Why Kertzner Swapped Corporate Fashion for Party Planning

Seri Kertzner spent a decade working in New York's corporate fashion world — at Kate Spade, Club Monaco and J.Crew — before motherhood changed her career calculus. After her first son was born in October 2009, she returned to her desk following three months of maternity leave and says she cried daily, jealous of the full-time nanny who spent her days with her baby.

With her husband's support, she started an event-planning business in 2010, helped by a former J.Crew coworker. The venture grew into Little Miss Party, picked up a feature in New York Magazine, and she was about two and a half years in when her second son arrived in July 2012.

The pandemic reshaped the business again. Kertzner and her family moved to Florida, expecting a short stay, then decided to remain. Instead of shutting down her New York operation, she handed the brand to trusted employees, who rebranded it as Rev New York while she stayed on as the company's face. A separate venture, The Social Society, opened in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, as a party store combined with an event space.

Now 47 and the mother of two teenage boys, Kertzner says the flexibility of running her own businesses has made the trade worthwhile — citing a last-minute trip to California when her son's hockey team qualified for nationals as something a corporate job likely would not have allowed. Of leaving fashion, she says regret is not among the things the move gave her.

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How Maternity Leave and a Pandemic Reshaped Her Three Brands

A Familiar Pattern Behind the Career Pivot

Kertzner frames her exit as a moment of clarity — returning from maternity leave and realizing motherhood had overtaken fashion as her passion. The fuller picture is more layered. She entered fashion through finance, taking an economics degree and a brief investment job in 1999 before the dot-com crash pushed her toward a financial assistant role at Kate Spade. By the time she left the corporate world, her edge was in production, built at Club Monaco and J.Crew. The pivot, in other words, rested on a decade of industry knowledge rather than impulse alone.

Little Miss Party to Rev New York: Relocation as a Business Problem

The most concrete business detail in her account is how she handled the pandemic move to Florida. Rather than close the New York operation, she kept its staff and let them rebrand to Rev New York while she remained the public face — a hybrid structure that preserved a high-budget event business in New York while she built something new in a different market. The Social Society, a party store doubling as an event space in Ponte Vedra Beach, is a separate, location-based model suited to her new home.

What the Account Doesn't Say

This is a personal narrative, not a business case study. There is no revenue, headcount or profitability data for the three brands, and the facts are self-reported in an edited interview. Her description of the departure as bringing "instant satisfaction" is a memory, not a measurable outcome — the story's value is as one working parent's account of a transition, not as evidence about the economics of event planning.

Practical Lessons From a Working Mother's Pivot

  • Kertzner did not resign without a route back: she launched in 2010 with her husband's backing and help from a former J.Crew coworker, working from home by day and holding events at night while her baby slept. Parents exploring a similar pivot can test demand in that low-overhead format before committing fully.
  • When she relocated to Florida during the pandemic, she kept the New York business alive through employees who rebranded it as Rev New York rather than trying to run everything herself from a new state. Delegating the operation instead of dissolving it is what made the move work in her account.
  • Her own advice to other parents is to "give yourself grace and dream big," and her example of the last-minute California hockey trip shows what she values most: the ability to put family commitments first on short notice. If that flexibility is the goal, building a structure that allows it — rather than hoping an employer will grant it — is the practical takeaway.