A mini crib showed up at my house, and that's when Poppylist was born.

I can remember the day—not the exact date, but the day. I remember walking in our neighborhood with my husband, Scott, talking to him about the time and energy I'd spent creating our baby registry. In addition to the items I added, we also bought quite a few things ourselves, including the nursery furniture (minus the rocker, thank you, Mom), my breast pump since we went through insurance, and all of the accompanying accessories.

We'd just finished framing two female astronaut prints from ETSY that went above the crib. Excidently, I sent my sister a photo from Amelia's nursery. Her response was, "Why is your crib so small?" I called her right away and asked what she meant. She had me send her the measurements, and to my surprise, she replied, "You bought a mini-crib."

Did you know that nursery furniture is non-refundable due to the strict safety standards in the US, especially after assembly?

As we continued our walk, I thought there had to be an easier way—a simpler way to prepare for parenthood. At the time, there were only a few options, and I think it was between Babylist, BuyBuyBaby, and then some big-box retailers with baby registry services.

However, despite my options, I still couldn't find a registry with the experience I was hoping to have. For me, that was simplicity and specificity. What exactly did I need, and where will I register for it? Will the experience be easy for my gift-givers? What are the top 25-50 items that my baby will 100% need? I didn't want to be inundated with ads, either. I just wanted someone to shoot me straight. And that's when I knew I would create a baby registry for parents who want the right stuff, not more stuff.

Our mission statement is simple, and has remained the same almost 4 years later: We help simplify how expecting parents build baby registries.

This post was first published on June 10, 2020, and it's remarkable to see how far we've come. I love coming back every six months or so to update this article! 

If you didn't know, Poppylist first started out as a product recommendation engine. In the early summer of 2020, I built a Parent Type quiz in Typeform. You could take a free 10-question quiz, and based on your answers, we'd guess your parent type. You could be one of the following: The Minimalist, The Tech-Savvy, The Cost-Concious, The Practical Parent, or The Environmentalist. Your results included 40 product recommendations that matched your parent type—and people LOVED it. 

There were two MVPs, or Minimum Viable Products before we launched the baby registry platform:

  • V1: Parent Type Quiz
  • V2: Organization dashboard for your products

As these grew, we felt conifdent that we had product market fit. What does PMF mean? When an entrepreneur identifies a need in the market and builds a solution that customers want to buy, that's product-market fit (PMF). 

Between V1 and V2, I met Poppylist Co-Founder Tamiz Ahmed in November 2020. I launched the first iteration of Poppylist on a website called Product Hunt, which is where Founders launch their product to seek initial feedback and their customers. During this time, Tamiz and his wife Sonia were pregnant with their daughter, and they were experiencing the same pain points I was trying to solve. Tamiz, who already had startup experience, was a developer who'd previously worked at Google and Bleacher Report. If this wasn't a match made in startup heaven, I don't know what is.

Six months later, my husband Scott and I flew to San Francisco to meet Tamiz and Sonia and sign our partnership agreement as co-founders. He's helped me take Poppylisy further than I ever could have imagined, and I'm extremely grateful to have someone like him at the helm with me.

So, what's in a name? The day I found out I was pregnant with my daughter, she was the size of a poppy seed. I'm originally from California and the poppy is the state flower. In fact, here's the journal entry I wrote on August 30, 2018:

Today, you are a poppy seed. The state flower of California is a poppy. One tiny seed - so much sunshine.

Amelia remains the sunshine of my life. She was my first baby. Poppylist was my second. And Zoey was my third.

Thank you for being here.