Kelly Oriard and Callie Christensen are co-founders and co-CEO’s of Slumberkins, an award winning, children’s educational brand that promotes early emotional learning. We interviewed Oriard and Christensen to find out why they started Slumberkins and how it works.
You weren’t always business owners, what are your backgrounds?
Kelly Oriard:
My formal education is as a Family and Marriage Counselor, but prior to starting Slumberkins I worked in the elementary school system to support children and their families with a range of social emotional needs.
Callie Christensen:
Before Slumberkins, I was a special education teacher who taught at a local elementary school.
How did you two meet?
Callie Christensen:
Kelly and I have been best friends for 20 years, we met in high school. We were both Division 1 college athletes. She played volleyball and I played basketball. We now approach our business like we did with sports, with a winning mentality and a team effort.
Why did you decide to start your business about social-emotional skills?
Kelly Oriard:
We started Slumberkins while on maternity leave together in the Summer and Fall of 2015 after we each had our own baby boys, Owen and Aidan. As a family therapist and an educator, we saw a need for an intentional children’s brand that reinforces a positive attachment between children and their caregivers while also providing a tool.
As educators we always say that parents actually are the best teachers when it comes to early emotional learning – they just may need some tools to be most effective when it comes to mindfulness, stress reduction, and conflict resolution.
Spend time with a child and you can quickly pick up on how observant they really are, how rampant anxiety and depression is, even for little ones. We saw this a lot in the schools we worked in and realized that it wasn’t me as the school counselor that would be the most effective to lay a foundation of social emotional learning, it was the parents.
So how does Slumberkins teach social-emotional skills ranging from Grief & Loss?
Our stories use research-based techniques to teach little ones important social-emotional skills. Through proactive and supportive narratives, each collection is intentionally crafted to build resilient, caring, and confident children.
We have 12 skill building collections. Each collection includes our Snuggler, board book, and affirmation card. The Snuggler is a plush toy creature that kids love to cuddle while reading the board book with a parent.
Each of our creature collections have an important message instilled within them that supports important early emotional learning topics. So while reading the book with a caregiver and snuggling the plush toy, children form emotional bonds with their primary attachment figure, often a parent, that helps to deepen their learning.
The topics range from conflict resolution to growth mindset and authenticity.
For example, our Fox represents our Family Change Collection, supporting families through difficult transitions, such as a move, a divorce, or any other disruption to the family system and/or routine. This is a tool we see so many families using in an event driven situation.
The affirmation card reads: “I am safe, I am loved. I can get through this part. It’s not my fault that things changed, and I can keep an open heart.”
That’s a great affirmation. I think we could all use that from time to time. What else is on the horizon for Slumberkins?
We are thrilled to be working on a television show with the Jim Henson Company that has been picked up by an international streaming company! If all goes as planned it should air within the next year! We are really excited to get the mission of Slumberkins out to the general audience on a wider platform.
A TV show with The Jim Henson company, the masterminds behind The Muppets! Congrats! Have you won any awards or recognition?
Our Snuggler Bundles were chosen for Parents Best Toy Award 2019!
Which of your Snuggler Bundles would you recommend a parent try first?
We always want to meet families wherever they are, supporting from either a proactive standpoint with skills such as Gratitude, Authenticity, Growth Mindset, or as a resource to a family in the midst of a key event, supporting with skill such as a Family Change (really helpful for a move or separation), Conflict Resolution (sibling rivalry anyone?!), Stress Relief (stabilizing for anxious little ones) or even provide direction in time where they have to confront Grief & Loss for the first time. We suggest parents take our Creature Quiz to help determine a creature collection that will best meet their kiddo’s needs, but we also really find that many of our first time families find it helpful to join our Slumberkins Social: Facebook Private Group and open up to this safe community about your story and child to get their recommendations. It’s been truly amazing to us to see the power of that community.
Editors Note: Slumberkins is offering Busy Mom Blog readers 10% off their first purchase with code: BUSYMOM
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