Cocktail garnishes. Greeting cards. Fragrance. Applesauce. At first glance, the businesses featured here couldn’t be more different. But look a little closer and you'll find a common thread: Each was built from a deeply personal story.
Across the country, a new generation of entrepreneurs is turning family traditions, cultural heritage, childhood memories, and everyday frustrations into thriving businesses. Some are preserving time-honored crafts. Others are introducing flavors, scents, and products inspired by the communities that shaped them. What unites them is a willingness to take a chance on an idea—and the determination to keep going when success is anything but guaranteed.
Their paths are as varied as their products. A former corporate executive transformed memories of his Taiwanese childhood into a fragrance brand. A jewelry maker is breathing new life into centuries-old silversmithing techniques. An entrepreneur inspired by her grandmother’s fruit trees built a nationally recognized line of cocktail garnishes. Together, they're expanding our definition of what entrepreneurship looks like today.
Meet seven makers who are proving that American innovation doesn’t always begin in a boardroom. Sometimes it starts at a family table, in a backyard garden, or with a simple desire to create something that doesn’t yet exist.
Greetings From the Heart
She’s bringing community together in a truly tactile way.
Meet the Maker
Savannah Stephens
Kindred Paper greeting cards
📍 Atlanta, GA | Age 43
Inspired by a lifelong love of handwritten correspondence, Savannah Stephens turned a personal frustration into a thriving business. While searching for greeting cards, she realized that few reflected the Black women she knew and loved. “There were no cards that represented my cousins, my sisters, or my best friends,” says Stephens, 43. What began with invitations for family celebrations grew into Kindred Paper, which she launched in 2020. Today the company features artwork by Stephens and other women of color, with designs celebrating Black culture and community. “My goal is to honor my grandmother and have something to pass on to my daughters,” Stephens says.
Field Notes
A former corporate executive bottles sentimental scents.
Meet the Maker
Steve Sun
Biology Fragrances
📍Los Angeles, CA | Age 38
For his functional brand Biology Fragrances, Steve Sun created products based on some of the most memorable sights, sounds, and smells of his Taiwanese childhood. But his biggest inspiration is his mother. “She suffered debilitating headaches, and our house always smelled like Tiger Balm,” says Sun. “This brand—and the healing power of scent that inspired it—is a love letter to her.”
After getting a business degree and working in corporate design for more than a decade, Sun started selling his essential oil mixes online during the pandemic. “My goal was to get into one store,” he says. Then Urban Outfitters came calling. Now Biology is sold in hundreds of Sprouts Farmers Market locations. “When my mom told me she was proud of me, I thought, I’m good now. I made it.”
The Fruits of Her Labor
Her small-batch garnishes will elevate any beverage
Meet the Maker
Adrienne Walker
BlueHenry cocktail garnishes
📍 Capitol Heights, MD | Age 49
Like many great ideas, Adrienne Walker’s business began with a grandmother. Growing up visiting Jacksonville, FL, Walker, 49, spent time among the fruit trees in her grandmother’s backyard, and fresh-squeezed orange juice was always on the table in her grandmother’s home. After leaving a health care administration career in 2017, Walker turned that inspiration and her love of entertaining into a business—BlueHenry, her line of all-natural cocktail garnishes, rimming salts, sugars, and spices, all made without artificial ingredients. Demand soared during the pandemic, and today BlueHenry products are sold online, through World Market, and at major events nationwide. “Everyone should be able to create something elevated at home that doesn’t take a lot of effort so they can spend more time engaging with their guests,” she says.
Ripe for Success
A hometown hero built a business around his core values.
Meet the Maker
Ethan Holmes
Holmes Mouthwatering
📍 Cleveland, OH | Age 32
One hundred pounds of apples: That Christmas gift was all budding entrepreneur Ethan Holmes, then 15, needed to perfect his applesauce recipe and begin to build a brand that’s now sold at his local zoo, big-box stores, and many other places. With unique flavors including apple pie cinnamon and strawberry peach, Holmes Mouthwatering is one of the only Black-owned U.S. applesauce companies. In 2015 Holmes launched its philanthropic arm, which teaches students the basics of entrepreneurship and provides applesauce to local communities. “My goal is to teach the next generation that they can grow their own businesses from the ground up,” he says.
A Product of History
A new generation of makers is reimagining what heirloom metalworking can be.
Meet the Maker
Alyssa Saccente
Gatta Zaffira jewelry
📍Southampton, NY | Age 31
Alyssa Saccente’s handmade silver jewelry is both rooted in the past and designed for the future. The daughter and granddaughter of metalworkers (her father restores antique railroad lanterns and builds model trains, and her grandfather worked on muscle cars), Saccente creates one-of-a-kind sculptural pieces for her brand, Gatta Zaffira (“sapphire cat” in Italian), which operates out of the historic Pelletreau Silver Shop. As an artist in residence for the Southampton History Museum, which manages the 17th-century shop, she also leads beginner metalsmithing workshops. “My process is slow and intentional,” she says. “I think people appreciate artisan work. And it’s so gratifying to connect through something you’ve made with your hands.”
Vinegar Vanguard
With a new spin on a classic process, a Portuguese American makes good on a family history of fermentation.
Meet the Maker
Rodrigo Vargas
American Vinegar Works
📍Worcester, MA | Age 48
As a kid, Rodrigo Vargas was taught to think of vinegar as nothing more than spoiled wine—he came from a family of winemakers in Portugal and grew up helping harvest grapes in the summer. But over time, Vargas developed a passion for great-tasting vinegar. “It’s a staple in most homes, but there are very few premium versions,” he says. In 2019, he started American Vinegar Works, making slow-fermented vinegar using custom equipment and an 1823 drip method. The fermentation process takes two to three months, and then the vinegar is barrel-aged in American oak whiskey barrels before being bottled raw and unfiltered. Unpasteurized and preservative-free, his vinegar is made from only American wine, cider, sake, and beer. “When you’re making something special and you want a flavor to pop, we provide that opportunity with vinegar,” he says.
A Taste of Home
A Seattle couple brings Chinese street food to the masses, one frozen dumpling at a time.
Meet the Maker
Jen Liao
Mila Dumplings & Noodles
📍Seattle, WA | Age 35
Every time Jen Liao and her husband, Caleb Wang, visited their parents’ hometowns in China, they sought out pan-fried pork soup bao. In 2018, desperate to recreate that authentic taste in America, the couple opened a restaurant, and during COVID they began making a frozen version of their popular soup dumplings. Today, MìLà, which means “honey and spice” in Mandarin, has sold more than 60 million dumplings. The biggest key to its success, says Liao, is the flavor: “If we get a thumbs-up from every person around my family table, we know we have something good.”
