Christina Soletti from Ergobaby
Aren’t we all officially tired of picture-perfect (and wholly unrealistic) depictions of parenthood? Join us as we dive into the power of authentic representation with Christina Soletti from Ergobaby, who shares her insider perspectives on why moms need more honesty in today’s outreach.
As the Senior Director, Content & Communications at Ergobaby, Christina Soletti oversees social media, PR, education, and content, influencer marketing and experiential marketing. She’s also a trained baby wearing educator, and is currently editing the Babywearing book with Dr. Bill Sears. With a background in PR, reality TV, and filmmaking, Christina believes in the power of storytelling and the importance of strong and meaningful relationships.
In this episode, you’ll find out what Christina has learned from marketing to moms over the years, including actionable tips for social outreach in 2023. Plus:
- Why Christina says brands don’t have to be on ‘every channel’ (…and which social channels you SHOULD be on)
- How simply letting moms know they aren’t alone can move the brand needle
- Why aspirational content has its appeal, but doesn’t always hit the mark
- The reasons not sharing more inclusive content does a major disservice to moms
- The ‘wild west’ of working with influencers and how agencies can ease the effort
Episode 29: Christina Soletti Transcript
Danielle Wiley: Welcome to The Art of Sway, the podcast that uncovers the power of influence and its impact on all areas of our lives. I’m your host, Danielle Wiley. Each week we’ll explore the many facets of influence through candid conversations with industry insiders, from brand marketers to social workers, educators, leaders, and more. Let’s dive in.
Danielle Wiley: As the Director of Content and Community at Ergobaby, Christina Soletti, oversees social media, PR, education, and content, influencer marketing and experiential marketing. She has developed and works to maintain the brand voice, manages the content, and works closely with influencers to tell authentic and compelling stories. She’s a trained baby wearing educator and has had the benefit of working with Dr. Bill Sears, Dr. Raylene Phillips, and Dr. Kirsten Uvnas Moberg, among others on the importance of baby wearing and the fourth trimester. She is currently editing the Babywearing book with Dr. Bill Sears.
Danielle Wiley: With a background in PR, reality TV and filmmaking, she believes in the power of storytelling and the importance of strong and meaningful relationships. She is passionate about babies, babywearing, birth, yoga, natural living, and healthy eats. When not online, reading and writing about all of the above, she can be found spending time with her daughter, creating their family’s story and their home of Los Angeles.
Danielle Wiley: It was so great catching up with Christina. She is a longtime Sway Group client and has become a friend and is just a businesswoman who I admire so much and just truly understands how to do influencer marketing and is just a very interesting person. So I am excited for everyone to hear my conversation with her. It was fun chatting with her, and I think it’ll be a fun listen.
Danielle Wiley: Well, hi. Welcome. I’m so glad we’re doing this. I feel like it’s selfishly a chance to catch up with you under the guise of work.
Christina Soletti: I know. I was like, oh, another meeting. Oh wait, I get to talk to Danielle. Great. It’s it’s a break. I love it.
Danielle Wiley: So I actually, sent over some questions to you and I had said that you’ve been our client since 2013, and I was like, I’m going to check for sure with my finance manager today. And it’s actually 2012. So it’s been 11 years that you’ve been a client.
Christina Soletti: Yeah. I mean, I started at Ergobaby in April of 2012, and I remember those first days because the office wasn’t even really set up. ‘Cause we had just moved. And I remember looking up because I’d already followed Rebecca Wolf, and I was like, that’s who I want. And that was it. And I just texted with Rebecca today, by the way. So 11 years. You connected… So not only did we connect with work, but then Rebecca and I remained friends, which is, thanks to you. We’ve found each other, but…
Danielle Wiley: Well, I think it was thanks to her. I think she introduced me to you.
Christina Soletti: Well, I think I reached out to her because I wanted to use… She was literally my first paid influencer with Ergobaby, and you were maybe representing her.
Danielle Wiley: Yes, that was back when we represented… Uh-huh.
Christina Soletti: Exactly.
Danielle Wiley: Wild.
Christina Soletti: Yeah. Yeah.
Danielle Wiley: So cool.
Christina Soletti: So then I did all the business through you and she provided the content and it was so cute. It was something about wearing twins, the twins Beau and [inaudible 00:03:31]
Danielle Wiley: Yeah, it was who are you wearing? Because it was like an Oscars thing.
