Cara Dumaplin: Founder of TakingCaraBabies

Episode 731

On this episode of The Kara Goldin Show, I’m joined by Cara Dumaplin, Founder of Taking Cara Babies—a trusted education company dedicated to helping parents navigate the challenges of infant and toddler sleep. A neonatal nurse, certified pediatric sleep consultant, and mom of four, Cara has built a global community of millions through her research-backed, compassionate approach that empowers families to thrive. Her courses, resources, and now physical products, like her newly launched swaddles, offer practical tools that nurture both babies and parents.
In our conversation, Cara shares her journey from years in the NICU to creating one of the most respected brands in the parenting space. We talk about the inspiration behind Taking Cara Babies, the evolution from education to product development, and the strategies she’s used to scale a mission-driven brand while staying authentic to her values. Cara opens up about the challenges and joys of entrepreneurship, how she balances building a business while raising four children, and the most meaningful success stories she’s witnessed from parents around the world.
Whether you’re a new parent, aspiring founder, or someone fascinated by how empathy and expertise can build a movement—this episode is full of insight and inspiration. Now on The Kara Goldin Show.

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Transcript

Kara Goldin 0:00
I am unwilling to give up, that I will start over from scratch as many times as it takes to get where I want to be. I want to be you. Just want to make sure you will get knocked down. But just make sure you don’t get knocked out, knocked out. So your only choice should be go focus on what you can control. Control, control. Hi everyone, and welcome to the Kara Goldin show. Join me each week for inspiring conversations with some of the world’s greatest leaders. We’ll talk with founders, entrepreneurs, CEOs and really, some of the most interesting people of our time. Can’t wait to get started. Let’s go. Let’s go. Hi everyone, and welcome back to the Kara Goldin show today. I’m joined by Cara Dumaplin, the founder of TakingCaraBabies. I love that we pronounce Kara the same, even though it’s spelled a little bit differently. So hers is with a C, mine is with a K, but TakingCaraBabies is a trusted and beloved resource, helping parents navigate one of the toughest parts of early parenthood, getting their babies to sleep. Cara is a neonatal nurse, certified pediatric sleep consultant and mom of four, and Cara blends medical expertise with deep compassion to give parents the tools confidence and support they need during those exhausting early months and years. Cara, I wish you were around when I was having my four kids, because it definitely is one of the most challenging I always say that the time in your life when you feel stupid, right, if you ever did, feel for so many parents. So since launching TakingCaraBabies in 2013 Cara has guided millions of families worldwide through her research backed heart centered approach to infant and toddler sleep, best selling digital classes to her newly launched physical products, which I love, love, love, and I cannot wait to hear all about her journey in the background around building, TakingCaraBabies. So welcome, Cara. How are

Cara Dumaplin 2:18
you? I’m great. Thank you for having me. It’s nice to be here.

Kara Goldin 2:22
Absolutely, very, very excited. So in addition to sharing at least the sound of a name, you are located in Phoenix, where I grew up. So very, very small world and four kids. Wow, lots, lots in common. That’s right, even our names? Yes, lots in common. Okay, so let’s start at the beginning. What inspired you to create taking care

Cara Dumaplin 2:47
of babies? Well, let me tell you, it was inspired from my own journey. I here I was a baby nurse, and my husband is a pediatrician. So here we are, baby nurse, baby doctor, and we have this baby, and I kind of thought we were gonna be experts, right? Like babies are our thing. We’re good at this, but let me tell you, breastfeeding. I had helped 1000s of parents breastfeed newborn care. I could do a baby bath with my eyes closed. But fast forward eight months, and we had this beautiful baby girl who we loved more than life itself, but she did not sleep. She did not sleep, and we were like at the end of our rope. I was exhausted, he was exhausted. Our baby girl was exhausted, and it rocked us to our core. And so I think that really set me on this journey to to dig deeper. Like as a nurse, I knew how to look at evidence based research, how look at the journals, what does the journal say? And take that and then turn it into daily practice. So I did, that’s what I did. I got my baby girl sleeping. Fortunately for us, we had more babies after that to practice, and that’s kind of where I thought it would end.

