About

Laura Wheeler is a middle aged, overweight, mother of 8 (so far), who has many years of web design and small business consulting, as well as farm and garden and mushroom cultivation experience. She homeschooled her kids, and is a prolific technical and instructional writer.

This site was conceived after the Wheeler family renamed their web design business to Firelight Web Studio. She met with a client, and mentioned her intent to expand her business, and said to him, “Who is going to take me seriously? I look like a frumpy haus frau!”

His reply was illuminating. He said, “I did.” He then went on to say, “One of the reasons I hired you is because you were unquestionably real. When I saw you in casual clothing, needing a haircut, with a kid in tow, all thoughts that you would try to gouge me went right out the window.” He then explained that he was more willing to trust her because as a small business owner, he could identify with her priority of people over clothing, and her priority of family first. He also said, “Any pre-judgments I might have had disappeared when you opened your mouth and started talking. I did wonder if my site might end up looking ‘homemade’, but your preliminary examples were so professional I stopped being concerned.”

Laura knows what it is like to be in that awkward stage of building a business where you are successful enough to know your worth, but no so successful that you can afford to LOOK successful. There are just more important things, like the software to do the best job for the client, or the ability to give your customers fair prices, the need to invest in one small thing that will boost sales, or the kid that needs shoes YET AGAIN!

Laura owns and operates more websites than she can accurately count on various home, family, small business, and marketing topics. She and her husband farm wherever they are, make products in their home for sale online, and provide consulting services for startup farmers, mushroom cultivators, cottage manufacturers, and micro-business startups.