Coming up with an idea for a business or creative project can feel exhilarating. Inspiration for a new idea can come from so many places and we’ve asked some great folks from the community to share their stories of how they came up with their ideas.

Kelly Shotwell

Balsam Business Photography started March of 2020 during the lockdown. We were living in Fort Worth, Texas and my husband, a fine furniture maker, worked in the garage next door. Since my office work was being down at home, I would walk over on my breaks to watch him work. His attention to detail and him hand cutting every dovetail joint had me wanting his clients to see what I was seeing. I had a small background in photography and started capturing the behind the scenes of the final products, highlighting his passion and skill set. Read more>>

Sarah Vining

I started The Hickory Post because I wanted a place to paint outside my home. I had devoted the previous 8 years of my life to starting a family, and with two young children at home, there was not room for my creative outlet. I reached out to people on social media asking if anyone has an extra space to rent and heard from a friend who had a lease on a building her business had outgrown. The previous month, I received a raise at my job of $500 a month. Although her rent was significantly higher, my friend graciously agreed to take my offer of $500 a month to rent her small commercial space. Read more>>

Nandi Edouard

As I have journeyed through multiple educational spaces, I’ve seen my family embark on entrepreneurship. I have seen them win and struggle. Entrepreneurship is not easy, it takes a lot of creative thinking, critical thinking, effort and discipline, ideals and philosophies most people are not taught in their traditional school. I know that if my family understood entrepreneurship and all that it may entail from a younger age, we would be billionaires by now. The Simple Vue LLC, birth The Simple Vue Academy just like my parents birth me. Read more>>

Melissa Hettinger

While on vacation in Savannah we found the cutest pair of bell bottom pants for my daughter who was 2 at the time. Fast forward about 6 months, and as she grew (as kids sometimes do) the pants no longer fit. After searching high and low for anything similar, and being close to giving up…I had an idea. Why don’t I just make my own! However with no knowledge of sewing and a three month old baby, I knew I had to rope in an expert…cue Grandma. With my design background and grandma’s lifetime of sewing expertise we set out on a journey to create our version of these magical bell bottoms. Read more>>

Natasha Ellington

My very first catering endeavor took place in 2012 and I had a partner at the time. She and I were fed up with our current place of employment and wanted to work for ourselves. We saw a blue beetle vehicle for the first time and I thought it would be cute to have a ladybug catering van. So we named our first company ‘Catering Bug’ and the van would be affectionately named the catering buggy! Never once thinking about the negative association between bugs and food! Needless to say that business was short lived. Read more>>

Sherday Fallen

In 2018 I started my fitness journey and at the time I was working in healthcare and finding my niche as a stylist. I lost over 30lbs and I was surrounded by a great community that encouraged me to get my personal training license. The thing is I did not know what to do with it, therefore I started my own business in 2020 and started blogging about the journey until COVID hit. As a new business owner and a career, I was fresh and I was not sure how to scale the business. It failed but I did not want it to stay as a failure because I knew the passion I had for the industry and how I wanted to change the stereotypes, especially what social media has done to the industry. Read more>>

Abigail Mason

Growing up, like many others in the industry, I always loved weddings. Everything about them: the pretty things, the romance, the celebration. Throughout high school I’d done some second shooting at a wedding and tried my hand in many other areas of photography, I’d considered becoming a bridal consultant at a boutique, and in college I worked some in catering. But my college degree’s focus was social work and I did not see myself doing anything but helping people who were in vulnerable circumstances, such as human trafficking. That was my goal in life. Read more>>

Britteney Haynes

My fiancé was researching engagement rings and wedding bands so he could get me the best ring possible. During his research, he found diamond & precious metal suppliers. A light bulb went off! He came to me telling me that with prices he was able to find, we could start our own jewelry company and pass on the savings. It’s only right because we feel that the fine jewelry market has always seemed so unattainable for most for so many years that we can create a middle more affordable market for the people. Read more>>