Kara Goldin 4:07
So how long did it take you to actually kind of get into the groove of fixing this issue once you actually maybe took kind of what you were teaching into this practice.

Cara Dumaplin 4:23
Let me tell you, I never set out to have a business like that. Wasn’t my goal. I started my career as a neonatal ICU nurse. I did that for about five years. Cross trained over to labor and delivery, which is delivering babies. So NICU is sick and premature babies. Labor and delivery is where you deliver the babies? I loved being a bedside nurse, right? I thought, I’m gonna do this forever. It was in labor and delivery that I met my husband a pediatrician, and then I worked labor and delivery through all four kids after my fourth was born, I traded the delivery room in for the OB office. Right? And it was there that I started seeing patients postpartum. They would come in for their four week, their six week, their eight week check, and I could just see darkness in their eyes, like after about the fourth one woman came in crying. I was like, I want to go home with her. I know I could make a difference in her life, if I could just go home with her. So that’s what happened. My son, Charlie, started preschool. The youngest started preschool, and I started TakingCaraBabies. And it started by going into mom’s homes and just helping them. Like, here I was working in north Scottsdale, which pretty like these women were running corporate America, right? But you hand them a seven pound infant, and they were like, I need help. And I’m like, I’m your girl, I can help. So I was teaching things like feeding newborn care, but sleep was the thing that they were struggling with. Like I was teaching them how to read their cues, read baby’s cues, how to set them down in the bassinet, how to get more than a few hours of sleep at night. How do you get them to nap in their bassinet so you can actually shower. And as I taught, I could see hope returning to their eyes. And let me tell you, if you help one mom, she’s gonna tell 10 of her friends. So from there, it just kind of blossomed. It was like, I I couldn’t go to all the homes. So I had this bright idea that I would start teaching a class. And Kara, I started teaching this class, and I had to teach it twice a day, three times a day, because it couldn’t fit everyone in the room. It became the number one prenatal class in in the Phoenix area. But people would come up to me afterwards and they would say, but Kara, my best friend’s in Boston, and my sister lives in Dallas. And I’m like, you guys, I have four little kids at home. I can’t just travel all over. So I thought, You know what I’ll do, I’ll record my class and put it on a DVD. And I thought, That’s it. That’ll help people, right? Well, I started Googling, and I found you could stream it into people’s homes. This is like 2014 right? Nobody had heard of an online class, but I just knew, how do I help people beyond the Phoenix area? So that’s what I did. That was kind of the beginning of how I took it from here this nurse turned into a business. But again, it never, I never set out to have a business. It was the heart of these parents have a need. I have the expertise to help them how? How can I do that? And that’s how TakingCaraBabies was born.

Kara Goldin 7:26
That’s wild. How did you get the word out? I guess it was all word of mouth in the Phoenix area. But then it’s a different thing when people are not I guess seeing you interact, maybe they hear for some of their friends. But, but how did you really build the business that you have online?

Cara Dumaplin 7:45
I have to tell you this little app called Instagram. And you know, at that time, let’s think back to like 2015 to 2016 people were posting pictures, right? And I would post a picture of a baby, but I would write a caption to educate parents, and I just did it because I kind of liked it. It was kind of fun. I wasn’t trying to sell anything. I just was like, I kind of like this little app. Well, in 2016 Instagram stories were released. Remember, like, you know, Instagram stories now from I would get on and I would just talk, I would talk to parents, and I’d be like, Okay, let me tell you a sleep myth. For example, never wake a sleeping baby. That’s a myth. And then I would tell them about it. And the more I talked, they were like, I want more. And I’m like, Well, I have this class. Do you want this class? And that Instagram grew my business, like I have to tell you, until 2021 I never spent one penny on marketing. I just showed up on Instagram and like I said, you help one mom, she’ll tell 10 of her best friends. So that’s how it grew word of mouth and Instagram

