Zipped Organic Babygrows from Sleep Thief

Aim

Sleep Thief's mission is to banish poppers from baby clothing and bring innovation and sustainability to the forefront of parents' choices!

The Story Behind Sleep Thief

Sleep Thief was started by two frazzled and sleep-deprived mums with a mutual love of their daughters and a shared hatred of poppers!

Sophie and Effie realised that the baby clothing world was stuck in the past, in a time where poppers were a cheap and easy fix and little was being done about it.

We're not sure if the person who invented poppers on babygrows was a parent, but we've come to the conclusion that they can't have been! There's nothing quite like trying to match up poppers at 3am after a huge 'poonami' in a sleep-deprived stupor!

And as our journey into motherhood began, we were astounded by how few companies were looking into innovative solutions to old problems for modern parents. Therefore our mission to #banishthepoppers began.

This is us trying to look cool... 

Why We Love the Mischiefsuit                                                                

Our launch item is the Mischiefsuit. We have created a 100% organic cotton baby grow with a unique ankle-to-ankle zip placement for super easy changing - innovation and care for the environment wrapped into one little babysuit. 

The Mischiefsuit currently comes in grey with a choice of vibrant trim in either blue, green, orange, pink or yellow, from Newborn size to 3 years old. 

Here's a little stop motion video of our Mischiefsuit in action:

The Mischiefsuit is a true labour of love. There are loads of reasons why we (and our lovely customers) think the Mischiefsuit is a can't-live-without product, and here are a few of them:

• The Mischiefsuit features a unique ankle-to-ankle zip placement (nicknamed the rainbow zip). Super easy access to little bottoms!
• Our cotton is 100% GOTS-certified organic. This is kinder to your kiddy's skin and the environment too.
• The Mischiefsuit has footens - a mitten for your foot! Easy to fold on and off, which makes for less time with socks.
• All our dyes are kind to babies and the environment as they are OEKO-TEX® Standard 100 certified.
• Our easy envelope opening in the neck makes changing an easy task.
• Our sizing is generous. We come up bigger because we believe in the longevity of baby clothes. 
• The quality of the suit is super. We don't want you to have to rush to buy another Mischiefsuit within a couple of weeks of buying your first one! 
• From our cotton which is spun into yarn in Leicester, to our designs which were concoted in Islington, the Mischiefsuit is made in Britain.
• We've had some super reviews (you can read them in our testimonials below). 

There's not a single babygrow like it!

The Who Behind the What

Sleep Thief was started by mum-friends Effie and Sophie.

Effie and Sophie met at antenatal classes in Islington, London. In a previous lifetime, Effie was a corporate lawyer and Sophie in Sales Hospitality, but our daughters soon changed that.

No matter how terrible the colic had been the night before, and no matter how many poonamis had exploded that day, we (almost) always made it out of the door to meet up. We used to call each other 'mum friends'. Now, we firmly call each other a friend, and one of our best ones at that. 

Over time, we discovered that we wanted more for our kids and more for our working lives. We worked out that we wanted to make a difference and that we wanted to do it together. 

And that's how Sleep Thief was born. A small idea at the back of our minds. And we basically dared each other to take a leap of faith and put our ideas to paper. We were there to encourage, to support and to cheer ourselves along through the ups and downs of starting a business. 

Our Vision

• We want Sleep Thief to become the household name for baby clothing - the brand that no parent can live without! 
• We want to make bigger and bolder designs and add to our collections. 
• We will always make sure that our products are different to everything else on the market - and they will answer the frustrations of parents. 
• We want to be stocked in stores all over the world with lots of fun collections and products. 

Pending B Corporation

We are proud to say that we are a Pending B Corporation. We are committed to meeting the highest standards of social and environmental performance, public transparency and legal accountability to balance profit and purpose.

Whatever we create at Sleep Thief will be made with care, accountability and sustainability. 

Support for Families with Premature and Ill Babies

This one's a bit closer to home... At the beginning of 2019 Sophie had a silent miscarriage and only found out at the 12 week scan. The news completely knocked her and her family sideways but, following a procedure and some time, she was lucky enough to become pregnant again.