Christina Soletti: That was the second one we did with her. So the first one was a twins one, and then the second one was, who are you wearing? It was right around the Oscars.
Danielle Wiley: Yeah. Yeah. So cool.
Christina Soletti: It was amazing. Yeah.
Danielle Wiley: So I just want to start set the stage, because obviously now we’ve established, I’ve known you for 11 years, but for those who don’t know you, you have a really interesting story. So I thought it would be fun if you could kind of share with us your journey, because you started as a reality TV producer, and you are now director of Social Media and Community at Ergobaby, which don’t necessarily seem… That doesn’t seem like the standard career path that one might take. So I thought it would be interesting to hear kind of your journey.
Christina Soletti: Yeah, sure. Well, it’s funny. I should say that I didn’t start in reality TV. I started in marketing and PR. I’m going to date myself. I wrote the first website for Peet’s. You know, Peet’s Coffee in the Bay Area. So I launched the very first peets.com.
Danielle Wiley: I wrote the very first website for Ortega Tacos.
Christina Soletti: Yes.
Danielle Wiley: All of us dating ourselves.
Christina Soletti: Amazing.
Danielle Wiley: Yes.
Christina Soletti: So… right. Yes. I’m 50. I’m Gen X.
Danielle Wiley: With my quill pen, I wrote…
Christina Soletti: Exactly. Quill pen and typewriter. But I launched the first Peet’s. So I started out in marketing. I did retail marketing in PR. And then from PR I started… I moved to LA and I continued doing PR freelance, but then I also started doing some styling and producing of photo shoots. And then that’s kind of how that morphed into reality TV was some of the producers I had met doing videos and whatnot. I just started working for them.
Christina Soletti: So that was probably 10 to 15 years doing reality TV and everything from doing story, but I also did mainly promotions producing. So a lot of trade outs, a lot of field producing. So I was working with brands and showing how they could integrate into the show. It’s kind of the same thing that I do now. I’m just on the brand side in a way.
Danielle Wiley: Interestingly, this is one of my big pet peeves. I talk a lot, or I have talked a lot about how on reality TV, they have all these integrations and they’re so not disclosed. I mean, they’re disclosed in the credits at the very end and every time I see one… I watch a lot of History Channel, and they’ll do on Pawn Stars, they were eating Subway sandwiches or something stupid. And if that was social media, it would say hashtag ad right under their face and be so obvious. And with TV, you don’t have… It’s way lower key from a disclosure perspective.
Christina Soletti: Yeah. Well, that was the sort of stuff. I did all of those negotiations. And it’s funny, actually, my very first product placement was Peet’s and I just flew to New York a couple weeks ago and I rewatched the movie, it was Goodwill Hunting. I placed Peet’s Coffee in the Goodwill Hunting movie. That was my first product placement. Again, dating myself. But at least in reality TV, it’s all those negotiations is what I handled. It was like, okay, do you get a verbal mention? Do you get a visual mention? Do you get a credit? All that sort of thing. So negotiating those integrations with the brands is what I did on the reality TV side mostly.
Danielle Wiley: And then how did that transition to Ergobaby?
Christina Soletti: Ergobaby, yeah. That’s the funny story. The last show that I did as a reality TV producer is Biggest Loser. At the time, my daughter was probably close to two because I started with Ergo in 2012. When she was born, I started freelancing. I went back to PR and was doing freelance PR writing, doing a lot of content. And I worked for this really cool company called The Content Department. I mean, that’s literally… There’s this amazing guy named Barack in New York, and he would send me all these clients and I would write blog posts or just content, right, websites, that kind of thing. And one day he called me and he’s like, “Hey, I’m coming to…” He’s in New York. He’s like, “Hey, I’m coming to LA. I’m pitching this client, and I think you would be perfect.” I was like, “Oh, okay, who?” And he’s like, “Ergobaby.”
Christina Soletti: And I was literally wearing my daughter in the Ergo at that… And I was like, “Oh my God. Yes.” So when I started freelancing for Ergo, I was still finishing up a job at Biggest Loser. And I started with Ergo as a freelancer, and then the director of… And then My Biggest Loser job ended, and the director of digital asked me if I wanted to stay on.
Christina Soletti: And it was one of those things for me when I looked around in reality TV, when I looked around in production, 90% of the other women were either very young and hadn’t had children yet, or they were older than me and had decided I’m not having kids. And here I was with a two year old like, where do I fit in here? And production’s a lot. If I had a client that we were placing something and we were shooting at 11 o’clock at night, I had to be there to liaison with the client. And I was like, mm-mm. So that was one of those serendipitous… But again, the thread through all of it really was content, right?
