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Treatment for postpartum depression led to the creation of an e-shop for babies
There are plenty of stories with happy endings after illnesses. There are not so many cases where a successfully healed illness helped to create a successful business. One such case is the unique story of Silvija Puskunigienė from Opšiūrai Village in Vilkaviškis District, winner of the most beautiful Lithuanian internet name competition.
After experiencing a complicated birth of her daughter and suffering from postpartum depression, the woman learned to knit and presented her knitted items online. With the help of a friend, she created an e-shop for baby socks nesušalk.lt, and this domain was selected as one of the most beautiful Lithuanian internet names this year.
First lessons from YouTube
While being pregnant with her eldest daughter, Silvija bought some knitted socks from another woman on Vinted. After receiving the socks, she noticed that they were of poor quality and stiff, and the yarn was too thick. The woman thought that she would probably knit better socks even though she did not know how to knit.
“I had a difficult pregnancy and often spent time in hospitals. Since I could not do any strenuous work, I decided to learn to knit while spending time in bed. I took the first steps in knitting by watching YouTube tutorials. I also received help from my grandmother while she was still alive. I still have the knitting needles made from bicycle spokes, which I keep as a memento,” says S. Puskunigienė.
Silvija Puskunigienė, knitter
According to Silvija, she enjoyed knitting; it was all new to her, and she was doing well. First, she learned to knit baby socks, and then, watching videos on YouTube, she continued to improve her skills and knitted a blanket for her daughter. After her daughter was born, she managed to knit a vest and a hat for the cold season.
Postpartum depression
“When my daughter was born, she was restless and cried all night long. Due to the extremely difficult birth and the restless baby, I developed postpartum depression, although at first I thought it was just fatigue. My husband would say, “You will sleep it off and everything will be fine.” But everything was not fine, and no one understood how bad the situation was.
It was probably because of postpartum depression that I was overly irritable and exhausted, so I did not show anyone my knitting. After the slightest setbacks, I did not want to knit anymore. It is handiwork, but my depression pushed me to set overly high standards for my knitting, and I did not show it to anyone,” the knitter shares her painful experience.
According to the woman, when her second daughter was born, postpartum depression hit even harder, so she had to seek help from a psychotherapist.
“When medication was prescribed to me, the psychotherapist said that after two weeks of taking the medication, I would start doing things differently, I would relax and enjoy life. A month later, I created a Facebook page where I presented my knitted items,” recalls S. Puskunigienė.
Starting a business on social media
According to Silvija, her page on social media was growing, and mothers became more and more active with their requests for knitted baby socks. Her knitting skills have also improved, and now the woman can knit about five pairs per day.
Silvijas Paskunigienė’s hand-knitted baby socks
“You should not assume that everything happened easily and quickly. Competition is fierce, and you notice it when you start searching for something. For example, I am not interested in paintings and do not see how many artists are offering their works. But if I needed a painting and started looking into it, searching in the thematic groups on social media, I would see a lot of people creating the same things. That is why I realised that I needed to be unique, and I started knitting baby socks with original Lithuanian inscriptions that would suit everyone. “My first socks,” “I’m already born,” “My whole world,” “Hello, world!” and similar Lithuanian phrases attracted attention on Facebook,” says the small-scale craftswoman.
Driven by competition, she began to think about new business niches. After learning to sew at the Vilkaviškis branch of the Marijampolė Vocational Training Centre, Silvija began manufacturing other textile products for babies.
A growing business required an e-shop
Although Silvija really enjoys communicating with mothers via Messenger, it is very tiring and time-consuming. Mothers are very particular, and each one requires a long conversation. She says she does not like individual, one-off orders; she prefers to make larger quantities of identical items, allowing her to be more efficient in time management.
“The advantage of an e-shop is that once you have manufactured, photographed, and uploaded your products, the sales process, inventory management, and shipment generation are automated. When orders increase, it becomes demanding to keep track of each shipment number or issue invoices. The e-shop automates accounting: instead of a multitude of invoices for each shipment from the parcel machine, I can receive a single one for all shipments sent during the month. If hundreds of shipments are sent per month, it is extremely difficult to manage each one and avoid mistakes,” says S. Puskunigienė, listing the advantages of an e-shop.
Nesušalk.lt products for babies
According to her, she lacked self-confidence and was hesitant about having an e-shop for a long time. However, with the help of a friend, she registered a domain and created an e-shop without a large investment.
“After two weeks of work, I managed to open a shop on the Shopify platform. I manage it on my phone, and I even upload photographs of the products directly from my phone. Managing the e-shop is very simple and convenient for people with no IT knowledge. There are many integrations available for automating business processes, and most importantly, it did not require large investments,” the small business owner shares her experience.
The most difficult part is bureaucracy
According to S. Puskunigienė, the most difficult aspect was dealing with bureaucracy, because she had to sign contracts with the bank and parcel delivery companies.
“I chose Opay, the most favourable and flexible payment collection company for small businesses, and Multisiuntos, a particularly convenient delivery system integrated with all parcel machines.
Although I tried other suppliers, the challenges while signing contracts with banks or parcel machine networks were unacceptable to me, incomprehensible in today’s competitive environment, and, most importantly, difficult for small businesses to overcome. After two months of struggle, I decided to choose intermediaries rather than working directly with these service providers. I cannot stand the dismissive and arrogant attitude towards customers, the excessive bureaucracy that requires a high level of legal competence. I am a knitter and seamstress, a small manufacturer based in a village, and bureaucratic matters make my work too difficult,” says S. Puskunigienė.
