Meet Olivia. She’s a Concord resident and the owner of Blondies Bamboo. Olivia is on a mission to plant, grow, and prosper sustainable solutions for future generations to come through the renewability of bamboo. For now, that means bamboo tea. But if you spend just 3 minutes with Olivia, you’ll see she has far bigger plans for sharing her passion for bamboo with the world.
Roots of a bamboo obsession
So, how does someone grow an obsession for bamboo? For Olivia, it all began when she was 16 and got to explore a bamboo forest in Cherokee. That experience stuck with her for quite a few years as she then fell in love with farming during an internship on a 5-acre fruit farm in Florida.
During that internship, she lived in a container home. This planted a seed for tiny home living and how bamboo might intersect with that.
Olivia then had to move back to North Carolina to take care of family. She decided to take a certification class online in bamboo architecture from instructors all the way across the world in Bali. She saw that these were sustainable structures that would last a lifetime and produce an incredible amount of oxygen.
She knew she couldn’t just start building bamboo houses quite yet. She had to start somewhere a little more realistic.
Being extremely resourceful and driven, Olivia went door to door across Cabarrus County asking residents if they wanted the bamboo she could see on their property. If unwanted, she asked permission to harvest it. She did this while working full-time as a retail manager to make ends meet.
Did she know what to do with all that bamboo? Not yet.
The Crossroads
She faced a big obstacle. The store she managed was robbed while she was working. Her boss said that she was responsible for what was lost and would have to pay for all that was stolen. She had no means to do that and decided this was a crossroads. She could quit and jump into the deep end of entrepreneurship with bamboo or find another day job.
She took that leap and never looked back.
Olivia figured out how to start her bamboo business by testing out what she could make with all that unwanted bamboo she had harvested. That’s when magic happened. She discovered that in China, bamboo is used to make tea.
On her first attempt at tea, she joked to herself, “God, please don’t let it kill me.” To her great surprise, it tasted so good. What was even better, given what she had learned of the health benefits of bamboo, she knew its impact would be greater than just a unique and delicious tea.
At her first farmer’s market, she sold $300 of her tea. By the end of the year, she turned that into $18,000 in revenue. She laughed as she shared that was more than she made as a retail store manager.
Learning to Scale with the Small Business Center
Earlier this year, Olivia had reached a point where she needed a lot of help figuring out how to scale, how to find more funding and how to get her books in order. This is when she found the Rowan-Cabarrus Small Business Center and first met Meg Smit, the director.
“Meg is thoughtful and so informative,” said Olivia. “She has every resource you can think of and if she doesn’t, she will find it. She’s a first responder.”
Just like in her business, she went all in on every opportunity offered to her.
Olivia took advantage of every single webinar offered. Sometimes, that meant three classes in one day. One series of classes was called “Farm School on Wheels”. This got her connected with Thread Capital and led her to obtaining a $10,000 small business loan that is going to fuel clinical research into her next exciting bamboo product.
At the recommendation of Meg, she applied and was accepted into the spring cohort of the Retail Lab program offered in a partnership between the Small Business Center and Flywheel Foundation at the Cabarrus Center.
“I was in the front row every single time,” Olivia said of the Retail Lab bootcamp. Not only did she learn in so many areas of business, but she also pitched for a grant at the end of the cohort and won!
Olivia also worked with one of the SBC’s specialty counselors, an accountant, who helped her understand her finances and taxes and saved her from making some costly mistakes.
“Every resource that I have gotten has been because of the Rowan-Cabarrus Small Business Center,” said Olivia.
As for the future, her goal is for Blondies Bamboo to be the largest provider in bamboo products. Her heart is to supply people with jobs, resources, and increased wellness nationwide.
In everything she does, Olivia leads with kindness and collaboration. Her bamboo teas are made solely from local ingredients through partnerships with area farmers.
Olivia truly embodies the notion that “a rising tide lifts all boats.”
As someone who has survived and endured so many personal challenges herself, she envisions a beautiful tiny home community built with bamboo that serves as a place for people who are suffering to find hope and healing.
To learn more about Olivia and Blondies Bamboo, visit http://www.blondiesbambootea.com/. You can find Olivia on Instagram and TikTok at @blondiesbamboo.
Recent Comments