Danielle Wiley: Right.
Christina Soletti: It’s like that content and how do we show the brand and how do we integrate brands into and tell stories? So that’s kind of always been the thread through my career, even though it’s kind of disparate.
Danielle Wiley: So your job, we’ll talk a little bit about some of the various ways in which it has evolved, but how would you describe your job? I almost just said mixer, which makes it sound like we’re in junior high school. But you’re at some kind of event and someone asks you what you do, how do you describe it?
Christina Soletti: All right, Danielle, how much time do we have? It’s morphed a lot. In fact, I was just thinking this past year, added some people to my team. So now my title is shifting, so it’s director of Content and Communications. So we’ve added an editor and we’ve added a copywriter to my team. So in a nutshell, as the director of Content and Communications, I oversee most of the consumer facing communications. So PR, influencers, social media, and then any of the content that gets created to go on those channels, essentially.
Christina Soletti: So we’re shooting… The social media has changed so much in even just the past year. We’re creating so much content for so many different channels. So that was how my position is morphed into more content. So again, the content and the storytelling piece, and then how influencers weave into that PR, it’s all pretty interrelated. And then events, and that’s the other piece that I oversee.
Danielle Wiley: I mean, I’m thinking back in 2011, 2012, I mean, I know having started Sway Group in 2011, we were just doing blogs in Twitter. That was it.
Christina Soletti: That was it.
Danielle Wiley: And I mean, the amount of content that brands need right now. I mean, great for Sway Group because we can help with some of that, but it’s completely overwhelming.
Christina Soletti: It’s so overwhelming. In fact, it’s funny you should mention Twitter. I have been talking to my boss. I’m like, I’m getting off Twitter. I was like the last… I spoke at a social media or digital marketing conference last year, probably through you guys. And one of the pieces advice I gave was, you don’t have to be on every channel. You just have to be on the channels that are relevant to your brand. And for us, Twitter’s not relevant anymore. And frankly, even Facebook’s starting to not be so relevant. I mean, most moms are on Instagram and TikTok and that’s it. But the amount of content that we have to create, I mean Instagram in and of itself is several channels. You know what I mean?
Danielle Wiley: Right. Yeah. I look at the contracts that we’re doing, and it’s static posts, reels, stories. I mean, Instagram
Christina Soletti: That’s four channels, basically, right? Just Instagram.
Danielle Wiley: Yeah. It’s overwhelming.
Christina Soletti: For us, it’s all about the visuals for us.
Danielle Wiley: Cute babies-
Christina Soletti: Really.
Danielle Wiley: I mean, you can’t really beat it.
Christina Soletti: Cute babies. Yeah.
Danielle Wiley: So I mean, we were talking about just kind of the sheer number of platforms and amount of content, but what other ways have you seen influencer marketing and the work that you do with influencers change throughout the year? 2021, I did a guest lecture at a couple of business schools, and I was talking about the difference in influencer marketing in the last 10 years. And one of the examples I show is an actual… It’s an Ergobaby photo from a piece of Rebecca Wolf content. And it was a photo of her. I think it was a photo of her pregnant with the twins and just talking about getting ready, something like that.
Christina Soletti: Amazing.
Danielle Wiley: It was so… I think one of her other kids took the photo and it’s kind of grainy, and she’s just standing in front of her door and it’s not staged, and it’s not… And then I compared it to a photo that we-
Christina Soletti: Yep, I know that picture.
Danielle Wiley: …Could use now or an actual piece of Ergobaby content now. And I mean, it’s gorgeous. It could be any kind of print magazine. It’s totally styled. So from our perspective, we certainly have seen just… I mean, some of it’s just technology, like the equality of photos that we can take now is very different. But I’m just interested to hear your perspective on how that’s changed.
Christina Soletti: Yeah. I mean, well, even just where the content was showing up. We were sponsoring bloggers. Even my accounting line, it’s still called the blog line. Know what I mean? Blogger advertising, I think is what it’s still called. And I can’t even think of one influencer that we work with that blogs, that has a blog. I think the other thing too, that I’ve been thinking about at least recently, how things have shifted is, well, A) a lot of the influencers are getting more savvy and understanding things about usage and rights and all that sort of thing, which is great. But it’s also sometimes making things cost prohibitive. And for us, I also think about things… The difference between say a content creator and an influencer. Sometimes we’ll contract directly with a content creator to create content for us, for our channel.
