A true entrepreneur has an eye for the future. They see an opportunity that has yet to be pursued and they conquer it to great success. We love hearing about women who were true visionaries and the story of Caron Spatola and 3Wishes.com is no different. Caron knew that the Internet was going to be big, she knew it far before it caught on and her attention to society and the potential of the internet led her to create the first online e-commerce business for bedroom lingerie and fantasy costumes. It was 1998 at a bar in Los Angeles when Caron and her husband Frank were deep in conversation about their lives, their futures, the future of society and the future of the Internet that the first glimmer of 3Wishes came to light. Caron knew the Internet was the way of the future, she knew she wanted a new project to work on while the children were at school and she was going to find a way to make the internet work in her favor. After a few rounds of drinks and brainstorming, Caron came up with the idea of supplying a product that was nearly impossible to find…bedroom lingerie. Stores like Macy’s, Sears and Walmart already sold lingerie and undergarments, but you couldn’t find or purchase fantasy apparel and sexy costumes anywhere. If you were lucky enough to find some, it was a French maid or schoolgirl costume, but that was the extent of the section.
Seeing an opportunity and with no prior web knowledge or training, Caron bought a copy of Frontpage off eBay and while her two sons were at school, she got to work. Within two months, hundreds of hours of custom building and dozens of calls to Tech Support for help, she had built the first 3Wishes.com website. The first day the 3Wishes.com website was live, they made a sale. Caron proudly tells us that since the first day when the first sale was made, 3Wishes has never gone a day without a sale. Caron kept her inventory of costumes in the family travel trailer and from the comfort of the kitchen table, she processed all orders herself with multiple trips to the post office, UPS and FedEx while the children were at school. The business of 3Wishes might have started in her kitchen but today 3Wishes.com is run from a 30,000 square foot warehouse in Creedmoor, NC.
We love the story of 3Wishes and how Caron saw the potential of the internet before most people, men and women, and made a booming career out of it. Caron may have started 3Wishes as her project, but today it is a family business with her husband Frank and son Steven helping her run the show.
Caron’s best advice for women looking to pursue something that has never been tackled before is to go for it and not to let what anyone says deter you. There will always be people who won’t support you or even look down on you, but at the end of the day it’s not what they think that matters.
We love the story of Caron Spatola and 3Wishes and appreciate them sponsoring Get Empowered: PINK’s 12th Annual Fall Empowerment Lunch Event by providing the masks for our panelist. You can get your own mask on the 3Wishes.com website and using code PINK2016 you can get 15 percent off your total purchase and free shipping!
By Samantha R. Strazanac
Photo by Caron Spatola
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