Kalvin Nutt

I have served in the military and was station in Hawaii for 4 years. I would always mention to my wife how much I love Hawaii and always wanted to go back. As this is like a song that I always sing or say to my wife, that I really wanted to go back to Hawaii or relocate to work or retire if we can. Read more>>

Ronny Buggs

Fresh Sips started by wanting to provide another healthy option, with natural ingredients for my family. As a kid, my family place major emphasis on natural remedies and with my grandparents being from Jamaica, we had access to a number of those natural remedies. Growing up my mother has always suffered from health issues and had to take a lot of medications. During the pandemic, I took the opportunity to learn about other options. With my findings, sea moss was one that caught my eye. Read more>>

Kellie Thomas

The idea of Camps by KT was created to nurture the youth to become well-rounded individuals through educational, and fun hands-on programs that cultivate creativity. I am on a mission to empower youth to grow physically, mentally, and emotionally; to achieve their own version of success. Read more>>

Elena Davis

Before working full-time on my food blog, I taught in public education for 13 years and acquired a master’s in reading. I left my teaching career to serve people by sharing my knowledge of cooking and baking. I started my food blog in the summer of 2020 when we could not visit Italy or see our family. I poured my heart and longing for my Italian home into creating achievable Italian recipes that every person could recreate! Read more>>

Salissa Smith

I was 17 when this idea came to my mind. I had several dreams about the logo and the words. I started by drawing different ways I wanted the logo to be and how it will look on shoes and clothes. I began by bedazzling Jean jacket with the jbs design, but I didn’t work. Fast forward years later, I met my fiancé who suggested to us fiverr to get my logo made. I followed his advise and saw my vision come to life. Read more>>

Teresa Costa

I have been a vegetarian and animal activists for many years. I also love fashion, so I decided to put 2 of my biggest passions together and create a line of high fashion vegan shoes for women. It was also very important to me to find a factory where the shoes are ethically made I don’t ever want to support any sweat shops even if I make less profit.. By the grace of God, I found a family owned an operated factory in Ecuador. Read more>>

Ashly Ryan

In 2017, I quit my job to backpack around the world with my boyfriend (now husband). I packed 50 pounds of clothes in a huge 60L backpack, plus had a carry-on/daypack full of electronics and travel accessories. I quickly realized that traveling with that much stuff was not going to be easy and almost immediately regretted packing so much clothing. When I returned home after traveling for 10 months with all that stuff, I wanted to create something that would help women travel lighter and easier. That’s when I came up with the idea for reversible travel clothing – designed to help women pack light, but still have lots of different options to mix and match together to create new outfits. Read more>>

Shelita Kicklighter

For the past 20 years, I can recall my dad driving “Big trucks” As a little girl, I remember my dad getting up wee hours of the morning on his way to drive the “Big trucks” as I got older, I developed a deeper understanding as to just how much work came with driving those “Big Trucks.” As a teenager, I began assisting with various paperwork and tasks to help my dad out here and there. However, it wasn’t until I was an adult, a Georgia Southern graduate working in my degree industry (feeling very unfulfilled and underpaid, might I add), that I met a lady at my job. Read more>>

Kaleia Hardeman

Hello, I’m Kaleia a native of Atlanta…Grady Baby! I’m the 4th generation of women on my mother’s side raised in the great city of Atlanta. I got my start in the beauty industry in late 2011 by getting lash extensions (Sept/2011). From there, a spark was ignited. I google lash extensions and saw that it was a billion-dollar industry! I was blown away! I then prayed about it… “asking God if this was the path for me and if so to please let his will be done!” I found a local lash trainer and took a two days class in November 2011. In December 2011 I was enrolled in esthetics school. Read more>>

Jennifer Joyce

Baking and decorating cookies has always been a passion of mine; and I was pretty good at it. When it came time to take treats and gifts to the teachers at school, I’d usually make cookies and other treats, and the more I did that, the more people asked if I had a business. At that stage of life, I didn’t have the time to consider it. My daughters go to Christ Preparatory Academy, which has a unique schedule. From 3rd-12th grade the students attend school on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays; Read more>>

