We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Paula Stano. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Paula below.

Alright, Paula thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

I am a single mother and during my son’s senior year of high school he started looking at joining the Marine Corps. He would bring home many brochures and I would throw them in the trash. The recruiters would call daily and I would always say he’s not interested. But he was. He took me out to dinner one night and explained why he was wanting to join. He had all the pros and cons written on a piece of paper. He was 17 at the time. He said to me, “Mom if you don’t sign me in at 17, I’ll sign myself in at 18”. I knew he was serious so I decided to write down all the questions I had and meet his recruiter. We sat together for hours and he told me at some point I would have to cut the apron strings. To me this was kind of harsh but he was right. I sat down with my son and said if this is what he wanted, I would support him 110%. I explained this would not be like summer camp and once I signed the papers, he belonged to the government. He was all in. So I started immersing myself in everything military related, I joined Facebook groups, I googled and I wanted to find a way to support my son in any way that I could. Fast forward to him leaving for boot camp. Our only form of communication was hand written letters so my mailman became my best friend and I stalked him daily. That first letter he not only told me they had chicken (his favorite food lol) but that he was okay and that set my mind at ease. He told me getting letters felt like “Christmas” to them as hearing your name called meant you had mail. In his letters home he told me not everyone got mail as not everyone had family or had a family that supported their decision to join the military. He talked about SAMs (Stand Alone Marines) who on family day and graduation day would not have anyone there for them. While everyone else would be able to leave with their family – these SAMs would be placed on a bus and headed to North Carolina for their next training. This is where I first got involved and my friends and I started collected items to give to the SAMs for them to take to their next duty station. Fast forward to after my son graduated his MOS (Military Occupational Specialty) and he headed to Okinawa. I was a little distraught as he would be half way around the world from me (or so it seemed). I would send him care packages all the time until he asked me to stop sending him stuff and asked me to help some of his friends as he was able to get everything and anything he needed where he was. His friends had joined different branches but some of them were on MEU’s or deployed to places where they didn’t have a PX and couldn’t get some basic items. So I started sending care packages to them for them to share with others. I also found an organization online where I could adopt a whole unit for the holidays and so I did. My friends, family and coworkers collected items and sent over 40 boxes to the unit. With so much stuff left over I started looking for ways to spread the love. I found a local organization here who was sending troop boxes out so I brought over all the leftovers and asked if I could help pack as well. This organization had two rows of tables set up with four tables on each side of the room. One side had cookies, chips, candy snacks and the other side had deodorant, hygiene items and books. The instruction was to go down the row of tables and pack up the box and bring it to one of their people who would tape the box up and put a customs label on it. At no point in time could you crisscross tables. So someone would end up with a box of goodies while someone would end up with books and hygiene items. I was a little perplexed and asked how they knew what these men/women wanted and how they knew whose label to put on what box. The answer was a little troubling to me. They packed the box and just took the next label in the pile and put it on. They had no idea what these military members wanted/needed and they had no idea if the box was made for a male or female. When I left the pack party I remember sitting in my car with my friend just shaking my head not understanding how they weren’t asking what was needed and then ensuring each person got what they wanted and females were given specific female items. She told me that if I was that upset that I should think about starting my own organization. I had NEVER in a million years thought about running my own nonprofit. So I started to talk about it with friends and family and my cousin had found an attorney to do all of the 501c3 paperwork pro bono so the wheels were set in motion. I had to come up with a name, a board, bylaws etc. I work a full time job so I knew this would be no easy feat but I wanted to make sure these heroes were getting a box of home full of goodies that they wanted. I didn’t want to be filling a box just to fill the box. So with that, the organization was born. I wanted it to be a little different than the few I had worked with so we ask our care package recipients what the top 5 things they miss from home are so we can try to incorporate them in their packages. We ensure all the female boxes have the female items they need and that they’re clearly identifiable with an F on the box. We have tweaked what we put in each box and as of right now they get approximately 40-45 items. We practice the mantra of we put the care in care package. We want our heroes to know they’re supported when they see our stickers and the box show up in the mail. Our military should never feel forgotten and if my small act of gathering items to make them more comfortable wherever they is what’s needed, then that’s what I want to do.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I am a project manager by trade and work full time while running the nonprofit on the side. None of us take a salary from the nonprofit.

I had no idea about military life until my son joined. It was through him that I learned once they’re deployed or stationed overseas that sometimes they can’t always get what they need. This was huge during COVID as some items would not be restocked in time or restocked at all at the PX. There are many organizations that send care packages but what sets us apart is that we ASK the care package recipients what they need and then try to incorporate that into the package we send. When we receive emails or messages back from our recipients they tell us they’re the best care packages they have received hands down. I feel like we go above and beyond to ensure when they open these packages that they’ll enjoy everything inside. For Christmas we really strive for the whole present feel of the box as we wrap the inside of every box with wrapping paper and add in Santa hats, wooden ornaments to paint, paint or paint pens, usb plug in lights, festive glasses they can wear and take pics with, festive socks, Christmas candy etc. I am proud of the fact that we are more about quality than quantity. Anyone can fill a box up and send it overseas to say they sent a box. Our care packages should feel like a box of home when it’s opened and that’s what I love about my foundation. We hear it ALL the time from the parents or the care package recipient themselves. When people see the Stano stickers on the outside of the box, they know that box is going to be full of things they’ll eat and things they want. It’s a small reminder of home and all the candies and snacks they may not be able to get where they are.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

I was a people pleaser. I never wanted to let anyone down so I never said no. I said yes to everything and “made” time. That all came crashing down when my mom’s cancer came back and I had to take care of her. It got so bad after her surgery and when PT was no longer helping that we had to move her into a facility. I could no longer juggle my full time job, speaking engagements, pack parties, community outreach events, fundraisers, emails, Facebook messages, visiting my mom daily in the facility, stopping by to check on my dad and the house and then helping him pay all the bills there. The one thing you can’t manufacture is time and I never had enough in my days. I have could no longer live my life to please others – I had to take control. I learned to put up boundaries. I didn’t look at my phone or social media after 7pm, emails could wait. I set firm boundaries in place and found out it was just that simple. The world didn’t stop, no one was mad and I was able to find work/life/family balance. You can’t pour from an empty cup so I had to learn to fill mine first.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

When I first launched our social media, I told my friends and family and asked them to like or follow our page. We had 1000 likes in the first month. It was crazy! However, it’s hard to then get others to like or follow your pages if they don’t know you. We tried collaborating with other pages, running sponsored ads on social media platforms but what seemed to work best for us was to work with Simply Promotions. Sonya and her team are truly marketing geniuses. She was able to help us read our insights, figure out what to post and when and helped us come up with branded templates. Sonya’s team is on top of all the new trends and understands what someone wants to see when they go to your page. She helped us step out of our shell of just posting drab posts and go live, post videos and make the posts more interactive.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://stano.org
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/stanofoundation
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/stano.org