Kumiko Love, founder of The Budget Mom LLC, a financial education and lifestyle brand, has expanded her focus to include two newer business ventures: Pine Manor Naturals, a soap and skincare company, and Pine Manor, a semi-private farm stand.

“In the world we live in now, diversifying your income is one of the most important things that you can do,” says Love. “I have a very strong business, The Budget Mom, but I know I can’t have all my eggs in one basket.”

Since 2016, Love, an accredited financial counselor, has shared her personal financial journey and practical strategies for getting out of debt through her company, The Budget Mom. She now has about 2.5 million followers across various social media platforms.

“I didn’t want to tell people what I was doing, I wanted to show them what it looked like,” she says. 

Each year, Love sells her Budget by Paycheck Workbook, which details her method of budgeting. As has been the case in past years, this year's workbook, released on Aug. 2, is already sold out.

“That one product sustains us for two years,” she says. “It’s massive for us.”

Though The Budget Mom continues to thrive, with annual revenue exceeding $2.5 million, Love has set a personal goal to earn $50,000 in annual gross income outside of The Budget Mom. She is documenting the process, including “the highs, the hurdles, and the lessons” she learns along the way on her multiple social media platforms, including Instagram and Facebook.

Her year-to-date income from Pine Manor Naturals, her soap and skincare line that she launched in 2023, already exceeds $42,000, with some soaps selling out on her website within three seconds, she says. Her farm stand Pine Manor, which is only open to neighbors and people driving by, offers classic sourdough, granola, natural soap, lip balm, cookie bags, muffins, and eggs.

At the end of July, shortly after it was launched, Love made her first $15 from the roadside farm stand and said she had never felt so proud.

"I had that farm stand sitting in my driveway for three months ... and I had told myself, 'I don't have enough sourdough, I don't have enough product, no one will stop,'" she says. "The reason $15 makes me so happy is because it's not just $15, it's proved to me what can happen when you believe in yourself."

She’s taking the same approach with what she calls her “passion projects,” documenting the startup process of her new ventures across her social media platforms.

“I call them passion projects because calling them businesses makes them feel like work,” Love says. “These bring my heart joy.” 

Love says she was inspired to start her passion projects when her mother unexpectedly passed away two years ago at age 61.

“It broke me,” she says. “It changed everything. You look at the world so differently. And everything I do now is to honor her.”

One week before her mother died, Love's mom stood in her garden and shed, where she makes her soaps, and said, “you need to share this with the world.”

She says her mom passed on April 16, 2023 and Pine Manor Naturals' website was launched a week later. 

The product line consists of skincare products, including soaps, lip balms, and beeswax lotion bars made at her home in Spokane Valley.  

Every package that is shipped goes out with a picture of her mom, her story, and her legacy.

“Her face has been seen in all 50 states,” she says. “And I wake up every day and ask, 'How can I live my life in a way that would make her proud?' That has been my life for the last two years.” 

Love says the number one piece of advice she would give to people is to, "start believing in yourself and what you're capable of learning ... and just start. Start with what you have and allow it to take you where you need to go."

When Love launched The Budget Mom in 2016, she says she wasn’t chasing fame, fortune, or entrepreneurship. She was a newly divorced single mom and buried under $77,000 of debt, simply searching for connection.

“I went from two incomes down to one, learning to live on my own with a one-year-old,” she says. “It was a really sad part of my life. I felt like I was the only one in the world feeling these things.”

That feeling of isolation led Love to online mom groups where she started sharing her budgeting journey.

“The level of support that I found online was immense,” Love says. “I had people all around the world cheering me on, giving me advice.”

After getting featured on Good Morning America, The Budget Mom quickly turned into a household brand. 

Love said her first profit came when a follower asked for a copy of her personal budget form.

"I sold it to them for $1," she says. "Then I created the PDF and sold it for $1. I sold 25,000 within a week." 

The Budget Mom operates out of a warehouse in Spokane's East Central neighborhood and sells workbooks, planners, budgeting envelopes, and other items geared toward budgeting. The brand also offers self-paced online courses that helps users create budgets using different methods, including an envelope system. 

In 2022, Love published a bestseller, "My Money My Way," a book about achieving financial fulfillment. Her recent experiences have pushed her to write a follow-up about finding joy.

"I think what so many people are missing in their lives is truly finding happiness and fulfillment," she says. "You can pay off debt, you can invest, you can have $10 million in an investment account and still be miserable." 

Whether it's through budgeting, side hustles, or handmade soaps, Love emphasizes the importance of bringing value to people's lives.

"At the end of the day, you don't even have to have a product to start a business," she says. "What you have to do is have value that you are bringing to someone ... you have to make people feel something."