Danielle McCann

In the late summer of 2018 our daughter Rian was born. From the moment she came into this world my husband called her his ‘little norwegian’, the light of our lives. I am of Norwegian descent from my fathers side and my husband FG has always loved everything about Norway , the heritage, culture and country. Read more>>

Carlisha Mullins

I have been a loctician for serval years before wanting to have my own loctician shop. I started off working in someone else’s shop , but with that owner making feel like I was still working a 9-5 I wanted to venture off and open my open . My first shop was honestly based off of faith , it was my trial run . I have learned alot during that time . I ended up closing my shop down in 2019 after my brother committed suicide. During that time while working in different places I knew I wanted to have a loctician shop. Where locticians with the same mindset & goals came together and worked together . Read more>>

Lyndeya Moore

I started off with just being a nail tech. I love everything about doing nails. Years later I went to school for massage therapy and fell in love with that. Right after massage school came esthetics. My mind kept evolving as my skills kept growing. I finally came up with the idea to have a spa for men. I have so many complex emotions about it. It’s a risk but I would stand out. There’s a big need for men’s self care facilities. Read more>>

Maryam Khan

I was sixteen when I was standing in my parents suburban Michigan kitchen sometime between midnight and 1am, eating a Shrimp Masala Slider; one of my many concoctions that took a dish my mom made and flipped it on its head into some culmination of the glorious junk food I was getting through drive-thru’s and the traditional Pakistani dishes we had every night at home – and it struck me that every bite of what I was eating was honestly better than most of the food I paid to eat anywhere, and that people everywhere needed to experience this. Read more>>

Kylie Kaiser

I have always known that I wanted to help people, and believed one of my strengths was the ability to teach. I actually received a Bachelor’s degree, and a Master’s Degree, with the intent to become an English instructor, and I actually taught at a college-level for several years prior to starting my own business. The struggle with that career choice is that I just didn’t feel passionate about what I was teaching, and I felt like there was a bigger way for me to make an impact that was more in alignment. Read more>>

Michelle Donovan

My journey to becoming a professional photographer has had many twist and turns. I picked up a film camera when my son was playing little league football. I knew how important it was to capture these precious memories. I later transitioned to a DSLR camera and boy was that a game changer. I continued to capture the precious memories our family was making and then life took an unexpected turn. Around 2012 my husband’s multiple sclerosis started getting worse and I had to start making plans for the future. Read more>>

Tom McLendon

Ninety nine percent of military veterans will tell you the number one thing they miss the most after leaving service is the camaraderie or the feeling of being apart of a team. I can certainly say that was my story. After retirement I found myself in a new job where friendships and camaraderie were not necessarily encouraged. It was increasingly hard to relate to my colleagues who had spent their lives climbing the corporate ladder and lacked a military background. For the first time in my adult life I wasn’t surrounded by people who had a similar background and purpose. Read more>>

Shakira Johnson

So my mom came to me one day with an idea that she wanted to sell purses. She mentioned to me that she wanted to eventually launch a boutique and asked if I’d be interested. At first I was like nope lol I was totally uninterested. I had worked in retail for a while and I just wasn’t passionate about it at all until one day when I decided to take a suitcase filled with purses to work and my colleagues loved every single one. I came home and told her ok let’s do this lol I want to sell more purses. Read more>>

Jodi Gaines.

