ANNA-Lee Kewley had no experience in business and only £230 in funding when she started selling baby clothes online.

Three years later, she has been named among the nation’s top “mumpreneurs” and is shifting “crazy” quantities of stock from her Bournemouth home.

Baby Moo’s started when Anna was pregnant with her first child and realised she would not be able to return to her job at Nationwide when the baby was born.

“I wasn’t going to be able to go back to my full time job because I couldn’t work the childcare around my other half’s shifts,” said Anna, 29.

She decided there was a gap in the market for distinctive but affordable baby clothes – and decided to try importing them.

“I went into the supermarket and the clothes are all just pink and blue and pastels. Anything that was a little bit different was ridiculously expensive,” she said.

“I gathered together some bits from around our flat at the time that I didn’t want and sold them on eBay. I got together £230 and imported my first lot of stuff.”

She taught herself to build a website and the business started to grow.

She soon moved to designing her own clothes. “There were always problems with some of the things I was importing,” she said. “I thought ‘I’ll try to get some money together and get my own designs manufactured’.”

She said: “Trusting someone you’ve never met in a different country with a lot of money – that was terrifying”

In October 2012, she re-launched the Baby Moo’s website. She was still self-taught and using WordPress software, but had read up on search engine optimisation (SEO) – and the business suddenly saw a leap in orders.

The first order she placed was for 300 garments, but her most recent was for 1,500.

She has figured in the Mumpreneur UK Top 100, the top 100 Mums in Business, and as one of Jacqueline Gold’s Wow Winners.

As well as her successful rompers, baby vests and footless sleep suits, she has launched a range of colourful bibs. Since many babies wear bibs for long periods to protect clothes from drool, she designed them to be an attractive garment in themselves.

The Bandana Bibs recently received a silver award from the website Bizzie Baby after receiving top marks from its reviewers.

Although she imports from India, Turkey and a small amount from China, Anna is having more garments made in the UK and hopes eventually to stop importing altogether.

She still runs the business solo from her Queen’s Park home, alongside bringing up children Rhys, three, and Mia, two. “I never have any time for myself. I’ve forgone all that but I enjoy what I do,” she says.

She is aware the business is likely to outgrow the spare room and garage before long.

“When I was doing tax returns for the first year I was at most turning over £500 a month. Last month, I was doing that in a day,” said Anna.

She admits to being astonished by how fast the business has grown. “I can’t look back, I can only look forward. If I sit and think about it, I get butterflies and it terrifies me.”