Kara Goldin 8:57
that’s so wild. What was the first sign that you that you really had a business at this point, was it? I guess, before you went on Instagram, you were growing this business in in Phoenix. I mean, there was, you know, lots of people coming to you, saying, Do you have a class in Boston? Do you, can you fit me in to this class. But what was the moment that you said, Gosh, like, I mean, it’s, I would imagine at this point you almost wish you had competition, right? You’re just like, you know, I want somebody who’s good, who can serve, right? Because that’s what you really wanted to do,

Cara Dumaplin 9:38
right? So funny, because even today, I’m like, Oh, this is a business. This is a business. I’ll tell you what would happen. I would go into mom’s homes and I would help them, and then they would like, go to write me a check or hand me money. And I’m like, no, no, no, no, really, it’s okay. You don’t have to pay me. Like, I had a hard time accepting money because I’m like, really? I’m just here to help you. And so you know, I’m gonna tell you, I think the day which this is a really late sign that you have a business, the day that a member of my team came to me and she said, Kara, 10,000 families got one of our classes this month, 10,000 families. And I’m like, what? I think that’s a pretty good sign, like, you have a business, right? When 10 and then the next month, 10,000 different families bought my class, and the next month, like, so I was like, okay, okay. And I also think when it started growing to the point where it’s like, it can’t just be me, I need a team. And that’s when it’s like, okay, this is, this is real. I have to tell you, even my husband thought, like I just had this little side hobby where I just really like to help people. And I finally had to sit him down and go, no, no, look, this is a real business here. Yeah, I think, I think he gets it out. I love it.

Kara Goldin 11:04
So you’ve worked with millions of families. What’s the most common misconception parents have about baby sleep?

Cara Dumaplin 11:11
Oh, if there was one thing that I could like break this misconception, it would be this. I don’t want you to have a nap schedule, just so you can say I have the best nap schedule. I I don’t want you to have a good sleeper, just so you’re chained at home. Our mission at TakingCaraBabies is we help babies and toddlers sleep, and this is the clincher, so families can thrive, and so I don’t want you chained at home to your nap schedule. I want you to have a good sleeper so you can take that baby and go meet your friend for lunch, and you have this happy baby, and you have this happy parent, this mom, who’s like, No, I am enjoying parenthood, and I’m well rested, and we’re connected and bonded, because we’re all sleeping well. So the biggest misconception is that it’s about a schedule or it’s about sleep. TakingCaraBabies is so much bigger than sleep. It’s about thriving in life. That’s what I want for every family.

Kara Goldin 12:22
I love it. So you launched your first ever physical product, starting with swaddles this year, so exciting, and they’re so awesome. So why now? I would imagine many people asked you to do this earlier, but how did you decide to start with the swaddle, but then also, like, why? Now, in

Cara Dumaplin 12:46
my newborn class, I teach about swaddling, we know that when you take a newborn and you swaddle them, it mimics the womb, right? They feel like they’re in the womb. Well, when they feel like they’re in the womb, that’s familiar, so they sleep better. And so it’s something I’ve always taught is swaddling, safe sleep and swaddling, and they’re like over the past 1314, years, I’ve become a resource for parents. They’ll ask me, like, Kara, what’s the best best bassinet? What’s the best sound machine, what’s the best swaddle? And so it’s been my job to stay up to date on the latest baby products and know what’s good. And let me tell you, with swaddles, there are a lot of great swaddles on the market, a lot of great ones that I’ve recommended over the years. But every time, I’d be like, Okay, I really love this swaddle, but I wish, I wish it had this, or this swaddle is great, except for this, and then there’s this swaddle, and I really love it, but not this part. And so one day, truly, I was just, I guess, complaining to my sister, and I was like, you know, I just, none of them are exactly what I want, and she’s like, so why don’t you make your own and I’m Huh, why don’t I? And you know, as a mom, you probably know this, I hit a stage in life where all four of my kids are now kind of independent, like the youngest was driving. You know, that’s a big life change for you, right? When your youngest starts driving. So I noticed I had a little bit more time, and I’m like, Oh, I would love to make a swaddle. And so I surrounded myself with people who knew all about that, because I didn’t know the first thing about bringing something to market like that, but I knew swatily, and so I surrounded myself with people. Started making it Kara, I have to tell you, they our timeline was, you know, about nine months. Took us 18 months, 18 months. You want to know why? Because I was like, No, I will not bring. A swaddle to the market unless it’s the best swaddle on the market. And so they would show me, and I would go, Okay, I like it, but not this, and I like it, but nope, nope. It’s gotta be better. It’s gotta be the best on the market. Guys, if I’m bringing this to market, it’s gotta be the best on the market. So I wanted to get it just right. So it took a while. What

