Mary Malek says her home-based business is much more than a source of income, it’s a passion.
“It’s another world in which I’ve explored the benefits of plants and food that I didn't know much about before,” she said.
When Ms Malek arrived in Australia in 2014, she said she discovered that to be able to work in Australia, she had to get an accreditation for the academic qualifications in foreign trade she had obtained in Egypt.
She said that she did not have the financial means to go through the accreditation process at the time and the birth of her son made it even harder.
She started thinking about how to start a home-based business that would help her make an income while looking after her newborn.
Ms Malek said she turned to the Internet to find ideas that could be applied at home and thought that making candles might be a good start.
"I first started with leftover candles I had at home. I collected them and made new ones," she said.
At first, she said she just made candles for herself and her friends, but as she gained more confidence, she started giving her business a more commercial look.
Some women, especially migrants, faced difficulties in searching for work while trying to juggle work and family responsibilities.
Source: Supplied by Mary Malek
A 2016 published by the migrant agency AMES and funded by the federal government described migrant women as Australia’s "hidden assets".
According to a published in 2022, the unemployment rate for non-English-speaking migrant women is 7.2 per cent compared to 5.1 per cent for Australian-born women.
Numbers from a 2015 prepared by the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed that the average number of hours women work decreased from 29 hours to 12 hours per week in the year following their first birth.
After a second child is born, according to the report, the probability of working decreased further, and the average number of hours worked decreased by another six hours.
The report also revealed that between 2013 and 2014, the participation of mothers with children under the age of five in the labour force was significantly lower than the proportion of fathers with children of the same age (58 per cent and 94 per cent respectively).
Migrant mothers face even greater hardship due to the absence of a to assist with childcare tasks.
Ms Malek said she put a lot of effort into learning how to make candles on her own.
“I spent many weeks when my son was a baby doing nothing but breastfeeding him and trying to learn to develop my business. I hardly had any sleep,” she said.
With time, Ms Malek said she developed her project and started manufacturing soap also from natural materials and oils.
“I learned a lot through Facebook groups and searched for suppliers near me so that I could purchase ingredients,” she said.
“I realised that soap can be made from the natural oils that we use in our daily lives, and the first type of soap I made was laurel soap, which I knew could be prepared from olive oil.”
According to , the number of Australian women running their own businesses has increased over the past 20 years, but figures show that women remained largely underrepresented among entrepreneurs.
In June 2014, women who ran their own businesses made up 12.5 per cent of Australia's 5.3 million female employees.
Many mothers are turning to home-based businesses to save money, have flexible working hours, and to juggle the demands of work and childcare.
Although running their own business might make it easier for some women to face the difficulties of finding a job, it may lead to a set of new such as difficulty obtaining financing and exposure to work risks.
While working from home helped Mary spend more time with her little one and home school her older daughter, she said there were some drawbacks.
Source: Supplied by Mary Malek
“I don't leave my house and go to a separate space to do my work. I have to wait for my kids to sleep to start work and it takes extra effort to be able to clean and tidy everything before and after,” Ms Malek said.
Making soap requires using hot materials and doing some steps quickly, which made it difficult to work with children around, she said.
On the plus side, she said she had had no difficulty in obtaining the necessary approvals for her business.
“What I produce is not considered cosmetics because I do not claim that my products have benefits in themselves. I only explain the benefits of the natural materials and oils that I use in these products,” she said.
Her previous experience in phone marketing had been helpful in marketing her own products, she said.
“My previous experience gave me the confidence to talk to people and shoot videos about my products,” she said.
She relied on social media for marketing and had her own Facebook group, on which she sometimes broadcasted live videos, she said.
Although the numbers from the indicate that more women are giving up their businesses than men, Ms Malek said she had big dreams for her business.
She said she initially dreamed of having her own shop, but her dream grew exponentially with demand for her products.
“Now I dream of establishing my own factory in which I will produce soap on a larger scale,” she said.