Christina Soletti: And that’s different than them creating content to post on their channel, which to me is advertising. I want your audience and I want you to post about it, versus creating something that we’re going to use for our channel. So I’d say that has definitely, that proliferation of content creators. Everyone’s a content creator, but not necessarily everyone’s an influencer and wears that line, too.
Christina Soletti: And the other thing, you and I have talked about this that still… And this is why I love you guys so much… Is that still happening a little bit, is I do still feel like sometimes it’s the wild, wild west where someone will charge something and then frankly, be very unprofessional, not get back. Oh, my kid, oh, my… And I’m old school. I’m like, okay, you’re an advertiser. We placed our money. We placed our ad. We’re expecting you to be professional and to post it and to provide us with the report. And that’s not always the case. So that’s still one of my frustrations, which is why I love working with you guys. You’re that middle-
Danielle Wiley: We take on that headache.
Christina Soletti: Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. But I think for me, just the proliferation has been, and it’s just exploded. And you can do something with someone on such a small… You could do one post. I guess what I’m trying to say is back in the old days, there was so many media outlets and you would post on those outlets. Well, now it’s just thousands. Thousands. It’s like, where do we hedge our bets? And for us, there’s even that added thing for Ergobaby where babies age out.
Christina Soletti: So we can’t even pick an influencer and say, oh, we love that influencer. They provide us great content. We’re just going to stick with them and have a great relationship with them and continue to, well… Because the baby ages out, and we’re constantly having to bring new people into the funnel. People aren’t thinking about Ergobaby until they’re pregnant.
Danielle Wiley: Right.
Christina Soletti: So for us, I mean, it’s not necessarily a change for influencers, but that on top of how influencer marketing has shifted, that’s an additional challenge for us.
Danielle Wiley: Yeah, I mean, not only are you constantly having to become aware of new platforms and all the new types of content that you have to create, you have this added stress/pressure/job of having this all. I know for us, we’re always on recruiting for you guys-
Christina Soletti: Always.
Danielle Wiley: …The second someone’s pregnant, right, we’re like-
Christina Soletti: Exactly.
Danielle Wiley: …Ergobaby.
Christina Soletti: Yeah. So that’s probably, and again, it’s not quite you what you asked, but just thinking about for us, that challenge of influencer marketing, it’s a lot different than other brands.
Danielle Wiley: One of the things that we have seen change is just the increased willingness of brands to let creators have their own voice and do things in a way that will make sense to their audience. We saw that it used to be a lot more heavy handed, I think. Because there was this kind of carryover from traditional media where you have full creative oversight of what’s being created.
Danielle Wiley: You were always a little bit different, I think just because you kind of were in that space yourself and got it, and appreciated what they could… Which is why you’re, we always call you our favorite client, don’t list another client. But you kind of got it, right? But for some clients, it used to be a lot harder to get clients to understand that you have to let go a little bit to get something truly amazing. I don’t know if that’s changed for you at all. Even though you’ve always been pretty good at it, I imagine it gets easier.
Christina Soletti: Yeah. No. Well, I don’t know. It was never necessarily hard for me. I mean, for me, I always thought that that’s the beauty of working with influencers is you get to see an authentic, real use of the product. And especially for something like parenting, sure there can be aspirational aspects to parenting. But let’s be honest, it really is down and dirty in the trenches sometimes. And I’ve always recognized that power of storytelling and that power of connection. You’re not going to connect, at least for the baby carrier, people have an emotional connection to their baby carrier. It’s not like, oh, this is my cell phone cover, or my cell phone case, or my diaper bag. Or they have an emotional connection. So to be able to work with influencers who can also tell that story and evoke that connection and be like, I see you. I see myself carrying one… Again, going to Rebecca, holding one baby and having the other baby in a carrier, and maybe being super overwhelmed.
Christina Soletti: So I think that for me, that’s always been the beauty of working with influencers. And I think it’s funny you mentioned that. Because I was at a conference, I was sitting in the audience, and this woman was giving a lecture and talking about, or a workshop and talking about, you have to give… Let them have creative license,. You can give them guardrails, but let them have creative license to do. And here are three examples. And one of them was one of mine as an example of someone who, give them the product, gave them the guardrails, and then let them do their thing and tell their story. So I was-
Danielle Wiley: Right.
