40 Under 40 Class of 2007

Amy Jamrog

Age 35. Managing Director, The Jamrog Group

Amy Jamrog took out her first small-business loan at age 7.

The financing was from her mother, and was used to purchase yarn and crochet needles to create hand-crafted Easter bunnies — a talent she learned from her grandmother and spun into a seasonal job.

“I would start in January,” Jamrog remembers. “I crocheted like a maniac, and went door-to-door, selling bunnies.” Her first year in production, Jamrog netted $50 after repaying her mother, and proved at a very early age that she innately possessed a number of key business skills, including creativity, perseverance, and that hard-to-acquire entrepreneurial drive.

She’s since tailored those skills into a successful career in financial planning, founding the Jamrog Group, the Northampton office of the Northwestern Mutual Financial Network, in 2006, and tripling the company’s size since that time. She is also a motivational speaker with a national reach, another talent she’s enjoyed since childhood.

“I just love motivational speech in front of large crowds,” she said. “I speak a lot within my industry, encouraging people to think more holistically about planning, how we teach people to be empowered by their money, and how to have fun doing it.”

Jamrog also speaks on the topic of philanthropy, another passion, and her engagements have taken her to Toronto, San Francisco, Jacksonville, New York City, and several other markets.

Her next goal is to publish some of the concepts she typically speaks about and uses to help counsel her clients, perhaps by penning a book. “I feel like I can take my creative side and my entrepreneurial side and create something extraordinary,” she said, adding that her life is one that includes a few different worlds.

Indeed, in addition to financial planning and public speaking, Jamrog also has two sons and is active in community service, having received Northwestern Mutual’s Community Service Award twice.

“But my life has become a wonderful Venn diagram,” she said. “I don’t struggle with balance because I see no separation. It’s not work and home, it’s just my life. There is no between.”

Still, she said it’s inspiring to be recognized for her achievements to date, and for those yet to be sewn up.