The idea came from a place of need. In October of 2020, I had just purchased a house in Little Forest Hills here in Dallas, then I received my Real Estate license and January of 2021 in case something happened, and then just months later, I was laid off from my job as a Marketing professional for a global tech company. All of the American professional services roles were terminated, but I still felt the sting. I had just moved cities and purchased a house in the middle of a pandemic. I didn’t have time to sulk, feel like a victim, or wait around for a new source of income. Read more>>

Los Turulecos 3D

Well, I always had the initiative… initiative to discover, create and being able to make something on my own. So, the pandemic came and all of the sudden had a lot free time, so I took this opportunity to emerge myself in a world of 3D printing and then the idea of buying my own printer became a reality. The beginnings weren’t easy, me and my girlfriend, Connie, became partners in this adventure and all of the sudden we found ourselves in a world that we were not familiar with, Read more>>

Tim Kelly

Growing-up my family owned and operated restaurants and liquor stores. You might say that hospitality and the spirits business is in my blood. Running a retail business or a restaurant takes a very special kind patience, energy and mindset. Ask any restaurant owner about what it takes to run a successful business and you might hear things like “controlled explosion” or “creativity meets chaos.” Running a successful restaurant is certainly one of the most challenging things to do in business. Read more>>

David Marshall.

Journey to Josiah Inc. has its own little story. It all begins with an amazing little boy by the name of Josiah Paul Marshall. Josiah was born March 16, 2017. March 28th of 2017, during one of David’s 5th grade music classes, he got a call from his post placement social worker. She went on to tell David that she was sure this wasn’t a phone call that he’d want to miss. There was a 1-week-old baby boy by the name of Josiah who needed a daddy. Needless to say, David lost it. David was already blessed with a Godson by the name of Josiah. Read more>>

Tanijah COley

It was November of 2017. I was a Sophomore at Susquehanna University. I had just changed my major and dropped a lot of classes, so I had a lot of free time on my hands. I’m in my dorm, playing with some lashes. I randomly ended up stacking the two pairs of beauty supply store lashes I had on top of each other, and it just made the FLUFFIEST lash I’ve seen (from beauty supply store lashes at that lol). From there, I knew it was lashes that I wanted to do. I called my mom and my sister immediately and was like ” I want to start a lash business.” Read more>>

Alexandra Johnson

Jack and the Pack started because I fell in love with dog-powered sports like bikejoring, canicross, and dogsledding but had a difficult time acquiring the correct gear and learning the basics. My dog Jack and I would try harnesses and they wouldn’t fit right, or we’d waste money on products we didn’t need. There was also a growing interest in the sport, and no one to show beginners how to get started. After coordinating MN’s first Dryland Race in 2021 I knew it was time to open a business to provide equipment and beginner lessons. Read more>>

Matia Buggs

I actually came up with the idea in grad school while attending American University in 2016. I had originally made Innovative Minds Media to be P3 (Picture Perfect Promotions). The idea behind it was the company being a pitch consulting company for local talent, including advertisers, film students, and professionals who are working on a film treatment, business plan, or script. The second being a video-production company to assist clients with shooting and editing film sizzles, trailers, or pilot episodes. Read more>>

Escoria Bingham

I came up with the idea for my business after I had suffered a great loss and also health issues. At first the business was a jewelry business, but then I changed it to an herbal business for the reason above. I still kept the name because Yapah is Hebrew and it means “beautiful”. What better way to describe the herbs of the earth as beautiful jewels to healing. It wasn’t always a feeling of knowing it would work it was more of a feeling that others needed the herbs just as much as I did. Read more>>

Brittany Koziol

We love the adventure of trying to find the perfect gift for someone special in unique small, local shops. When a turn of events happened in our lives, it was our dad who encouraged us to open our own shop. Cascade does not, and still really doesn’t have a lot of local, small shops. We felt that there was a strong need for a new shop on this side of town.
We attended the free business classes offered at GVSU and spoke to other friends and family that owned their own businesses for advice and suggestions. Read more>>

Aisha Martin

When I think about my adolescence, aside from wanting to be an actress starring in television shows, movies and plays on Broadway (yes, I had a vivid imagination) there was nothing I wanted to do just as much, other than science. If anyone asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I would tell them very emphatically that I wanted to be an actress and a pediatrician! I have always been an analytical problem solver, a STEM (science, tech, engineering, math) girl. I loved experiments, solving puzzles, playing the board game Clue, and watching television shows like Unsolved Mysteries, Matlock and Murder She Wrote. Read more>>