aden + anais

I was living and working in New York City when my husband and I found out that we were expecting our first daughter, Anais (pronounced UH-nay). As with many first-time mums, I was absolutely unprepared for the journey I was about to embark on.

After Anais’s birth, I searched high and low across the United States for the muslin swaddling blankets that were a staple of my Australian childhood. Aussie mums—my mother and grandmother included—had swaddled with cotton muslin for centuries and I had intended to continue with the tradition. With no luck to be had, I rolled up my sleeves and got to work creating the first cotton muslin swaddling blankets available in the U.S. In 2006, the aden + anais brand was officially born.

Named after my daughter, Anais, and my ex-business partner’s son, Aden, the brand took off quicker than I could have ever imagined. Our first store in NYC gave me our first indication that we had hit something big. Within a few days of taking on stock of the swaddling blankets, Felina from The Upper Breast Side had sold out completely and called me to say, “Hold on to your hat—you are in for a wild ride with these blankets.”

I have always been a big fan of a quote by John Burroughs, “Leap and the net will appear.” This was especially true during the inception of aden + anais when I was selling swaddles from the boot (trunk) of a taxi in New York City. For the first three years of aden + anais’ existence, I continued to work my full-time job at The Economist while raising my family and running aden + anais from my kitchen table until the wee hours of the morning.

I was fairly miserable where I worked before I began aden + anais. I took everything about the corporate world that I disliked and vowed to make my company the antithesis of it. Here, everybody’s voice matters. Everyone can absolutely be who they really are. No one has to pretend to be what they are not. There is no hierarchy. The open plan of our office space is a visual way of showing that we are all on an equal playing field, no matter the role. We have a stocked full bar, a pool table, and an air hockey table to encourage everyone to have a good time—and because I am really good at air hockey. I always say, “We’re not curing cancer, folks. We’re just making baby blankets, so we might as well have some fun while we do it!”

I think we are able to be so productive in this relaxed culture because everyone at aden + anais is like-minded with similar values and work ethics, which is very intentional. At a lot of big corporations, people don’t care what you’re like as a human. Here, who you are as a person matters just as much as how good you are at what you do. It doesn’t matter if you’re the greatest writer, marketer, or salesperson, if you’re a *bleep*, you don’t make it here. You just don’t.

As we grow, it does get harder to preserve the culture. The bigger you get, the greater the need to bring in expertise that often comes from having worked in big companies and corporate environments, so there are more personalities in the mix. This transition is hard on everyone, not just the new people, but also the original people who built the business from the ground up, sitting here at four in the morning getting it all done the old fashioned way.

But people are respectful of each other as people here, and I think that is how you work through the growing pains. We are living proof that being a lovely person and a skilled person doesn’t have to be mutually exclusive. I think that’s how you protect a culture, by valuing the person as much as the professional.

When the (RED) team approached aden + anais about a partnership in 2014, the decision was a no-brainer. As a mum, how could I not contribute to something as impactful as preventing the transmission of HIV from mother to child? Our efforts have not only focused on eliminating mother-to-child transmission of HIV, but also on improving the lives of women and girls affected by AIDS in Africa. And we have been extremely grateful to see that our audience has had the same passion for this partnership as we do.

Today, 15 million people worldwide are on life-saving HIV treatment – more people than ever before - and our (PRODUCT)RED™ collections have contributed directly to this effort. With your support of our first two (PRODUCT)RED™ collections, aden + anais raised enough money to provide more than 300,000+ days of life-saving medicine to help HIV+ pregnant mothers give birth to HIV free babies. And the good news continues:

• Mother-to-child transmission of HIV is on the decline, in turn, new child infections are down 58% since 2000.
• The same ARV treatment that keeps an HIV-positive woman alive and healthy and also prevents transmission of the virus to her baby now costs as little as 30 cents a day, down from nearly $300 a day.

This is inspirational. Since we launched our partnership, I have traveled to Rwanda to see (RED)-funded programs in action on the ground—making a difference in the lives of people affected by HIV/AIDS. I visited clinics and education facilities providing HIV/AIDS prevention, counseling, testing and treatment programs. I met with families, healthcare workers, and local activists, and saw first-hand the social and economic impact that Global Fund programs bring to communities where HIV/AIDS is a part of everyday life. The highlight for me was meeting the many HIV-positive mums who had recently given birth to healthy HIV-free babies.

It’s wonderful to see the difference that our contributions are making on the ground in Africa. My hope is to continue working indefinitely with (RED) in one way or another. I believe so strongly in what (RED) is trying to accomplish with the help of brands and individuals like you around the globe. By working as a team, we can soon end the transmission of HIV from mother to child and deliver an AIDS free generation. It would bring me much joy to be able to say that we all played a part in making that happen.