Christina Soletti: That’s always been super important to me is to really to see those true, authentic. I know authentic is such an overused word, but I don’t think there’s anything else like it.
Danielle Wiley: I think it’s accurate. One of the things that I’ve been excited about recently, I’m not a huge TikTok. I always joke, I’m such an old lady, I see all my Tik Toks on Instagram.
Christina Soletti: I’m the same.
Danielle Wiley: The old days when I was a mom blogger and kind of came up with the idea for this agency and was doing all this, everything was so authentic. You saw all the dirt and the messiness and the tears and all the ugh of being a young mom. And it was very real and authentic. And then there was this shift towards aspirational. And I think as technology got better and people could make something that looked very professional, the content kind of followed, and aesthetics became very important, and rooms looked miraculously neat. And there were no kids living in them and everything got very kind of rosy and-
Christina Soletti: Sterile.
Danielle Wiley: …Mono. Yeah, sterile.
Christina Soletti: Sterile.
Danielle Wiley: Perfect word. I feel like with TikTok, there’s this shift back to authentic. My daughter watches babies all summer and is obsessed with all of the young mom, TikTok. All she watches is babies on TikTok.
Christina Soletti: Amazing.
Danielle Wiley: And she’ll show them to me, and I mean-
Christina Soletti: Can I hire your daughter? Can we hire your daughter, please? That’s what we need.
Danielle Wiley: Well, she had the whole nursery at her camp using Ergobabies last summer.
Christina Soletti: I know. I know.
Danielle Wiley: Thanks to you.
Christina Soletti: I know, I love it.
Danielle Wiley: But it is very real now, and you’re seeing that messiness again, which is so just coming at it from a personal perspective, had I been a young mom when things were in that more aspirational realm, I think I would’ve felt kind of lost. And there wasn’t anyone going through all the shit like I was. It’s so important for moms kind of in that really tough, tough early stage of parenthood to see that others have that. It’s hard for everyone.
Christina Soletti: Well you want to be seen. I mean, you want to be seen as a mom. You want to see yourself, and you want to be seen. And I think it’s funny, I’m thinking about some of the messiness and realness, and I’m like, oh, well, reality TV, although reality TV is not messy, and it’s not reality.
Danielle Wiley: I was going to say it’s not… From what I’ve heard, it’s not real.
Christina Soletti: I’ll tell you right now, it is very constructed. But the idea of… I guess I go back here again, old school. The real world, the very first reality show, and really just seeing people, what their lives are like. And we do have a little bit of that voyeurism, right? We want to see sometimes as a mom, I’m like, is this what I should be doing all day? Am I really sitting here on the floor with my kid all day long? Are other people doing that too? So I think that that idea, documentary style, fly on the wall, I think is really interesting. What do you do in your day and how do you get through your day? The joys and the jobs. We do all of these things that make us cry and changing the diapers and all that because of this immense love that we have for our children.
Christina Soletti: Unfortunately, we don’t raise children in community anymore. We’re raising our children in isolation. One point of connection is online, and it is a mom seeing another mom going, oh, I’m not alone. I’m not the only one doing that. I’m not the only one who can only get my baby to nap in the Ergo. I’m not the only one who has to put them in the bouncer so I can take a shower or whatever it is. I think that’s the piece for me that really, I don’t know, makes it all worth it. And that’s always… I mean, yes, the aspirational ones, it’s a lovely to have beautiful photos. And it was.
Christina Soletti: But I think even then during that kind of aspirational period, we had pushback in our community saying, this isn’t real. And I was like, you’re right. And for a while, we were casting models and babies for photo shoots, and I was like, no, we need to shift that. We need to cast actual real families and show that there are real families using our products. There are real families out there that we are supporting. So I think that that shift back to actual reality or authenticity, or unfortunately, until we raise our kids in a village again, that’s all we have sometimes.
Danielle Wiley: Right. Yeah. Yeah.
Christina Soletti: …That’s all some of us have is this.
Danielle Wiley: So on that note of showing real people, it has always been very important to you and to Ergobaby to have diversity of creators within your campaigns, which we love. ‘Cause it’s always been important to us too. After George Floyd was murdered and there was all this social unrest, we suddenly had other clients asking for the same thing, which it was finally, we’ve been telling you. But have you… Because it’s something that was always important to you guys. Did anything shift for you at all, right, in that 2020 time? I feel like the whole world turned itself over at that point, but I’m just curious because it was always a priority for you.
