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| Ann Evanston, Keynote Speaker |
 BLP CONNECT! proudly announces Ann Evanston, M.A. to the speaker line-up. (www.warrior-preneur.com) Ann will address the ever important and growing Power of Connection. She has over 20 years of speaking and consulting experience with an extensive background in developing new leaders from corporate America to those starting their own businesses. She has developed programs and presented seminars to diverse populations and workforces on social media, networking and finding the “warrior-preneur” inside of every individual. |
| Wendy Bellissimo, Designer and Host of BLP CONNECT! |
Now the proud mother of four little girls, Wendy's days are full of happiness–and plenty of hard work. Between designing nurseries for celebrities like Kelly Ripa and Cedric the Entertainer, starting her own exclusive line of baby care and nursery products, and authoring a best–selling book, Wendy knows her most important jobs include playing in a magical backyard fort with her daughters and singing a bedtime lullaby. It's in experiencing the day-to-day pleasures of being a mother that Wendy perfected her signature style. Now, through an exclusive partnership with Babies "R"Us, Wendy is sharing her inspired nursery designs with the world. Comfort, convenience, and touchable elegance–along with limitless imagination–are the hallmarks of Wendy's designs. |
| Jen Levingson, Jen's List |
Jen met her husband Mike in 2000 and they were married two years later. In late 2002, they had their first son, Zachary. After several miscarriages, she became pregnant with identical twin boys. A risky pregnancy at best, Jen was put on bedrest for 4 1/2 months. What was a girl to do? She began emailing her closest 8 girlfriends every baby and mommy tidbit imaginable. Sample sales, nanny leads, coupons – you name it. At one point Jen’s friends were getting eight emails a day. They passed the emails on to their friends and “Jen’s List” began. In July of 2005, Benjamin and Joshua were born happy and healthy. Almost 3 years later, Jen gave birth to another set of identical twins, Matthew and Joseph. Another high risk pregnancy gave Jen the “down” time she needed to put together a business plan to grow Jen’s List. Today Jen is a stay at home mom to her 5 boys and continues to grow her business, which now has more than 16,000 subscribers. She drives carpools, makes lunches, chairs school committees and plays with the ladies. While the weekdays are full of rushing, and dividing and conquering, most weekends are spent together with the family chocolate lab, Daisy and kitten, Jake. In her downtime, Jen is busy counting her blessings.
JEN’S LIST, a free daily e-mail newsletter and website reaching over 16,000 families, is the mom’s guide to what’s hot, new, and undiscovered – from baby products and nannies to fun family things to do. As useful as it is informative, Jen’s List is like getting an e-mail from your up-to date, and totally in-the-know SUPER mom of 5 boys. Jen knows about the latest and greatest products and services in the greater Los Angeles area- and always shares the scoop via the Jen’s List e-mail newsletter.
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| Sarah Eisner, Juice in The City |
 Sarah Eisner is a Northern California native, anally on-time, sarcastic, and silly person who is also a co-founder of Juice in the City. A serial entrepreneur seasoned at multitasking and letting her house “go to pot”, Sarah loves building brands from the ground up and creating buzz. She spent the first ten years of her career utilizing her Stanford tech education in product marketing and marketing strategy at Cisco Systems. After the birth of her two insanely active sons, she left Cisco for a tech startup and to start her own photography business, and then just a short year later, in 2006, left those two things behind to co-run an innovative baby bottle company, Adiri, with two other local moms. Adiri reached the shelves of Target, Whole Foods, Babies R Us and many other national sellers, but alas, the bottle that looked like a breast was not to be. Co-founding and acting as CMO of Juice in the City turns out to be a lot more fun than building a baby bottle, with ample opportunities for Sarah to attend hip hop classes and tanning parties. |
| Vivian Tenorio, Signature Flan |
In 1993, Vivian was a 16-year-old high school student who became pregnant by her then high school sweetheart and now husband of 16 years.
