Marietta Mom Wins $250,000 to Keep Business Afloat

MARIETTA, Ga.--Lori Lite's children's books spring from a place of stress. "I didn't plan on this, it happened in an instant, actually," Lori said.

Lori's five-year-old son was hyper-active and stressed out. It took Lori and her husband more than two hours to get him to go to sleep every night. It was becoming a huge stress on the family. "My husband and I would fight about it, about whose turn it was. No one wanted to do it. And my younger daughter started having troubling sleeping too," Lori remembers.

The Marietta mother of three wrote a bedtime story for him. "Breathe in through your nose, 1, 2, 3. Breathe out from your nose, 1, 2, 3," Lori reads from one of the books. The bedtime stories that were published into hard-cover children's books and CDs include adult relaxation techniques.

It worked. Her son settled into sleep, and she settled into a new role: an entrepreneur mom. Her business is called "Stress Free Kids". She was working out of her kitchen, making just enough money to keep her business going.

Then, a jackpot.

"I figured why not," Lori said. "It was one take, one chance." Lori appeared on an ABC television show called "Shark Tank". Successful investors listen to a pitch and decide if they want to give the contestant money.

Lori watches the recorded show from her den of her Cobb County home. She said she was terrified and used the techniques from her own books to calm down. "You see me shaking my hands, right there; I'm shaking off the stress."
It worked. Lori sold 50% of her business to real estate mogul Barbara Corcoran for $250,000.00.

Lori knows other entrepreneurs won't get this chance, but she encourages them to fight for their business dreams, despite the recession: "These are creative times, creative thinkers. We all need to think outside of the box and think of ways to survive and create new jobs for ourselves."