Christina Soletti: I’ll be honest, I’ve always been… I think sometimes the people I reported to don’t always understand exactly what it is I do. It’s hard to explain sometimes if you’re not in the trenches. And I don’t know that the past CEO really understood what it was that we were doing. And so I’ve always operated… I don’t want to say independently by any means, but I’ve always had the support that I can do, create what I want to create and show. So yes, it’s always been important to me to make sure that we’re showing the breadth.
Christina Soletti: Again, going back to what I was saying is a mom wants to be seen. She wants to see herself, she wants to relate. And if we’re only showing people who look a certain way, then we’re alienating a whole nother group of people who aren’t seeing themselves. So yes, that’s always been super important. So if anything, everything that went on in 2020 illuminated these issues. Made it maybe, made it less taboo. And like I said, I’ve always had the support of my team and the current CEO is absolutely in support. But like I said, it definitely allowed for a lot more, oh, okay, this is real. Again, it’s always there. It’s always been there.
Christina Soletti: We were able to illuminate this is really what’s happening. So I think it just allowed us to have a little bit more support. And like I said, I’ve always been able to have… I don’t want to say leeway, but I’ve always been able to have the ability to create content that is relevant to our audience. And our audience is just, it doesn’t look a certain way. So if I’m tasked with creating authentic and relevant content that people can relate to, then we have to have diverse content. And to me, it’s a bare minimum, frankly.
Danielle Wiley: So on a different note from influencer marketing, but I’ve heard you say that baby wearing can change the world, and I want to hear more.
Christina Soletti: Yeah.
Danielle Wiley: I’m giving you the platform to tell us how.
Christina Soletti: Yes. Well, and sometimes I get emotional still. I mean, I’ve been working for Ergobaby for 11 years, and I still get emotional. I mean, do feel mean, again, just on a personal note, the work I do has to have meaning. And yes, Ergobaby is a company that we make a profit, we’re a corporate company, and we create baby carriers, which yes, I believe can change the world.
Christina Soletti: Quick science lesson, there’s a thing that’s called attachment theory. It’s a scientific theory that is essentially how well your caregivers attuned to you. So between zero and three is the most important period, creating this attachment style. And so this attachment style will essentially stay with you for the rest of your life. It will inform all of your relationships for the rest of your life. Can it change? Yes. But it takes a lot of awareness and it takes a lot of work to change your attachment style.
Christina Soletti: Again, I’m totally oversimplifying this, but essentially there’s a secure attachment, which means you can have secure relationships with other people. You feel safe, you feel grounded. And then there’s a insecure and under insecure, there are several different, anxious avoidant, disorganized, all that sort of thing. So that attachment style that sticks with you for the rest of your life and informs all of your relationships happens between zero and three.
Christina Soletti: What’s happening between zero and three? Well, parents are overwhelmed, stressed, they’re what have you. There have been studies that show that baby wearing promotes a secure attachment so that the parent or the caregiver who is attending to the child can be more attuned to the needs of the child. And then that child will then develop a secure attachment, which will then stay with them for the rest of their lives. Unfortunately, you go interview someone on death row, or you interview someone in a prison, or you talk to people who’ve committed crimes, or most of them have insecure attachments, addiction issues, disorganized attachments.
Christina Soletti: It’s one of those things that is literally the basis of our human inner relationships and connections. Yet we rarely talk about it. I mean, there’s some great books out there and there’s amazing science out there for sure. But I really truly believe that if one mom who maybe didn’t wear her baby or didn’t think, oh, I’m going to have my baby in a baby carrier, changes her mind and wears her baby in a baby carrier, then my work is done. If I can change one mom. There’ve been very few studies, actually, there was only one study in 1986 that showed babies being carried in carriers reduces crying by 40%. 40% wearing a baby, in a baby carrier, reduces crime by 40%. I mean, that’s huge. And that study came out in 1986.
Christina Soletti: And then until very recently, there have been very few studies. Recently. I’d say the past… Since I’ve been working at Ergobaby, a lot of women, Emily Little at Nurturely, Leila Williams, being moms themselves, they’ve both done these studies and been doing studies that literally show that baby wearing increases secure attachment. It increases breastfeeding rates. At the Hazelden Institute, Joshua Sparrow showed that it reduces the mother’s heart rate, baby wearing I mean, it’s incredible.
