A dad can’t find a bakery to make a birthday cake that can accommodate his daughter’s allergy-related needs. Two freelancers realize they need a way to organize all of their client contracts and can’t find software that adequately handles their use case. Necessity is often hailed as the mother of innovation – but not all ideas come from necessity. Unfortunately, in our experience, often media coverage of the ideas that powered amazing businesses and projects often stops at a very superficial level. The founders noticed a need and boom – idea. Often the ideation process has a much longer, more complex story and so we’ve asked some entrepreneurs and creatives we admire to go into detail about their ideation stories.
Heather Emerson
I was raised in the 80’s, in a small, Texas town eating boxed, frozen, or fast food. Not because my parents didn’t care about my health, but because they thought processed food was perfectly fine. This was during the height of “Milk, it does the body good” campaigns, followed by “got milk?” ads featuring celebrities wearing white milk mustaches. Needless to say, I was utterly shocked and offended when the raw vegan at Whole Foods in 2005 told me that milk was for baby cows, Read more>>
Nadia Kaminskaya
I got my inspiration at an early age. When I was 16 years old, I started my own tutoring service. When I saw that the business was growing, I wanted to find a branding company to help me get new clients. However, when I approached companies about potentially creating a website, most companies completely disregarded me because of my age and budget. Turns out, this inspired me to learn the ins and outs of marketing and I created my own website for my business. It was at that very moment, I absolutely fell in love with Branding. Read more>>
Lionel Noah
Being a soccer athlete while attending the University of Tampa, I picked up modeling to make money on the side to sustain my college living necessities. As I became more involved in the modeling industry, I started working with more people in the industry for print work, especially photographers. The more I shot with photographers, the more ideas came to mind, and unfortunately, I felt that they would be better executed by me. At the time, I had no big vision. Read more>>
Sebastian Orta
Since my arrival in the United States back when I was 14, I always knew I wanted to be a video editor. I went to the University of Florida, got my bachelors degree back in 2018, and joined the work-force. However, I wasn’t able to get a job as a video editor and our family had just had our first son, so I couldn’t wait and started driving Uber. After a couple months of Uber I got a job at an Amazon warehouse, and after 2 years I started working at Publix grocery store in Florida. Throughout that entire time, Read more>>
Amber Campbell
Ever since I was a little girl, I loved hair, I loved beauty. My mom used to let my sister and I play in her hair, and clothes. I loved it! I just felt drawn to beauty and love seeing people well put together, it just makes me happy! As I got older, I started playing in my own hair and trying different things, went to college and decided that it wasn’t for me so I dropped out, went to cosmetology school and didn’t look back. I’ve been doing it ever since. Read more>>
Kyle Hollenbeck
Blt Kitchens is a shared Kitchen work space for startups to create and run their business. Anything from someone who wants to sell salsa at a farmers market to large scale catering companies are who rent from us. We offer kitchen time, space and resources to be successful. We have a full marketing / Sales department and they help create business for our renters as well. We realized that there was not a place for small businesses to grow and be able to make their dreams a reality. Blt Kitchens is not just a landlord we offer a business in a box solution for all of our tenants. Read more>>
Matthew Kozlowski
I first walked into a tradeshow for hemp and vaping products to look at to insuring these type of products. I realized there was a bigger issue. I first said, “why don’t people and businesses buy these products on Amazon? The answer to that question was the products were not allowed, so a light bulb popped in my head. Let’s build it! There were problems at every level of the supply chain currently in the industry so we set out to solve those problems. At the same time, I had a leg up as this would be no easy task to develop this software. I took a role as an advisory to a Non for Profit Blockchain called AXIA. Read more>>
Sandra Porter
As a beauty fanatic, I have also tested many different cosmetic products and found a passion within it. Considering my skin type and the sensitivity, I wanted to create a more affordable cosmetic line that could be so diversified but yet so detailed and catered to one’s skin type. As someone who has worked in retail and purchased tons of makeup, I found one common thread within certain makeup artists which was the ability to match my undertone and skin tone correctly. Read more>>
Jim Meyerott
The story of how Partypop began is really a love story. At the time, I was in a long term relationship and doing everything in my power to keep my girlfriend happy. Thats what every mans job is (am I right ladies?). We had been together for a long time (5 years) and at this point the relationship had become a bit stale. We were growing apart and needed to add something to add pizzazz back. What better way to do that than to take her favorite chip Read more>>
Sheinata Carn-Hall
When I first started my African jewelry making business I would have never imagined how successful it would become. It was in 1998. I was a sophomore attending The University of South Carolina in Columbia, SC. I moved off the campus and needed money for gas and groceries. During this same time I was a member of a conscious group of African Americans who wanted to live a natural vegetarian life and raise a strong family to grow our legacies. Being that I was connecting more with my roots I got into making African jewelry. Read more>>
