I didn’t want to go to work anymore.
The business that had once fueled my passions and could keep me up 24 hours straight, effortlessly churning out new designs, didn’t exist anymore. It now felt like work.
After 17 years, I had unwittingly steered us down a path where we were spending a large percentage of time mass producing wholesale products. Tho successful, the opportunity for creativity was so limited that I had almost forgotten what it felt like. My fire was out.
I was desperate to find my passion again, and little did I know just how transformational Marilyn would be for me.
As each failed prototype was tossed to the side, I promised myself that if this wasn’t going to be an amazing bag I would want the World to know came from me, I wasn’t going to do it. I felt like I had been settling for the last several years. My business had become a diluted version of what it used to be. I had to get back into my lane or I needed to get off the road.
We launched the first Marilyn bag 7 months ago.
I’ve never been so nervous for a product launch before. This was entirely outside my comfort zone. Not a product for your horse or dog, markets I was confident and familiar with, this was something entirely new and terrifying and much more personal. Each Marilyn is a direct reflection of my own taste and style, there are no custom orders. If she flopped, it was really going to sting and I wasn’t sure there was a next step after that. I had a lot riding on this. Maybe everything.
The response was mind blowing. Completely mind blowing. So much more than we could have ever anticipated. Most importantly, I found my stride again.
~ Jess