GoKawiilKey Takeaways Blankenship drew on her design background to showcase DIY projects and sell paint.
The business quickly outgrew her kitchen table — then she and her husband went all-in.
Now, Heirloom Traditions is a $100 million company with a new facility opening in July.
Paula Blankenship, the 63-year-old founder of Heirloom Traditions Paint and author of the forthcoming memoir Just Open the Jar: A DIY Path to Creating a Life You Love, comes from a family of entrepreneurs.
Image Credit: Courtesy of Heirloom Traditions Paint. Paula Blankenship.
She grew up in Oneida, Tennessee, watching her parents run a retail business. Blankenship was interested in doing the same. She didn’t graduate from high school; at 16, her mother helped her open her first shop selling clothes. After that, she and her sister opened a retail store selling floor covering, paint and other items for home decoration.
“ I never want to look down on that because it was where I really learned to hone my selling skills, design skills and all that,” Blankenship tells Entrepreneur. After a chance meeting with a young billionaire who appreciated her eye for interior design, she applied her expertise to properties in New York and Connecticut.
But when her parents passed away, Blankenship, a single mother then, cut down on her travel to be with her teenage son. He earned a place at a private school in Louisville, Kentucky, and when they made the move — one her son wasn’t all that thrilled about — Blankenship began to brainstorm ways to fill some of their evenings.
Starting a paint business with help from Facebook
With her background in furniture and interior design, starting a paint business seemed like a strong fit. “I thought, You know, maybe that is something I could do,” Blankenship recalls. “I’m going to paint some of this ornate, heavy furniture that I’ve dragged up here to this home.”
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