Ashley Johnson
My first job at 19 years old, was working at this woman’s clothing boutique. While working there, I fell in love with the idea of being able to help women feel their absolute best in the clothing at the store. The owner would leave me with her key and allow me to run her business for her when she wasn’t there. I soon realized that I developed such a passion for fashion and wanting to start my own boutique. I knew I wanted to also provide women with clothing that would allow them to feel their absolute best! Read more>>
Erica Yern
I quit my job and moved to Austin, TX in order to spend more time with my kids. I was writing a baking blog at the time and was constantly coming up with recipes, testing, and creating tons of desserts we couldn’t possibly finish. I tested breads, cakes and cookies until a happy accident led me to my first Cookie Wookie Kitchen cookie- my absolute favorite chocolate chip cookie! I shared my sweet experiments with friends and family, even bringing it to parties to see how it would do, and everyone raved! Read more>>
TKeyah Gadson
I always knew that I wanted to be a entrepreneur. I never had a job that I actually enjoyed going to . I took a leap out on faith quit my job to become an entrepreneur. I didn’t know how things would work . I was trusted god . I got back into doing hair while also running my retail business . My very first product i came up with was for my son due to his severe hair loss . I began researching looking up different things . I wanted something natural so that everyone could use it . It did way better than I expected and before I knew it I was shipping to many different states . Read more>>
Bodied Boutique
Bodied is a female owned, online boutique. We came up with the idea over a year ago, based on wanting financial independence not only for ourselves but our families and being tired of working for others for less than our worth. We all had full time schedules with a lot of responsibilities and still found ourselves drained after ginning our all to organizations that cared nothing about us. Joanne, one of the co-owners, worked a full time job, Read more>>
Curtesha Howell
The idea for a women’s ministry/organization came about when I was 15 years old. I remember journaling about ministering to women and providing helpful resources. Fast forward to 2016, I went to a church conference in Atlanta, GA with a friend at the time. After the conference, we headed back to our hotel room where we sat down and came up with the idea of creating a nonprofit organization. This organization would not only support women, but also assist in giving back to our community. Read more>>
Richard Dennard
Rich Mentality Empire, llc derived from a mixtape I dropped in 2015. As time progressed, I named my clothing line, book, podcast and entire business “Rich Mentality.” There, I built a foundation that operates multiple businesses. I knew this was a worthwhile endeavor when I impacted my entire hometown with my influence. I knew if one person could feel me then the world would. Read more>>
Murphy Paschall
Growing up in Baltimore City Murphy saw his fair share of urban plight and how it effects the people that live in certain environments. With a burning desire to get involved in community activism he joined a group of high school friends to create a ‘rights of passage’ program to provide manhood training for African American males. My assignment within the organization was to research Black Economics. Read more>>
Tionna Plummer
I remember I was in Cape Town, South Africa, and I was interning at the Children’s hospital. Many of the children there had been sexual or physically assaulted, involved in gang related shootings, or were abandoned. I realized that trauma is universal, and in minority communities it is occurrences that happen so often, that we tend to become norm or used to it without realized the mental and health effects it really does have on us. Read more>>
Amber Williams
I was born and raised in Columbus, Georgia, and ever since I can remember, I’ve always had an interest in media and public speaking. When I was younger, my elementary school report cards would say, “Amber’s a great student and writer, but at times talks too much,” and now, as an adult, I get paid for my voice and writing! LOL! Life is funny like that. I started my “As-I-Amber” website in college because I wanted an outlet to express myself and write about things I didn’t see people that looked like me in mainstream pop culture or media talk or write about. Read more>>
Douglas Mincey
The Meatbone Market story begins with a young man named Douglas Arthur Mincey, who at a very young age lost his parents, found himself having to assume the responsibilities of an adult. At 17 he got his first job at Greens Grocery and there he learned everything about this world of meat, special cuts and grills. He became a responsible adult with the dream of one day running his own business. After 11 years working at Greens, his wife’s support, and their business experience, the idea of Meatbone was born. Read more>>
Emily Macias
We came up with the idea through our love for my moms grandmother and my great grandmother! When I was younger we would take her out to eat ice cream and would spend hours just sitting and talking and enjoying each other’s company. We thought we could do a simple concept and provide the same enviornment for others to enjoy with their loved ones. Along the way we became more and more inspired. It started first with the symbol of our latin woman owned buisness, the mermaid. Then we became Sea Maids! We’ve grown so much since and keep uncovering our identity daily. Read more>>
Lisa Raebel
I am not a good employee. Let’s start there. My career has been spent helping both large and mid-sized organizations get bigger, either through selling or marketing their services to their clients. And I was pretty good at it… until I wasn’t. As I became a wife and mother, my priorities shifted yet corporate America didn’t seem to care, so I left. Read more>>
Joy Chen.
