We recently connected with Paloma Culver and have shared our conversation below.
Paloma, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today So, naming is such a challenge. How did you come up with the name of your brand?
“Cultivating” is a verb which means it’s an action. The definition for “cultivating” is trying to acquire or develop (a quality, sentiment, or skill) or apply oneself to improving or developing. Our mission is to be an outlet that helps you break up all negative “clutter” in your life! Whether it’s clutter that we store in our heads, physical spaces, or body. We collect all sorts of negative stuff through life from either ourselves, others, and our environment. Negative stuff sticks like a magnet and we have the power to detach from it, but it takes time and support to cultivate it. ⠀
Culver just so happens to be an excellent last name that I received from my husband. But it represents me, Paloma Nicole Culver, the founder and CEO of Cultivating Culver. The person who will help you…⠀⠀
• Declutter Your Mind: I firmly believe that if we work to declutter your home, office, or any space around you it allows you to slowly declutter your mind. You’ll find peace in your new found space which will allow you to do what makes you happy, which in turn brings overall peace to your mind. (Organization portion of our business and blog/social media)
• Find Your Happy Heart: You all know that I am a creativity guru! I think it’s perfectly okay for us to go back to our crafting, party hosting, and DIY obsessions. Reconnect to your inner child and be creative! Start that business and spark a new found happiness and freedom! It will bring happiness and peace to your heart! (Balloon Installations, Branding, Graphic portion of our business)
• Recenter Your Body: I have the right essential oil, reusable glass containers, low tox hacks, detox bath, and home-remedies the support you may need to get back in tune with the earth and the amazing body God gave you! (Wellness portion of our blog/social media)
Put both words together along with their purpose and boom, we have “Cultivating Culver”. For happiness of the mind, heart, and body! Cultivating Culver is here to help you with your journey!
Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.
Hey peeps! My name is Paloma Culver. I’m a Texas girl living in little ole Leitchfield, Kentucky. I’m the oldest daughter of a military family with seven girls. Yes, all girls! We moved to Kentucky when I was nine years old and I absolutely fell in love with this state, so I haven’t left and I don’t plan to. In 2017, I was blessed to find the love of my life, Serg, (who happens to be from Moscow, Russia) in an even smaller town McDaniels, KY. We dated for a little over a year, got engaged and in 2019, I was lucky enough to marry him so no one else could snag him up! We now live in our perfect little home full with over 100 plants and 2 cats, Howley and Blair. I spend my time enjoying the life and blessings God has bestowed on me!
In June 2021 I hopped on a plane and I attended a women’s business to retreat in Montana. It was named Success Simplified. I was scared out of my mind to go to this retreat all by myself with no true clear vision of what I wanted to get out of it. But I knew that my 9 to 5 job wasn’t what I really wanted and it wasn’t going to make me happy for the rest of my life. I knew I needed to get up and to take a leap of faith and build my mindset to help me get to a bigger and better place in my career. I took the leap of faith with the thought “I’m going to become my own boss!” stuck in my head. When I got back from that retreat, I hit the ground running. Cultivating Culver started out with me taking on small logo projects and small balloon garlands while also working a full-time job AND part time job. I took the end of 2021 and beginning of 2022 to really build a base for my business. In August of 2022 Cultivating Culver became a full-time job and I was able to quit my 9 to 5!!! Cultivating Culver was officially an umbrella name for graphic design, website design, brand coaching and balloon installations. My small “hobby” became a business focused on creativity and fun!
Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?
The hardest lesson that I had to unlearn was that you are not selfish, odd, or completely off your rocker for wanting something bigger and better in your life! Society often portrays people who have “go getter” brains in a negative light and I personally have been called “selfish”, “attention seeking”, and “big headed” for trying to grow my business on social media and wanting something other than a 9-5. Words like that have stopped me in my tracks and caused me step back out of fear. Learning to push through other people’s doubts and fear is hard, but we have to remember that hate is just that, it’s OTHER people’s doubts and fear being portrayed onto us. They try to make us feel the way they feel out of fear of seeing someone push past it and rock the dang thing!
To help myself get over the hurdle of feeling like I’m the only one out in the world that wants “more” I created a women’s small business group that meets monthly. We talk about the ups and downs of running a business, we help hype each other up and cheer each other on when we have small accomplishments, medium accomplishments, and especially those large accomplishments. I overcame that feeling of being “odd” or “weird” by finding this tribe of women who have been looked at and hated on for wanting bigger and better things like myself. Together as a group of business owners we are rocking our dreams, and no one can make us feel or think negatively about it! Never let anyone tell you, you are selfish or antisocial for wanting to keep your head down and work for your dream! Being different, thinking differently, and doing different actions isn’t wrong. Be proud that you know what you want and scream it from the rooftop. Don’t let other people’s discomfort make you uncomfy.
Does your business have multiple or supplementary revenue streams (like a ATM machine at a barbershop, etc)?
Cultivating Culver has four streams of income. Currently our services are graphic design, website design, brand coaching, and balloon decorating. In 2023, we are going to be adding luxury picnics! Often times I get strange looks when I tell people that Cultivating Culver this lineup of services, but I love it and it makes my heart happy! I love getting to trade my different “hats” throughout the week. No one wants to sit in their office and design logos all year long. I personally would get bored. I can focus on graphics and website during the week and then I can go out on the weekends and create beautiful, stunning, fun, balloon installations. It gives my life a good shake! I think that we, as business owners, are in need of a good shake every now and then. Without it my business would feel stale or I would burn out.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.cultivatingculver.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/cultivatingculver/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/cultivatingculver
Image Credits
Photo of Paloma Culver on blue couch with blue balloons taken by Bail Creative