Ambition, Motherhood, and the Hardest Business Decisions
Tue Dec 30 2025
In this episode of Work This Way, Nikola Pottinger shares her journey from driving a Cadbury van to building and ultimately closing her own craft subscription business, Little Miss Sew'n'Sew. With honesty and reflection, Nikola talks about how ambition shaped her early career and the realities of balancing big goals with motherhood.
She explores launching a fabric shop, pivoting into e-commerce, and experiencing rapid growth during the COVID-19 pandemic. But as demand shifted post-pandemic, overstocking and financial pressure led to some of the toughest decisions of her life, including voluntary liquidation.
Nikola opens up about the emotional impact of that chapter, the lessons learned from listening to both heart and head, and how those experiences shaped her next step as an operations manager at FOUNDRY. A candid conversation about resilience, perspective, and starting again.
More
In this episode of Work This Way, Nikola Pottinger shares her journey from driving a Cadbury van to building and ultimately closing her own craft subscription business, Little Miss Sew'n'Sew. With honesty and reflection, Nikola talks about how ambition shaped her early career and the realities of balancing big goals with motherhood. She explores launching a fabric shop, pivoting into e-commerce, and experiencing rapid growth during the COVID-19 pandemic. But as demand shifted post-pandemic, overstocking and financial pressure led to some of the toughest decisions of her life, including voluntary liquidation. Nikola opens up about the emotional impact of that chapter, the lessons learned from listening to both heart and head, and how those experiences shaped her next step as an operations manager at FOUNDRY. A candid conversation about resilience, perspective, and starting again.