WWP Podcast #17 - Mompreneur: From Kitchen Dream To Worldwide Success with Margaux Khoury

In this episode, I chat with Margaux Khoury, mompreneur who makes The Best Deodorant in the World. She shares how her product grew from a formula in her kitchen to a worldwide business and how she’s found ways to balance work and family life. Hint: it involves letting go of some things and trusting your team. Margaux is comfortable being unconventional. Choosing, with her husband, to follow their intuition and unschool their children, growing their business more slowly to support that dedicated effort, and doing it all well show how she’s making it cool to be the black sheep. We talk sacrifice, lifestyles, sustainability, snacks (at least I do), and having a gut you can trust.

Today, Margaux dishes on:

how cleaning our bodies from the inside out will make our sweat less smelly, the differences between conventional and natural deodorants, why she wants people to not need deodorant, the challenges of scaling a business, and her unschooling and world-schooling philosophy.

 

Highlights

On her life and work:

Now that I’m a mom I love mentioning it first. It’s my primary focus, my priority. They are my world right now. And I’m also an entrepreneur. My company is The Best Deodorant in the World. I started out in our home and it sells worldwide in stores and online. And I live in Canada.

 

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On discomfort/fear:

I do have many fears...we have overcome a lot of things too.

 

Predictability is actually very comforting. And entrepreneurs often have very little of that. If I can make my life as predictable as possible, it’s better for me than the fear of what is going to happen.

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On failure:

My opinion on failure is it’s really great, it kind of leads us to the next thing and also allows us to see when to quit certain things that we’re not meant to do.

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On knowing your limits:

I love being the voice for other parents as well, letting them know that it is absolutely possible. A lot of people say you can’t have both - you can...There’s been a lot of sacrifices. We’ve sacrificed growing a company super, uber fast because we prioritize our family at this moment.

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On taking ownership:

I really believe in my heart that we don’t have to harm anything in the world to have a very successful company as entrepreneurs… In our hearts, I know we are adding value because we’re offering a product that truly works.

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On work ethic:

What I encourage women to do is look at where they’re spending their time. Are they happy doing that? Is it like a chore? Look at what you love, what you’re passionate at, what you’re really, really good at. If you’re good with connecting with people, that’s what you need to be doing.

 

We don’t have to do it all. It’s really, really important to give ourselves a break.

This is another amazing encouragement that I give other company owners – letting go and also paying others for something that you don’t want to do anymore, your time and effort is better spent elsewhere.

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On intentions:

Really listening to our inner voice is magical because it can guide us and we can really feel good about things that we are doing.

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On perceptions:

I find too the investment in our health today will really prevent an investment in our sickness in the future.

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On growth:

I don’t want to be the one who’s so set in my ways, in my decisions, that I’m not able to change for the better once better comes around.

What’s really empowering to me is the knowledge that whatever I ate in the past and whatever I did in the past to my body, my mind, I can start today and improve and change and it will reverse. 

 

It’s not convenient to change a lifestyle. It’s challenging. It’s hard. It’s turning a whole world upside-down sometimes.

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On unschooling:

 

Unschooling is sort of a philosophy that we as human beings including children do not need a formal school to learn anything. We learn every single day. I was a teacher; I feel like I’m in a position where I can say this: the [traditional] model is not really working. Our children are not really being prepared for the future…It’s not giving them the skills that they need to thrive.

 

So the unschooling when I discovered it, it was scary…Then I dug deep and did the research and met families... It was giving our children the freedom and the autonomy to be able to choose and really go for our passions truly without having to worry about the curriculum or math or learning how to read at a certain time. My five-year-old knows his alphabet. No one taught him, he taught himself. We give him resources but who cares if you’re eight or nine and you just learned to read. It’s not a big deal. So it’s really refreshing.

 

My opinion is, the way we’re doing it and the way unschoolers do it for the most part is we get them familiar with the world activities. I love that the children have friends that are older and friends that are younger. And the younger ones thrive by learning from the older ones, having great role models. And the older ones thrive because they become sort of leaders and guides for the younger ones.

 

I look at [my children] as an equal, I look at them as my friend and why not? Why do we have to be the boss of our children? We could be their guides.

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On being an entrepreneur:

Talk to any entrepreneurs out there and you’ll discover that their story, their journey, and their path from where they were when they started to today is not straight. The stepping stones I’ve done in the past have all led me to what I’m meant to do today which is not about deodorant. It’s about showing the world that I can build a company, a really successful company, and use healthy products, this amazing product that works without harming the world, without harming my body or other living creatures. That’s the real mission behind it.

 

Having a family is definitely not a hindrance; I look at it as a major positive cause it’s taught me so much and it’s given me even tougher skin as an entrepreneur.

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On negativity:

Like anyone going against the grain and sort of being their own voice, we are going to get a lot of naysayers.

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On sustainability:

What we put into our bodies, what we do affects how we think and how we act.

 

We always try to make sure we buy sustainable products too. That’s very important to us because we don’t want to ruin land or destroy the bees in the process.

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Keep in touch with Margaux Khoury:

Websites

The Best Deodorant in the World – Natural deodorant redefined.

 

Huffington Post – Author page.

Theultimategroceryguide.com – Future home of the book, The Ultimate Guide to Organic Groceries to be released soon.

 

Links Mentioned

 

Alex and Cadey Charfen – Offer products that serve businesses and entrepreneurs.

Dr. Bruce Lipton – Leader in bridging science and spirit.

Dana Martin  – Activist and author.

Joanne Young – International chef and holistic nutritionist.

Kris Carr – Wellness activist and author.

Marie Forleo – Entrepreneur and online trainer.

Suzie Batiz – Founder and CEO of Poo-pourri.

Tim Ferriss – Educational activist and author of The 4-Hour Workweek.

Tony Robbins – Author, life and business strategist.

 

Alliance for Self-directed Education – A non-profit organization that focuses on self-directed learning.

Growing Without Schooling – Homeschooling and unschooling resources.

Mental Wellness Summit – Online mental health presentations for purchase.