The pregnancy was tough and following a presumed miscarriage at nine weeks (which fortunately turned out to be a false alarm), her waters broke at 21 weeks. With the support of her incredible family and friends, and the wonderful staff at UCLH, she made it to 36 + 2 weeks before she went into spontaneous labour due to Group B Strep septicaemia and gave birth (breech!) to a little boy. 

He had the same infection in his lungs but was given expert treatment by the doctors and nurses and quickly taken into intensive care and survived. He is a little fighter, and was taken off his ventilator and moved to the special care unit by day three, before being moved up to the maternity ward to join Sophie, who had fully recovered from the infection too.

After a week in hospital, full of canulas, heel prick tests, blood tests and injections, Sophie came to the conclusion that there were hardly any options for decent baby grows for babies and toddlers who are ill and spend time in hospital. 

Since then, Sophie and her little boy have also spent some time in Great Ormond Street Hospital, where Sophie had the opportunity to speak to the nurses taking care of them and asked them about what would be useful in a sleep suit for children who have to stay in hospital. They came up with some wonderful suggestions and we would like to use some of the funds from this project to build on these ideas and develop a Super Mischiefsuit, which will make the life of children and their parents or carers easier when they are going through the really tough times.

Funding

By funding our project, you will have our unending love, but also some more tangible things. Your funding will:

• help create the next collection of Mischiefsuit. This will include new colour ways, fun prints and investment into even better quality organic cotton
• create a Mischiefsuit in close collaboration with neonatal units to help premature and unwell babies and their families
• help local families and charities by allowing us to donate our products to those in need
• help us reduce our waste in fabric offcuts by allowing us to research and create suitable products from them
• let us exhibit at international trade shows

Funding beyond our target will, very excitingly, go towards:

• creating a Mischiefsuit for charity, with proceeds going towards a charity nominated by our customers
• the research, development and production of our next range of innovative baby products (think foldable leggings, vests with easier fastenings and clever sleeping bags)
• helping us create a range of organic undies for toddlers and beyond
• helping us fulfil our dream of creating happier (and better-slept) families all over the world!

A Final Word About Our Core Values

In everything we do, Sleep Thief is guided by 3 core values: innovation, care and families.

1. Innovation

By innovation, we mean challenging the status quo in the clothing world. We want to solve old-age problems with modern solutions, and make day-to-day life easier. This means researching new ways of dressing our little ones so that families have access to easier and quicker solutions than those readily available on the market.

2. Care

We care for everyone and everything we encounter. Whilst we are by no means perfect, we have made it imperative from the day we started that we can trace our supply chain, that our factories are advocates of ethical practices and that we are being kind to the world that we live in. This is our approach and we will continue to refine it in the face of an ever-changing landscape.

3. Families

Finally, helping families the world over is the reason Sleep Thief came to life. We create easy dressing and changing solutions to bring happier times to families all over the world. We want our clothes to be high quality and last for years so that they can be passed on from child to child and generation to generation. Our charity partnerships will always be with those amazing organisations that are also trying to bring happiness, relief and respite to families going through really difficult times.

Testimonials for the Mischiefsuit

Carol Goss, Boston, USA

"I love Sleep Thief! It fills a true need in dressing babies easily & comfortably. And beautifully I might add! The colours are both appealing and refreshing - not your standard pastels but fun bold colours. Combined with the practicality of those genius zippers, and you have a perfect product for your baby - and the perfect gift for all the babies in your life! I gave one as a gift, and plan to make all my gifts from the very clever and beautiful Sleep Thief!"

Eleanor Sage, UK

"My only regret is that I wish I had bought one sooner when my son was really little as it would have been a God send with the multiple night wakings and changing. However, I got one when he was 10 months and we've not looked back. He always seems to sleep well in it, maybe down to the super soft material(?) which also washes really well. I plan to buy one much earlier for my next baby :) thanks Sleep Thief!"

Recognition for the Mischiefsuit

• Voted one of the top 10 organic and chemical-free babygrows on the market
• Voted one of the top 20 British baby brands

Thank you!

Thanks so much for your support! We are as chuffed as this little Sleep Thief!

Effie and Sophie

www.sleepthiefbaby.com

@sleepthiefbaby

This project successfully funded on 30th March 2020