At 44yrs of age Jo’s world was shattered by divorce. Just the thought of starting all over again on her own with two young boys was devastating. It made her question her judgement, competence, intelligence and destroyed her self-esteem. The personal, emotional and financial turmoil was only compacted by the significant impact on her children and family as a whole.

The many pressures and responsibilities of motherhood made it impossible for her to work a 9 to 5 job thus losing all the benefits like superannuation, sick pay, holiday pay etc. It’s not hard to see why the fastest rate of homelessness in Australia is women over 50. Divorce, children, sickness are just some of the reasons they end up homeless. Most spend their lives serving others and they have nothing to retire on.

In a desperate attempt to make enough to get by she gathered clothes from her wardrobe, purchased bits and pieces of pre-loved clothing and approached warehouses to buy their end of line bits and pieces at drastically reduced prices and she started selling at the markets. 

The two oldest careers for women are the markets and prostitution. She chose the markets.

Dress for Success - a worthy women’s charity allowed her to pick up the clothes they would throw out and together with her mother they washed, sewed and reinvented old clothing and  re-sold them at the markets..

She worked Saturdays, Sundays and Wednesdays at the markets where she started her working career when she was 14 years old and then 30 years later she was back where she started. The markets provided a small but manageable income and she used the skills she had learnt in her professional career BF (before kids) as a business development manager to create a unique concept. 

She was frustrated by mainstream retailers and designers who were not listening to their customers. And then, as if by divine intervention after 4 years working the markets and listening to what women said they wanted she was offered a shop close to home. She put whatever little she had accumulated & took a chance, and opened a shop which was a quite isolated location at the time but on a main road.

This is where her entrepreneurial dreams began. 

Now, nine years later she is still going strong. Ciao Bella Moda was a learning process and a series of fine tuning, listening and being true to herself by making a business that she would like to see.

A practical way to make an impact at ground level using basic one-on-one sales strategies such as - a touch of kindness, sincere interest, professional styling, honesty & taking customer service to a whole new level. 

Honesty, integrity and loyalty are her key life words. 

Honesty – she is honest to a fault and will tell you the truth. Always! There are plenty of stores that will tell you whatever you want to hear.

Integrity - Is everything to Josephine. practice what you preach, lead by example, be true to yourself and be the change you want to see.

Loyalty – to yourself first & as a gift that you give to the special souls you value the most. 

Her dream has always been to help other women do what she did and become financially independent of any man or government

She always wanted to do public speaking so the universe has given her something to speak about.

“I've learnt to trust the process and allow life to flow. Focus on the good and be positive and grateful and the rest will take care of itself.”