My mother is my role model. Seeing how she took care of my grandmother for so long AND started this company up from scratch. Amazes me. I am so proud to be a part of Jewels For Hope with her. She continues to help others constantly (their well-being over hers) and has such an awesome eye for creating… everything she does inspires me.