Fittamamma: The startup dispelling myths about pregnancy fitness

Concerned with her pregnant sister-in-law’s struggle with her body, Alexandra McCabe was determined to do something. Now she tells Zlata Rodionova how she’s keeping mammas across the world active​

Armed only with a diploma and a small loan, McCabe’s brand is now sold in 200 countries (Photos FittaMamma)

From improving your ability to cope with labour to reducing backaches, there is a whole host of health benefits linked to exercising while you are pregnant. The Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists actually recommends that all healthy pregnant women should aim for at least 30 minutes exercise five days a week.

But when Alexandra McCabe, 36, launched FittaMamma, an activewear brand for pregnant women in 2013, there were still lots of misconceptions floating around physical activity during pregnancy.

“Your health going into labour, your mental health, the health of your baby – these can all be positively impacted by being particularly active while pregnant,” she tells The Independent. “But some people still get very anxious about the idea of exercise during pregnancy – and that’s something we’re trying to work on overcoming.”

The entrepreneur from Brighton was first inspired to launch FittaMamma after struggling to find maternity sportswear for her pregnant sister-in-law who wanted to stay active but was confused by conflicting advice around exercising while expecting.

“My sister-in-law felt such a disconnect between the joy of becoming a mum and the unhappiness she felt about her body. She was quite active but she lost the ability to even go for long walks. She felt self-conscious in her usual workout clothes and I couldn’t find any maternity sportswear for her,” she says.

It took Alexandra seven years to transform her original idea into a business. During this time she completed a postgraduate diploma in digital PR marketing, and used a fixed-term £10,000 loan from the Start-up Loans scheme to launch her website and develop a community for mothers-to-be providing information on health and dispelling old wives’ pregnancy tales.

“In addition to creating a place where like minded mums could support each other, the community also helped me to test the idea and make sure there was a need for it. Otherwise you’re just spending a lot of money creating something that no one is interested in wearing.”

A growing bump needs to be supported, and McCabe spent a lot of time researching clothing materials to make sure her maternity gear offered maximum support for high-intensity exercise. Subsequent tests that she carried out with researchers at the University of Portsmouth against standard high street maternity fitness clothes found that FittaMamma’s specialist sportswear reduced “bump bounce” by nearly 50 per cent during exercise.

Despite the results, her biggest challenge while developing the product was to get people to test it: “It was about finding the right people who were happy and fit enough to test our fitness gear. It isn’t easy to convince a pregnant women to wear a prototype and maybe jump around a little.

Women often feel overwhelmed by the levels of misinformation surrounding exercise (Fittamamma)

“I did feel a little bit of a fraud for not being able to test my own products. Fortunately, I had lots of friends and relatives who wore them. Then we developed some new products whilst I was pregnant in 2018, so it was good timing and I knew exactly was looking for.”

Seven years since the launch her hard work is paying off. The maternity fitness wear is now being sold in nearly 200 countries worldwide and has been voted IndyBest’s best maternity sportswear brand in 2019. In 2016, McCabe also increased the clothing range in order to offer more workout clothing options for different exercise levels as well as slogan tops.

“I don’t wear slogan tops so I didn’t design at first but our customers told us that when you’re pregnant and happy to be exercising, you want to shout the message loud and clear.

Our customers told us that when you’re pregnant and happy to be exercising, you want to shout the message loud and clear

“Pregnancy is a strange time where people will have an opinion and share it with you. It can be patronising, with many women sharing experiences of people telling them they should cancel their gym membership or stop attending a particular class. It can really knock your confidence, especially if you’re worried already.”

FittaMamma now offers about ten different products including leggings, yoga pants as well as support tops specifically designed to hold your bump in place with an elastic strap to take the weight off. Over the years, social media and mum-to-be celebrities including the Duchess of Cambridge, Beyonce and the Kardashians have driven the growth in the maternity wear market and it shows no sign of stopping.

“There’s been a real positive change in attitude towards pregnancy and exercising and celebrities posting pictures on their social network definitely contributed to it.

“We now need to look for additional funding. The business has got such global opportunities and so much scale, there are pregnant woman everywhere and potentially more people are interested in fitness outside of the UK.”

But the entrepreneur admits that due to Brexit the business has been in a holding pattern for the best part of a year. “We’ve got opportunities internationally, but to be able to do things properly with scale, we’ve got to have the infrastructure in place and understand how we can import and export.

“But I’m optimistic, we have a fantastic product and the need for it is not going anywhere.”

Her ultimate dream would be for people to be aware of FittaMamma as name brand such Lululemon or Sweaty Betty and have a strong presence in Australia and the US.

“I’d like to really look after mammas in all areas of the world. We are also working with personal trainers, academics, people from the fitness industry to understand the barriers they are facing and ensure our message is put forward.”