our mission
Our mission at Minnow Designs is to make a day of outdoor play easier for parents & more fun for kids. We dreamed up the unique design for our original range of swimmable water shoes when our firstborns started toddling through Australian seaside rock pools together. Since then we’ve added new beautiful, practical products to our range & grown our business from an eCommerce side hustle to a brand sold in 140 retailers across 4 continents.
In the summer of 2021 we launched into North America. A dream come true for us!
At Minnow, we’re about small salty faces, sandy toddler bottoms, spontaneous fun, unhurried friendship, big belly laughs and rare moments of parental peace interrupted by frequent moments of breathless joy.
meet the makers
Minnow Designs is the brainchild of two friends who have made it their mission to design beautiful, purposeful products that ‘fill the gaps’ in a parents life. Lorraine, a Fashion Designer and Stacey, a Marketing Consultant met when they were young and carefree, had babies at the same time and went into business shortly thereafter.
In the time since we launched Minnow in the Australian Summer of 2016 we’ve drunk countless bottles of wine, refined our product to the point of real pride, learned more about small business and ourselves than we’re entirely comfortable with and created another set of small adorable toddler buddies. We’re chuffed to be on this journey and we’re so grateful you could join us.
our products
Designed in Australia by Aussie Mums, our range of waterproof shoes were created to ‘fill the gaps’ in a parents life. We generate our shoe construction from scratch, with the issues we’ve had with our own children’s shoes in mind. Our first range of fun, bright swimmable water booties were dreamed up after a disappointing search for toddler-appropriate aqua shoes turned up ugly, uncomfortable shoes made of shoddy materials that were ironically too heavy and cumbersome to swim in. They let in water, created drag and our kids hated them. Other parents & kids clearly felt the same way as our first range sold out within weeks and each year since 2016, we’ve increased sizes and products available in line with customer feedback.
Our second range, the Minnow ROAMII sandal was designed to be the ultimate play shoe. Super lightweight, waterproof, easy for little hands to put on and pull off, and (this might be the best bit) machine washable. Like our water play shoe, they have no bits that rub and are made of thick, plush neoprene that’s so soft they can be napped in. Reflecting a fun, outdoor Australian aesthetic, our shoes come in a range of designer prints and colourways that kids and parents all around the world love.
find us in store
You can find us in stores in the USA, Australia, the UK, New Zealand, Singapore & the Gulf!