At the start of high school, I had an eating disorder. I was a year into it until I finally decided to start recovery. At that time, I had to take pictures of my meals and send them to my mom, so she can make sure that I was eating enough. One day I just impulsively decided to start an Instagram account because I really wanted an outlet for me to write down the struggles that I was facing and the progress that I made each day; Read more>>
Ashley Lewis
Creating I’m With Her came from God and honestly being at a place of confusion, needing support, and wanting to fill the need for something that I heard many women say they needed – COMMUNITY. Backstory: I was in a place in my life were my emotions felt like a rollercoaster and I literally spent most of my time in church. One Sunday in 2019, I went to church and I felt like the pastor was talking to me directly and he said, “If you are frustrated by something, Read more>>
Emilie Hernandez
I was exposed to indoor rock climbing and outdoor recreation during summer camp in the 90s, but it wasn’t until I was in my senior year at Texas State University [in 2010] did it really became a part of my life. It was very intimidating at first despite finding community at our student recreation center. At the time, I was dating an impatient and abrasive scientist who had little patience with teaching me about rock climbing and outdoor recreation in general. After climbing on and off for all those years, Read more>>
Jamie Santillo
As a full time power wheelchair user, I have always loved to travel, however travel also looks very different for me. Often times I would have to come up with creative work arounds for the most basic travel excursions. With over 20 years in the marketing field and owning my own marketing firm that handles event planning, I was often asked to book the hotel, flights and car rentals needed in addition to planning my client’s event. I started in travel as a way to fill this need for my company, but it opened a door to something much bigger. Read more>>
Lai Will
I have been cooking all of my life. My mother and grandparents started teaching me as early as 3 years old. My grandfather was a great cook, and we often cooked together as our bonding time. When I was about 8 years old I told my mother I wanted to own a restaurant, but unfortunately, my mother didn’t encourage that idea, instead, she told me how difficult it would be to be a business owner and the likeliness of success was slim, instead, she encouraged me to “get a good job”. Read more>>
Mikaela Walker
When I had my daughter 13 years ago, I had no clue about family activities and things to do with kids. So I was doing a ton of research going to all these individual sites to find out what they were offering each week and it took up so much time. Then we took a trip to New York to visit her grandparents and I went to look for what there was do in NYC with kids and a site popped up that collated all the information from the disparate sites. It was amazing; I only had to look in one place to get all the information that I needed and instead of spending hours, I could spend minutes finding fun family activities. Read more>>
Jamarius Leaphart
In 2017 and 2018, I began losing close family members. It put a strain on my emotions, mental and my life goals. I really knew it was something wrong with me because I never felt like “This” before. It was something different. Depression and anxiety, for me, became a everyday struggle for me. At the time I was like 15 or 16. It wasn’t until December of 2018- I knew it was time for me to get myself together. I was raised by people who wholeheartedly believed in the power of prayer. Read more>>
Kelly Schuit and James Weiskerger
When James Weiskerger decided to start The W Home Group, he had a vision of a local Real Estate team comprised of only top producers. This idea of combining top talent under one roof has not been done before locally. In most brokerages and teams, there is a low barrier odf entry and the profit model is that of volume. Teams will take on a lot of changes knowing that some will sink and some will swim. James wanted to create the opposite. Read more>>
Michelle Hicks
I started my makeup career in the ’90s as a makeup artist and sales representative for Prescriptives in Dillards. This is where the love of beauty and beautifying began. Transforming young ladies for Prom and Homecoming or ladies being illuminated for their evening out brought joy to me. Yellow Rose was initially launched as a full makeup line created by me for retail online and presented at vendor events. Read more>>
Serina Augustin-Brunot
From the very beginning, I knew what would be in my future of things to do. It was never a question of what but in fact when! I think its every person goal to be happy and continue to keep that genuine happiness within themselves. I realized at an early age, that genuine happy thing, for me, was makeup. Starting at an early age and seeing the different things and art that comes with makeup. From that moment till now is a feeling I can’t let go. Read more>>
Virginia Chamlee
I sort of grew up in the world of antiques. I was raised by my grandmother, who started a business buying and selling lost-in-transit containers of furniture when I was young. Eventually, she grew the business to a brick and mortar but early on, she was working out of our living room, which was styled like a store (complete with a cash register on a dining table). She would supplement the new furniture with vintage accessories she found at thrift stores, estate sales and the like. Read more>>
