As a baby sleep consultant and mother, Ash Perry understands firsthand the challenges families face when it comes to achieving better sleep. Driven by a passion for supporting parents and a desire to create products that genuinely make a difference, she founded Jelley, an Australian baby sleepwear brand built around innovation, comfort and wellbeing. Combining her professional expertise with extensive research, Ash developed a unique sleeping bag featuring silver fibre woven into bamboo fabric, designed to help little ones sleep more comfortably. Here, she shares the inspiration behind Jelley, the realities of building a business while raising a family, and the lessons she’s learned along the way.
The passion: What inspired you to set up your business?
Before starting Jelley, I had been working with families for a number of years as a Sleep Consultant, where every single family who I worked with had a unique journey relating to their baby’s sleep. There is so much that goes into providing families with the support and strategies they need to make the changes to improve sleep for their whole family.
Through this work, I had often thought about the idea of innovating a baby product, but it took me a number of years to put my finger on exactly what this might be. The topic of sleeping bags was something I would often talk to parents about, and it was something that I kept coming back to. With young children of my own at the time, it was a product that was very much still used in our household.
I started to explore fabric compositions, what was already on the market and where there were opportunities. It took a lot of research before I came across the benefits of silver fibre woven into bamboo for its thermo-regulating properties. Being antibacterial and anti-odour, along with being so incredibly soft, I couldn’t believe what I was feeling when the first sample arrived. It was made even more special as there is nothing else in Australia that has silver fibre in a baby sleeping bag.
It was a long process (almost 12 months) of sampling, refining and compliance testing before receiving my first bulk production and working out along the way how I was going to market these sleeping bags when they arrived.
The launch: How did you start out in the beginning?
The launch was good, but I definitely had moments of wondering if I had made a huge mistake! I was often questioning if it was too hard to market something brand new that no one had ever heard of – in a world where there is an abundance of amazing baby products and brands. Nevertheless, I’m here today and I’m so glad I persevered.
Because it was a lengthy process of getting the manufacturing right, I had plenty of time to work on my marketing strategy to launch. I am very fortunate to have a close friend who has been like a business mentor to me, as he built a product business from the ground up and recently sold it. I quickly realised that having these connections is so important when starting a business, as it can feel a little isolating doing it all solo.
There are endless resources online, and not all of them cost a fortune, so I made the most of everything that was available to me, especially in the marketing and advertising space as this isn’t my forte. It’s important to keep learning and developing new skills as a business owner to keep up in such a fast-paced environment.
The innovation: What was the biggest breakthrough for you with your business?
It starts at the very beginning and the whole reason behind the Jelley sleeping bag: the innovative silver fibre woven into bamboo fabric. It is a really hard fabric to source, and I received many “no”s from manufacturers who weren’t able to source it for me. Thankfully, I persevered and found a fabric manufacturing facility who made the bamboo with silver fibre that I was hunting for, and they were able to supply this to my sleeping bag manufacturer.
When the first samples arrived, I had so much confidence in what I had created with just how soft and luxurious it felt and the rest is history!
Yin and Yang: How do you balance work and family?
As most mums in business could relate to, it’s a juggle!
Family always comes first and I make a conscious effort to do the least amount possible during family time. But as we all know, there will always be something to do when running a business. I find that I really get into business mode in the evenings when my children are in bed, perhaps because I have become programmed that way.
My husband has always been incredibly supportive of Jelley and he backs me 100% with the decisions I need to make. He also picks up the extra household tasks when I am particularly busy.
I think it’s really important to block out time that is not negotiable, which includes R&R time to ensure I’m getting enough rest to be able to show up as a mum and in my business. I think these are the things that are easy to skip past when we’re all busy and juggling thousands of things, but they’re honestly the things that can make or break the experience of having your own business.