Kara Goldin 15:20
was it that you like, what was the painful part of of building it and, like, what did you change? And finally say, okay, green light, let’s go.

Cara Dumaplin 15:31
Okay. Well, so there were kind of four things. And it’s, I call it like the name is called the best swaddle, B, E, S, T, and so B is buttery soft, like I wanted you to feel this swaddle and go, Oh my gosh, this. I wanted it to be an emotional experience, like you’re wrapping your baby in this. It better be like, feel luxurious, right? So buttery soft. E, easy. It had to be easy. It’s 3am and you’re trying to swaddle a baby. I didn’t want anything complicated. S is silent. The velcro is literally silent. And here’s what I saw in so many swaddles, they’re so noisy. It’s, yeah, you know that Big Rip and not at 3am makes babies do this, and it makes parents go, Oh my gosh. They hated it. So I’m like, Okay, it’s gotta be silent, and then so B is buttery soft, E is easy, S is silent, t3 ways to swaddle. I wanted it to be I wanted you to have different options. So, for example, I live in Phoenix. It’s 115 degrees today. Swaddling a baby, it’s hot, so one part of it is just, you can just swaddle their arms, or a lot of babies become Houdini babies, they bust out of every swaddle known to man, I wanted to have one that was breakout proof. I also wanted just a quick and easy, just option that could be there. So there’s three different ways to use it. So that was the challenge. Like I had these standards, and I was not compromising on it, and they had to meet all of those. So my team was so great. I have the best team. And they were like, Okay, well, we hear you. It’s gotta be the best. Okay, we hear the standards. And they just worked with me, and it took us a while, but I’m like, I am not compromising. We’re going to have the best swaddle on the market.

Kara Goldin 17:24
I love it. Well, they are so buttery soft and and so amazing. So I love what you what you’ve built. What was it like moving from just being an educational content company to a guest product development. I mean, you’re in the early stages of it, but how challenging was that

Cara Dumaplin 17:46
I have to tell you I didn’t know I would love it like I know babies, I know products, but what I love is listening to parents. Parents will tell you their pain points, right? They’ll tell you, I don’t like this. I don’t like that. I love this. I want this, and so I love that. I love hearing from parents like this is what we want, and then taking my expertise as a NICU nurse, a labor and delivery nurse, and combining it to make the best product possible. Let me tell you, though, with the swaddle. Here’s the other thing that I love. You have a physical product, but on that physical product, on my swaddle, there’s this little QR code, and of course, it shows you how to do the swaddle. Every product shows you how to use it. But I took it a step further. I’m like, no, no, no, no. What if you swaddle your baby and they instantly start crying. They hate to be swaddled. Let me teach you. So my swaddle comes with a little mini sleep class. And I show you how to take this swaddle, swaddle your baby up, and if they’re crying, what do you do? And I show you how to literally on camera you’ll watch. It’s just, I think it’s an 18 minute little video you can watch, and this baby goes from crying to literally asleep in the bassinet with the swaddle. And so it’s like, oh, you get a swaddle, but you also get the education. And so to take a physical product and combine it with education, that’s what I want. I want parents. I didn’t do this just so you could have one more product to clutter your home, right? I wanted them to feel confident, and I wanted them to have physical tools and educational tools to help them. So it’s been really a match made in heaven the physical and the digital.