Christina Soletti: Just wearing your baby can do and even the skin to skin, take it a step further and wear your baby, take your shirt off. You’re just nursing all day, wear them naked. It’s amazing what that will do, the benefits for babies. So I feel like the more people in this planet who have secure attachments, it’s literally going to change our world. And that is the time to do it, that zero to three, because it’s possible to change your attachment style when you’re older. But…
Danielle Wiley: It’s rough.
Christina Soletti: It’s a lot harder. It’s a lot harder. So I’m super passionate about that. And I know I went on for a while.
Danielle Wiley: No, it’s fine. But I was just going to say on that note, you guys have this Ever Love initiative, which is helping to bring baby carrying to more people.
Christina Soletti: To more accessible. Exactly.
Danielle Wiley: Yeah. So how does that work?
Christina Soletti: Work? The idea with Ever Love is the circular economy. So if we’re going to make the worlds better, well, we got to make sure the world’s here for those children. So then how can we do our part to then keep the planet? And one of the best ways to take care of the planet is the circular economy. So ever Love then will take carriers, because all our carriers have a lifetime guarantee. I mean, most parents will wear their carrier for multiple children. They’re made so well, but you don’t necessarily need it for that long if you only have one kid, one and done. So it’ll take those carriers and put them back in the circular economy, and yes, they’ll be more accessible for more people.
Danielle Wiley: I love it.
Christina Soletti: And we donate. I mean, of course we work with Baby to Baby. When you go on Ever Love and send your carrier in, you can choose to get a gift card, but you can also make a donation to Baby To Baby. And then we make carrier donations to Baby to Baby as well.
Danielle Wiley: So this season that you are appearing on season three is dedicated to women 50 plus, because I’m turning 50 this year and just got this wild idea that I would-
Christina Soletti: Yes.
Danielle Wiley: …Elevate all the world.
Christina Soletti: I love it. I love it. I love that I’m in that club.
Danielle Wiley: Yes, I’m excited. Actually, I was asking for recommendations on who to talk to, and someone responded to me and said that a lot of women don’t like to share their age. And I was really? In 20… I didn’t know that was still a thing. I’m like, super proud.
Christina Soletti: I know. I’m 50. I have gray hair.
Danielle Wiley: Same thing. So we’re asking all the guests this season to share with us a woman who has influenced you, inspired you, who has just meant something to you in your life.
Christina Soletti: There’s so many that I could name, but one of the women that really sticks out to me, and I still call her, she’s still my mentor, is our former CMO, Cynthia. She was a working mom, older than I am, and her kids are older than mine. So it’s funny to think about when you think about your parents… Being a working mom is so ubiquitous now, but for our moms, it wasn’t. And for even the generation right before us, it was hard. It was hard. I mean, it’s still hard, don’t get me wrong. It’s still hard being a working mom, but it’s definitely more accepted. She was one of those kind of women who forged the path to be one of the first working moms. And she’s wicked smart and just really puts her heart into everything. I mean, I think there’s that… Sometimes women think that when they come into the workplace, they have to be more like men.
Christina Soletti: And that’s not the case. I think let’s bring more vulnerability in. That’s why I always had an issue with Cheryl Sandberg and Lean In. I was like, no, let’s not lean into the patriarchy. Yeah, let’s smash the patriarchy and make it more soft and vulnerable so that people can really be who they are. And we don’t have to kill ourselves being a working mom. And that’s something that Cynthia really taught me is, and I got to work with her for a long time at Ergobaby. And I’m really… She works at Children’s Hospital now, which of course she works at Children’s Hospital now.
Christina Soletti: But having that mentor and someone to really show me that it’s okay. That whole thing, Rene Brown, it’s okay to be vulnerable. Vulnerability is actually strength and courage. And she demonstrated that, and she demonstrated that leading as example in a really beautiful way. So I would definitely say she was, at least in my career, one of the most inspirational women.
Danielle Wiley: Love it. I love it. Thank you. Well, thank you so much for coming on. This has been so great. I feel like I need to invite you every season just so we can keep catching up.
Christina Soletti: I know. I’m like, could we… This went by so fast. I’m like, wait, that’s it. Yeah, we can’t keep chatting?
Danielle Wiley: Well, this is awesome. Thank you again. It was great.
Christina Soletti: Thank you so much, Danielle.
Danielle Wiley: Thank you for listening. Don’t forget to like, share and subscribe. Please check back next Monday for a new episode featuring marketing conversations through the lens of influence. I am your host, Danielle Wiley, and this is The Art of Sway.
