37: The Motherland Story: How former journo and rural mum, Steph Trethewey started a business that morphed into a movement.
Media MagnetShow Notes
Never in her wildest dreams, did entrepreneur Stephanie Trethewey envisage herself married to a farmer and living on a property in remote Central North Tasmania with two small kids.
Stephanie loved her TV career and spent adrenaline fuelled days chasing dodgy tradies down the street for A Current Affair, long night shifts on the news desk and enjoying the pressure of the tight deadlines of a 24 hours newsroom and the fast pace of life in a big city.
Until one day she interviewed a smart and charismatic brand manager for a story she was working on, they fell in love and got married, moved to a farm in Tasmania and the rest is history.
Well, not quite.
By her own admission, Stephanie had romanticised the idea of what life would be like on the land. With her first born six month old son in tow, her husband now working 7 days a week to build their family business, isolated and miles from anything and anyone, she didn't know a sole...and she struggled bigtime.
Suffering from post natal depression and loneliness, she was without the village she knew she needed to raise her young family...and so she set out to build one herself, from scratch.
The idea started as a simple podcast and she called it Motherland.
Turns out, Stephanie wasn't alone. The demand for the Motherland style network, support and connected conversations quickly exploded as thousands of rural and remote mums from all over Australia opted into her community and the business quickly evolved and grew.
Stephanie's honest story, the business' swift organic growth and her clever communication skills were the ultimate triple threat. Steph managed to get her business air-time across a plethora of the country's top media organisations in print, radio and TV.
As a much needed service, Motherland also caught the attention of the Australian Government which culminated in January this year when Stephanie was announced as 2024's Australian of the Year for Tasmania.
Motherland is now a registered national charity on a mission to reduce isolation, improve mental health and the well-being of rural mothers across the country.
I can't wait to share with you how she did it (by herself with two small kids in tow!).
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