Kara Goldin 19:35
So you’ve created this amazing, amazing company built around something that you’re really good at, and, you know, you’ve got a gut for it, and you’re teaching others happiness. And, I mean, it must be so fulfilling and, and, you know, I’m sure there’s super hard parts of it, you’ve built an incredible team. Yeah, but I think what you’ve done is, really, you know all about entrepreneurship, right? And I’m sure, my guess is you never considered yourself to be an entrepreneur. Maybe somebody said, Oh my gosh, you’ve started a company. You’re an entrepreneur, but you’re like, Wait, is that what I’m doing? I mean, I’m a nurse, right? And I I do what I love doing. Can you talk about that and how, I guess, how it’s grown into, it’s grown into you, and sort of what you’re what you’re doing today? Yes, I,

Cara Dumaplin 20:38
you know, I think when your the passion comes out of you, when it’s like, no, you have a fire in your soul, like fire in your chest, where you’re like, I can make a difference in the lives of people. When that’s pouring out of you, you can’t help but to impact the lives of other people, and that’s ultimately what I want. I I heard it say like, okay, where your passion and your talents intersect? That intersection is your sweet spot, and that’s what this is like. I have a passion to impact the lives of of new parents. That’s my passion. Well, my talent is educating new parents. Is taking medical knowledge and teaching. And so that passion and that talent, where they intersect, that’s your sweet spot. And so for any entrepreneur out there, I would say this is what worked for me. Instead of trying to, like, build a business or make revenue or have a business plan. It was an overflow of passion and surrounding yourself with people who are strong where you’re weak. I think that’s, that’s what it was about for me.

Kara Goldin 21:53
Yeah, definitely. So when you think about you know you’ve you built your business, as you mentioned on Instagram, I mean, built it first in person, but then took it online. You’ve got a lot of people who love what you’re doing. You’re always going to run into the haters, right that? And that’s with any entrepreneur you’re launching a product, you believe in what you’re doing, and you’re going to run into the haters. What would you say to a founder that you know, maybe is dealing with this today? I mean, you don’t even have to be a founder to get those people right that are on your back and and being negative about whatever you’re doing. But what would you say about that?

Cara Dumaplin 22:42
You know, let me tell you my sweet friend Darryl Ann Denner, actually, she was on your podcast. Yeah, me, her and I were talking, and she said to me, she said, Kara, I saw this sign, this picture on the wall, and it was a great white shark, great white shark. And it said to be great means to be misunderstood. And she said to me, because I was talking to her about this, she said, Okay, you can be here in the middle where everybody likes you, right? If that’s where you want to be, be there, or you can choose to go impact lives make a great impact. What do you want? You need to pick one. Do you want to be liked or do you want to make a great impact? And I was like, I want to make a great impact. And she said, Okay, so that means not everybody’s going to like you. Lean into that. Lean into that, the bigger impact you make. The more people don’t like you. Are you okay with that? And in that moment, I’m like, yes, because my mission is so much bigger than people liking me. I want to change lives. I want parents who feel like I’m at the end of my rope. I am struggling with postpartum depression. I’m struggling with postpartum anxiety. I can’t stand my partner because I’m so freaking sleep deprived. Isn’t that funny how we turn on each other when we’re exhausted like that, like I want them to know? No, no, no, there’s hope. Because changing lives to me is so much greater than people liking me.

