In the crisp air of Central Oregon in 2002, a young mother named Jess Crouch held her newborn daughter Railey close and made a quiet but determined decision. At just 24, freshly married to her high school sweetheart Jim, she walked away from the corporate job she’d spent four years in college preparing for. No grand business plan. Just a deep, instinctive wish to stay home and raise her baby herself, while feeding a wickedly expensive horse habit that came with a love for rodeo life.

What started as casual tinkering with her mom crafting leather items for their own horses because nothing on the market felt quite right. Suddenly became something more. One evening, Jim came home from work to find their dining room table cleared and their home office transformed into a tiny, makeshift leather shop. An antique desk served as her workbench. Jess worked through the middle of the night, throwing away more pieces than she kept, her designs bold, ostentatious, and unapologetically different. Confidence was hard-won. Doubt was a constant companion. But somehow, in that grind of late nights and small orders from fellow barrel racers, it was working.

The shop spilled into the garage. Then came the first employee, the second, the third. They rented commercial space, bought land, and built their own building. Jim brought his business sense on board full-time in 2007, turning his own contracting experience into fuel for their shared dream. There were small victories, customers falling in love with the custom tack. But there were plenty of painful failures too. For 17 years, Heritage Brand grew quietly through custom orders, refining their craft one stitch, one tool mark at a time. Jess often wondered if she’d ever find her creative footing. Jim never let her quit. His belief in her was the steady heartbeat keeping the whole thing alive.