"I ran my business from my living room - and now it's a global success"

Mum-of-three, Aimee Cestrone, has just been named as one of the finalists for the National Entrepreneur Awards 2025.

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The 34-year-old, from Penistone, began her business journey five years ago - starting out selling shoes online for a profit, which sparked a love for the marketing side of business.

Over time, she diversified and entered an entirely new market - baby feeding and weaning.

Her firm, Pippeta, is known around the world.

“I have three children myself and I got really interested in the feeding line, it really bugged me that everything we had got had either Mickey Mouse all over it or other characters, so I decided to create and design, along with my husband, a product range that parents wouldn’t mind being left on the side, I wanted it to be aesthetically pleasing,” she said.

She began selling her products online and in the first 24 hours of her stock being available they had sold all 500 breast pumps available.

She restocked them,and within another 24 hours another 1,000 had gone.

Aimee now sells her products all around the world, in shops like Asda, Boots, and Mamas n Papas in Dubai.

Pippeta now has distributors in Malta and other countries in Europe.

The firm has been going from strength to strength, being involved in trade shows and consumer shows and has won numerous awards already, but what makes Pippeta unique is the company offer a free consultation with every breast pump bought.

“I had a difficult birth myself and I wasn’t receiving that support from the midwives and to pay for a lactation consultation support, you have to pay a lot of money and mums don’t have that money,” said Aimee.

“So I thought if we could build a community and a board of lactation consultants that can support and do that through Pippeta I needed to use this as a platform to give the mums what they currently aren’t getting,” Aimee explained.

Aimee said when she applied for Entrepreneur Awards – known as the ‘Grammys of Entrepreneurship – she placed it at the back of her mind as she thought she wouldn’t be even considered.

When a letter landed through her door confirming her as a finalist, she described that feeling as ‘gobsmacking.’

“It is an honour to be chosen as a finalist, but it goes to show that if you have a vision, being a ‘mom-trepreneur’ is doable,” she said.

“This has gone from being set up in my living room to a global success. For me it’s about empowering other mums and women to go for it,” said Aimee.