Kara Goldin 24:18
So when you think about kind of the the life cycle of your of your consumer, and many of them are having a second baby and going, maybe this next baby was, is, is not a sleeper versus the first one. Maybe was a lot easier to kind of get under control. But beyond that. It seems like you have a huge opportunity in front of you to actually help people beyond the swaddling. Where do you think TakingCaraBabies goes from here? Is it taking care of toddlers? Is it taking care of mom? Taking care of you know, there’s so. Many directions that you could

Cara Dumaplin 25:02
go in. Well, let me tell you, the business kind of did go in that direction. Like I’m I’m a baby nurse, right? And so I was like, I do babies, I do babies. And about who, three years ago, we crossed over to toddlers. So it’s TakingCaraBabies and we help toddlers. Now that’s come from just listening to parents like, Kara, I didn’t find you until I had a three year old or a four year old, like, we need help. And I was always like, not toddlers, not I can do babies, but not toddler, toddler, it becomes about behavior, right? And so it was a little different, but we leaned in, and we’re doing toddlers, and we’re helping parents with toddlers sleep too. But as far as the future, like, what’s next for TakingCaraBabies we have, we have a new generation of parents like Gen Zers are becoming parents, and they learn differently. You know, like millennials, they like their online classes, and they are. They love that, and that’s how they learned. And so Jen, Jen’s ears are a little different. And so we’re okay. We’re leaning into that, like, Okay, how do we serve them best? And so we’re there’s that educational piece. And also, what products what right now, I foresee that in the sleep space. But what products can we bring to market? That’s not just one more thing to buy, but that truly helps babies and toddlers sleep. So that’s that’s where we’re going.

Kara Goldin 26:31
I love it. How many people do you have in the company now?

Cara Dumaplin 26:35
Well, there are about, oh gosh, 38 of us. Wow, isn’t that crazy? 38 so it started with me, just one, yeah, and some of them are full time employees. Some of them are part time. Some of them are contractors that like, get on the phone one on one, like they’re all a part of my team. They all have been trained by me, but they get on the phone one on one with moms. So let’s say or dads. Let’s say you take my class and you want one on one support, they get on the phone and help parents one on one. So we built this beautiful team, and that’s I’m gonna tell you. That’s a little secret that entrepreneurs need to know, like you don’t have to be good at everything. You have to know, where you’re good, and then you surround yourself with incredible, incredible people who are strong. And that, I think, is what I’ve done well, is I surrounded myself with a team who is top notch, stellar and, I mean, isn’t that? Isn’t that what we’re wanting, like that’s how we can serve families best by all of us doing what we’re good at.

Kara Goldin 27:45
Yeah, definitely. So your last question, years from now, when people think of TakingCaraBabies, what do you hope they’ll say about the impact of the brand and that it’s had, not just on babies, but also and not just on Mothers, but on families.

Cara Dumaplin 28:03
The legacy that I hope to leave is confidence and connection. I always tell parents. I always say, Mom, you are the best mom on the planet for that baby. Nobody could do it better than you, dads, you’re the best dad on the planet for that baby. And I think if I can instill confidence into a parent that that goes well beyond the first or second or third or fourth or fifth year of parenting, like being confident in who you are as a parent, and then having a connection that’s strong and an attachment that is rooted in like, we’ve got this like, that’s the legacy I want to leave, confidence and connection.

Kara Goldin 28:52
I love it well. Kara, thank you so much for joining us on the show. I loved hearing all about your journey, and thank you for doing what you’re doing, because you’re really, you know, having impact on people. And I’m such a believer that it’s not just about having products or a great service, but it’s actually having somebody who cares, right? And you clearly do. I mean, you’re doing what you do every single day, because you want to have this impact and really help a lot of people, which you have. So definitely, we’ll leave all the info in the show notes. But TakingCaraBabies is all over Instagram that TakingCaraBabies and definitely, definitely check it all out and tell a friend and get the swaddles for now, more coming soon, but thank you again, Kara. Really appreciate it. Thank you so much. Thanks again for listening to the Kara Goldin show. If you would please give us a review and feel free to share this podcast with others who would benefit. And of course, feel free to subscribe so you don’t miss a single episode of our podcast, just a reminder that I can be found on all platforms. At Kara Goldin, I would love to hear from you too, so feel free to DM me, and if you want to hear more about my journey, I hope you will have a listen or pick up a copy of my Wall Street Journal, best selling book undaunted, where I share more about my journey, including founding and building. Hint we are here every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Thanks for listening, and goodbye for now. You.

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