In 2005, after 6 years of working in the software industry, she co-founded “Mofongo” with her husband, a Puerto Rican restaurant based in Texas. The restaurant was ultimately closed, but her dream of entrepreneurship did not die. Later in 2009, Vivian decided she wasn’t comfortable with someone else calling the shots for her, so she started her newest business venture, “Signature Flan.” signatureflan.com. Getting her pink slip from her “other job” in 2010 was possibly the best thing that ever happened to her. Now she can follow her plans to create an online channel (viviantenorio.com) where she will interview other small business owners and industry professionals. Vivian also has plans to continue her speaking engagements so that she can share her story with others who wish to start a small business and live a no-limits lifestyle. Vivian Tenorio’s story has been seen on: * CBS The Talk |
| Lolita Carrico, The Gloss Network |
 Long before the word “mompreneur” entered our lexicon, Lolita Carrico was already blazing trails as a true mommy media pioneer as founder of Modern Mom Inc., one of the first major online presences for mothers. With the success of both Modern Mom and the GLOSS Network for Women, her latest venture, Lolita has established herself as one of the industry’s top marketers and influencers.A PR and marketing pro with over 15 years in the industry, Lolita has always been intrigued by online technology and its effects on the way we communicate and gather information. Specializing in emerging media and consumer products, Lolita worked with some of the first major brands and technologies online, such as Shopzilla and Launch.com. After having her son, Jaden in early 2001, Lolita was unimpressed by the tiny pool of “mom sites” and resources available online. Combining her professional background and expertise with her personal experiences as a mother, Lolita created Modern Mom Inc. After eight years, Lolita sold Modern Mom in 2009 to launch the GLOSS Network for Women, an online destination offering content and community covering motherhood (of course), fashion, beauty, fitness, cooking, technology, pop culture and more. Within only a few months since its inception, GLOSS has already been featured by media outlets like Entrepreneur.com, and continues to see remarkable growth in readership with a projected 300,000 for the month of March 2010. A recognized voice for moms in the industry, Lolita also serves as a spokesperson and consultant for many companies including Procter & Gamble’s Charmin and Swiffer brands, Baskin-Robbins, Got Milk, Fresh & Easy Markets and others. She is a member of Nielsen’s Power Mom Advisory Council, pens a regular column for Marketing Daily’s Engage: Moms series and is a featured blogger for LA Moms Blog. Lolita has been featured as an expert on hundreds of media outlets like Redbook, Parents, The Washington Post, ABC News and FOX News, discussing topics such as parenting, relationships, career and balancing it all. Lolita currently lives in Los Angeles, California with her two sons, Jaden, 9 and Jack, 6. |
| Erin Condren, ErinCondren.com |
After years in the apparel business, designing and manufacturing for major US brands, Condren began designing her own clothing line. That same year she was surprised with a TWIN pregnancy, complete with months of bed rest and complications that thankfully ended with the delivery of a boy and a girl just one month premature. Erin found transitioning from working 12-hour days in a sewing factory to becoming a “stay-at-home” mother of two quite challenging: a lot of the same chaos, but with hours of “downtime” when the kids would nap and go to bed for the night. She also knew it took two incomes for her family to live life at the beach, so she was determined to find a new career with the option to work from home. As a busy mother, Erin began utilizing her creativity making note cards and gift labels for friends, birthday gifts, new babies and hostess gifts…recipients loved them! A friend encouraged Erin to sell her designs for the first time at a “home shopping party” in 2004, and the grass roots-viral marketing plan was a huge success! After a year of mentoring her at-home business, Al Marco of Marco Fine Arts became business partners with ErinCondren.com in 2007, and together their companies collaborate in a state of the art printing facility in El Segundo, CA. Erin’s business has evolved from the initial shopping party to a flourishing internet retail business, along with licensed collections and partnerships with Target, Shutterfly, and TinyPrints. Her business provides customers with personalized note cards, gift labels, baby and moving announcements, holiday cards, calendars, and so much more! Features on “The Ellen Show”, “Rachael Ray” and countless magazines and celebrity endorsements, Erin and her team continue to create “happy packages” that ship all around the world each day! |
Ask Wendy Bellissimo what she does, and she will say "I'm a mother" before mentioning that she’s also one of the world’s leading designers. But for Wendy, the two are never mutually exclusive. Her passion for her family has inspired her career since her first child was born in 1999.
Vivian’s belief of thinking that anything is possible if she just puts her mind to it helps her deal with and hustle through the challenges she faced as a teenage mother, young wife and high school dropout. This no-limits attitude has led her to opening a restaurant, starting Signature Flan and becoming the author of her first book.
ERIN CONDREN is a true Southern Californian- born and raised! After graduating from UCLA, Condren moved out to the beach and has never left- now residing in the South Bay with her husband and two children.
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