Today we’d like to introduce you to Sonja Miller
Hi Sonja, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I am a dutch born immigrant that moved to the US with my family when I was 11 in 1979. I have lived in a number of locations up and down the Eastern United States, landing in Greenville in 1992. My now 30 years + of living here has made me a Greenvillian and I am passionate about the place I call home and have raised two children in. I worked in a family business from 1992 to 2006 where I rose to President but I always had a need to be more creative. In 2006 I went for broke, left the family business and started my own. I started Samantha Grace Designs out of my garage with an open balance on a credit card as my financing. My brand started with kitchen textiles and slowly morphed into the original clear bag company in 2011. We had a shift in our product line that year after taking our clear organizer bags to the Atlanta Market and receiving an incredible response. By the end of 2012 we had supplied our clear organizers to 200+ retail boutiques across America. Our TSA bag was the favorite and still is today although we now have 15+ sizes to choose from and a few that are geared specifically towards clear bag policies for event venues.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Marketing your product line or your business concept is never an easy thing to accomplish. You can have a great idea but getting it in front of people requires diligence and perseverance and money. There were many a time where I thought to give up as I felt I wasn’t getting anywhere but I kept pushing and through the support and belief from family, I hung in there and eventually came in front of the right people at the right time and launched my business to the next level.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I started creating things that made sense for me on a personal level. I would find things that I would like to have and if I couldn’t find just what I was looking for, I would create it. My Samantha Grace Designs brand was born that way. I had two small children with lots of little toys and a house full of stuff that needed to be organized. Life was too busy personally and professionally not to try to find a few loop holes to simplify. I started creating clear bags so we could find things quicker and the clean up of toys was easier if the kids didn’t have to dump out bags or buckets every time they wanted to play with something. Once I made the first one, it just kind of rolled from there into other sizes and functions. Soon I had clear organizer bags that fit into my handbag, ones that I could travel with, beach totes that I would take on vacation, storage bags for everything from junk drawer items to pen and pencil cases to larger bags to store ribbons, trim, colored papers, coffee pods, you name it, I was organizing it. I love color so I found fun, colorful fabrics and I found a method to laminate the fabrics so they would easily wipe down for cleaning and would be sturdier for toting around. I used the laminate fabric to accent the clear plastic and I developed a full line of clear bags that all closed with a velcro strip across the top. I quickly realized living in the South that people liked their items monogrammed so I bought an embroidery machine and started adding monograms to the top strips of the bags to personalize them. Next I purchased a vinyl machine to do the same on the clear portions of the bags. I was doing all of it out of my garage and had one employee doing all the sewing while I did all the cutting, pattern making and embroidery. Once I took the line to market in Atlanta, the wholesale orders started coming in and before I knew it, it was time to find a bigger space. I lucked out and found a cool space downtown Greenville in the back of a retail building and set it up as a cut/sew operation with a small showroom. I was anxious to sell direct to the public but I didn’t have retail frontage where people could see what we made so I patiently waited until a space opened up in the front of the building and that’s when I mixed my own line of products with 40+ other American manufacturers to create an eclectic gift shop. It wasn’t until a few years later that I added apparel to the mix and now I carry 60+ different brands and I have curated a nice selection of products that beautify and simplify your everyday life. That’s really what my focus was from the beginning, creating and later curating products that make you happy, can make life easier, can put a smile on your face and that make you feel good. My business has been a journey, ever changing to adapt to what mine and other’s needs are. I listen and learn and soak up information constantly, I pivot when things aren’t working and I am not ashamed to say, wow that was a mistake, let’s go in a different direction. I think that’s very important when you’re in business for yourself. You will never anticipate every obstacle and you can not get too proud of a direction you are going in when it’s not working. You have to roll and dodge and flip around and keep trying different angles. When you think you have it, most likely things will change and you need to rotate again. Go with it, don’t fight it. Flexibility I think is the key to survival.
Risk taking is a topic that people have widely differing views on – we’d love to hear your thoughts.
I am a turtle. My nickname is Myrtle the Turtle because I am slow and scared of taking a risk. Yet, I have taken many in my life. I have lived for short and long periods of time in the northeast, southeast, west and central United States and three different countries. I travel extensively when given the option and have visited 30+ countries. Doesn’t sound like someone adverse to risk but I am very slow in risking things in business. Probably because of money constraints as I have done things solo without utilizing partners and have done them without going to investors or banks for start up cash. When you’re doing it all alone and with just the cash in your personal accounts, you have to take things slow and steady and grow one small step at a time.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.samanthagraceusa.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/samanthagdesign/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SamanthaGraceDesigns/
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sonjamiller/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@SamanthaGraceDesignsGreenville
- Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/samantha-grace-greenville