Dawn Cooper
I didn’t have a direction for my life. I was just living day-to-day, working a 9-5 job. I never wanted to own my own business. I was happy punching a time clock, working for someone else, having set hours and collecting my steady income. My (now ex) husband wanted me to quit my full time job and run his two companies. March 1, 2019 I quit my job, staring running his businesses full time, and he trained me to photograph real estate. Read more>>
Neve Foster
Preparing for a vacation I tried an upcoming beauty trend, eyelash extensions. That’s when my prayers were answered. I woke up from my lash session feeling beautiful, strong, and fierce. I felt like my alter ego was activated! I thought “wow if I could make other women feel how I feel right now, this would be an amazing rewarding job.” So, I did my research on how to become an eyelash technician, and shortly after I decided to take class. Read more>>
Kylie Russell
I came up with the idea to create Priceless One Management because I noticed that I was solving a problem that no one else was, which was creating an agency that had a focus on hiring event professionals with multicultural backgrounds. There were so many instances in which I was a promotional model and was the token black girl. I didn’t see enough experiential representation for brands who’s target markets were people of color. I had to change that. I knew that I always wanted to own a business, so why not create one where I can provide jobs for people of color? It was the perfect solution and I now know how important it is to have a specialized agency such as Priceless One Management. Read more>>
Brenda Nguyen
It was during the lock down that I started being a social media manager for a loungewear brand. I got to be in charge of casting models for the photoshoots and needed people to send in pictures for my client to approve when I realized that not a lot of aspiring models have the proper presentational materials such as basic headshots to submit. Read more>>
Michelle Y. Talbert
The ‘experts’ said that I would go out of business within six months and that my business model wasn’t viable. What none of us knew was that everything on our planet was about to change. In 2011 I was interested in creating technology for folks over 40 to help them successfully navigate online dating. I immersed myself in what was at the time a really vibrant tech and coworking scene in Washington, DC. I remember attending my first talk with founders at a new coworking space. The energy was amazing. Read more>>
John Hughes
A new gym opened in my area and I decided it was time for a change as they had new equipment and a good variety of classes. Even though it was new, members were still exhibiting the same problems all gyms face with leaving weights on the floor, not re-racking and machines not being stripped of plates after use. This forced members to clean up after others. I started thinking about a possible solution. Read more>>
Randall Sullivan
In 2014 I lost a loved one to suicide. Right after this event I started to get more involved with the local whiskey enthusiast community. I noticed that whiskey had a way of bringing people together, even people who likely would not have crossed paths during the daily lives. I knew I wanted to help people feel connected, so they didn’t feel alone they way my brother did when he made that decision. Read more>>
Teresa R. Funke Author/Speaker/Blogger
As the author of seven works of fiction for adults and children set in World War II, people often told me I should start a blog. But I knew the best bloggers wrote consistently, so I was determined not to launch until I knew I had an idea I could revisit weekly. One that I’d never grow tired of. Eight and a half years ago, I was mulling over a story a friend had told me. He was a mechanical engineer who had started a business in his basement. Whenever he’d get a new idea or a new client, he’d run up the stairs, fling the door open, and say to his wife, “I’m a goddamn genius!” Read more>>
AILEEN LIPTAK
I had worked at Archives Book Cafe and loved bookstores and coffee. Archives went through a two more owners before I purchased their equipment and searched for my perfect location. I had many ideas I was ready to share with the book reading and coffee drinking world. 2006 I found that location and began my coffee dreams. The first location was intimate and a great learning curve for what the future was to bring. 2011 Undergrounds Coffeehaus made its move to its current location and as I was able to keep the intimate feel, we were also able to grow triple size. Read more>>
Da’juh Sawyer
It was a financial struggle for me to even get from high school to college. I was working full time at Dominos Pizza in high school to save for college expenses and with the help of my family I was able to afford to finish and graduate from Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University aka FAMU. I always had the passion for wanting to reach back to help others especially those who wanted to continue their education but may not have the financial resources to do so. Read more>>