This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Jo Baker, founder and CEO of ShipperHQ. It has been edited for length and clarity.
Before my husband and I had kids, we agreed that he would be a stay-at-home parent, since I was the breadwinner. I was working in tech for a media company in London, earning a decent income for a comfortable lifestyle. We took the kids to Fiji for vacation and enrolled my son in private school.
My husband, who was bored at home with the kids, started an eBay business. It was really more of a hobby and didn’t make much money, but there were issues with shipping. I created software that helped solve those challenges and made it available for free. Soon, my program had thousands of downloads, and people were asking me to help solve their specific shipping challenges.
One day, while taking the train to work, I ran the math. If I could make £100 a day, I could get by. I called my husband and said, “I’m handing in my notice.” He told me I was nuts.
I immigrated to the US, where the business continued to grow
It took me a long while to replace my salary, but the business grew steadily. My safety net was knowing that I could always go back to corporate if I needed to. Luckily, I didn’t.
In 2013, I immigrated to the US because that’s where the majority of the business was. It wasn’t glamorous: the first year we moved to the US, I had $68 to spend on Christmas presents after I paid everyone else. There have been many times when we’ve had to reinvent and discard what we’ve created; that’s happening now as we adapt to AI.
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Doing that has helped us grow. Today, ShipperHQ is based in Austin, where we have 47 employees. Last year, we did about $15 million in revenue.
I don’t fit the mold of a tech CEO
When people think about a tech CEO based in Austin, they don’t picture me. I’m a 53-year-old mom. My working-class English accent sounds more like the 1980s gangsta film “Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels” than “Downton Abbey.”
Over time, I’ve become sick of justifying the fact that I don’t fit the mold. I want to show that you don’t have to look or sound how people expect. The success of my company speaks for itself.
My past traumas left me searching for security
I’ve always been chasing a feeling of financial security. My mom died from cancer when I was 22. After that, I went into debt and had to scramble just to make ends meet.
My mom’s death still impacts me 30 years later. I assumed I’d be dead by 50, like her. Because of that, I wanted to create stability for my sons. If I died, I wanted them to be able to stand on their own two feet without me. That’s what drove me as a business owner.
In 2021, I felt financially safe for the first time. The pandemic increased the business revenue. More importantly, I started to truly trust myself. It took only 12 years, but I have finally come to believe in the decision I made as a business leader.
That safety gave me the confidence to enjoy life now, without the constant scramble for growth. I didn’t want my teenage sons to move out without feeling like I’d really enjoyed them.
I want my sons to have more than I did, but not too much
While I wanted my kids to have more than I had, I was also very afraid of destroying them by giving them too much. I believe money is a very powerful and potentially dangerous thing.
I started working with a wealth counselor a few years ago. She has helped the entire family process their feelings about wealth. She’s become like a grandmother to my kids and has helped us reframe our thoughts. There’s a lot to unwrap there, and it’s very personal. However, it manifests in subtle ways. For example, when I’m grocery shopping with my kids, they still need to ask before putting something in the cart so I can purchase it. And I’ll always prefer a dive bar over a swanky restaurant.
I want to show my sons the world without overindulging them. This year, we’re going back to Fiji, just like the vacation we took with them when they were little. The difference is that this time, they’ll understand what I had to do to earn this.