Registration of the domain name was quick and convenient
When asked if it was difficult to come up with a domain name for her e-shop, the woman recalls that her products inspired the idea for the name.
Silvija Puskunigienė, knitter
“When I knit a larger item, such as a blanket, it clings to the body, covers the knees, and I immediately feel the warmth. My products create warmth that protects you from getting cold. So when looking for a domain name, I thought first and foremost about warmth; I wanted something more unique, subtle, and clear. I definitely did not want an English name, as is fashionable now. I wanted to emphasise that my handmade products are Lithuanian, so I chose the top-level .lt domain, which represents Lithuania, and after checking various domain names, nesušalk.lt (do not get cold in Lithuanian) was available. Its registration through domenai.lt was very quick and convenient,” S. Puskunigienė shares her experience.
On the social network TikTok, the knitter’s business is available under a different name – Mezgaliute, but the woman decided that the domain nesušalk.lt was more suitable for the e-shop and logo.
“I really did not like the fact that social media accounts can only have diacriticless names, which makes it very difficult to publicise the name of the e-shop. I would really like to have the correct Lithuanian name Nesušalk on Instagram instead of the diacriticless name Nesusalk.
On Facebook, the domain is displayed as incomprehensible code, which makes it difficult to share the e-shop’s pages. Sharing on Facebook groups is completely impossible because the domain with xn symbols is considered unsafe or even a pornographic link and is blocked. With the nesušalk.lt domain I cannot use email, so I have to use my personal Gmail account for business,” says the small business owner, listing the problems she encounters.
The Lithuanian domain is not an obstacle
Vaidotas Jakuška, Marketing and Communications Specialist at the Internet Service Centre DOMREG at Kaunas University of Technology (KTU), acknowledges that domain names with unique Lithuanian letters ą, č, ę, ė, į, š, ų, ū, ž are rarely used due to inconveniences in displaying IDN (Internationalized Domain Names) domains on social networks, email, and other systems.
“Even though the possibility to register second-level .lt domains with specific Lithuanian letters has been available since 2004, the infrastructure adapted to a multilingual environment has not yet been fully developed in all areas, which is why we see virtually no use of IDN domains on social networks or in email addresses.
The good news is that the number of such domains is growing, and businesses are deciding to use correct names for their websites or e-shops instead of the diacriticless ones. In total, more than 2000 IDN domains have already been registered,” says V. Jakuška, Specialist at KTU Internet Services Centre.
Vaidotas Jakuška, Marketing and Communication Specialist at KTU Internet Service Centre
According to the Marketing Specialist, when using the diacriticless domain, its equivalent with specific Lithuanian letters should also be registered. With both domains, one of them can be redirected, making it possible to access the website or e-shop using both diacritic and diacriticless domain names. Like a trademark, a domain is a valuable asset; therefore, it is important to strive for business protection and not only for the convenience of users when typing the domain name. In some cases, a domain with the same name in diacritic form is registered and used by competitors, e.g., svarstyklės.lt and svarstykles.lt, bitėms.lt and bitems.lt.
Last year, a survey of the internet usage habits of the Lithuanian residents conducted by the public opinion and market survey company Baltijos tyrimai revealed that although 70% of respondents do not use diacritics when typing domain names, 27% use letters with ogoneks and carons in their addresses, i.e. they write domain names correctly, e.g. gražus-vardas.lt.
What should you know if you consider opening your first e-shop?
Donatas Bartusevičius, Head of Domenai.lt, a provider of web hosting and domain registration services, encourages people to pursue their dreams and start now, because creating your own e-shop is easier than ever before.
“After registering a domain, you need to create your first email account with your domain name, for example, labas@tavodomenas.lt. Then start creating your e-shop, which you can do in less than an hour using artificial intelligence (AI) website development tools.
We noticed that in the past, beginners would spend a lot of time creating texts and photographs and looking for recommendations from software developers. Now, all you have to do is specify the items you are going to sell and what the website should look like, and AI will do everything for you, including the website design, texts, and photographs. Obviously, you will have to make some adjustments, but this is a huge help for getting started,” says D. Bartusevičius, founder of Domenai.lt.
Donatas Bartusevičius, Head of Domenai.lt
He recommends first choosing a hosting plan for the start, which should cost approximately 3–7 EUR per month. With the increasing number of orders and website visitors, the plan can be upgraded.
One of the most popular is the WordPress content management system. Its biggest advantage is the option to manage all data on the website, export it to other platforms, easily integrate newsletter sending (Omnisend), payment options (Opay, Stripe), and SEO plugins.
“Of course, you can choose specialised trading platforms such as Shopify or others. They have advantages and disadvantages, but if their functionality, price, and design are suitable for you, that is great. However, I recommend you to carefully read the terms of service, who will manage the data, and what options are available for exporting goods, because you may want to integrate them into platforms such as Etsy, Amazon, etc., later on," warns D. Bartusevičius.
According to D. Bartusevičius, although there is a wide choice, the fastest and best results are achieved using AI tools, and humans only need to make adjustments. There is a clear trend of artificial intelligence becoming our assistant and helping us achieve our goals quickly and easily.
Published 2025-10-30
