Today we’d like to introduce you to Jennifer Carver.
Jennifer, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
I am currently a stay at home mom and have the pleasure of being married to my husband, Seth Carver and we have two beautiful kids, Beckham who is two and Harper who is just six weeks old. I have always loved any kind of fashion, shopping, etc. I got my Bachelors from Kennesaw State in Exercise and Health Science and from there went to PTA school and got my license to be a Physical Therapist Assistant. I worked full time out of school until I had my son two years ago and went part-time. All while doing physical therapy (which I absolutely love) I always told everyone that I would love to own a women clothing boutique one day. It was more of a dream and figured it would never turn into a reality. Well, insert my husband and his business. He owns Twisted Cycle. A gym that is a mixture of cycle and cross training. He has a few locations and last summer I had the bright idea of launching a fitness and athleisure clothing line that I could sell in his gyms and eventually online. It was a no brainer to me. My husband has the perfect space for me to sell my clothing line and has my target clientele coming into his gyms. Over the next few months, I worked on setting everything up. I decided on the name Juneberry and began working with distributors and designing pieces that I would want to sell. All the while, I was currently pregnant and due in March 2019. My plan was to launch Juneberry before I had my daughter but she surprised us four weeks early. I ended up launching Juneberry on March 13 in my husband’s gyms and it did awesomely! We are launching our website this week and the best is yet to come!
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
It has been a fairly smooth road. I wanted this to be very little stress and something fun that I could do as a stay at home mom. The struggle at the moment is finding the time to work on Juneberry and still be a good mom and wife. They are my number one priority but I also love having my own thing on the side. My advice to the mom that has always loved working but chooses to stay at home with her kids would be to find something you are passionate about and go for it. It doesn’t have to be anything big or grand, but something fun to do while you can still stay at home with your kids. I really had no idea where to start but just got on the internet and started finding answers and reading different blogs or forums of other people doing something similar. My husband was a huge help. Since he owns his own business and is very successful at it, he knew a lot of what I needed to do to get started. I would tell other women to find someone who has done something similar and pick their brain, don’t be afraid to make mistakes, and just go for it. Its all a learning process but it really is a fun journey.
Alright – so let’s talk business. Tell us about Juneberry – what should we know?
I currently own Juneberry. It is a woman clothing and athleisure company. The goal is to make women feel their best when they put on our clothing items. The items I am selling will be great for the gym or any fitness activity but then you can also wear them around the town. You can feel comfortable and look great while running errands! What woman doesn’t want that?! I am most proud that I get to do this alongside my husband. As I said before, I get to sell all my items in his gyms. I like that it is in his business and we get to be a team. He is my biggest supporter and I am his, what better way to support each other than having our businesses align together. I think that I am most set apart from other lines because I am actually hand picking these items, I wear them and see how they fit and find out the good and the bad about the item. I want to only sell the best. On our website our tagline is “Thoughtfully designed to make you feel your best” and I truly do want that. I want my customers to wear items that feel the best, fit the best, and look the best.
We’re interested to hear your thoughts on female leadership – in particular, what do you feel are the biggest barriers or obstacles?
I think as a stay at home mom people don’t take you seriously when you want to start a business. They think that you are too preoccupied with your kids and family, or that you don’t know what you’re doing when it comes to owning your own business. I think you are constantly having to prove yourself that you can do both, run a business and be a great wife and mom.
Contact Info:
- Website: juneberryapparel.com
- Email: info@juneberryapparel.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/juneberryapparel
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/juneberryapparel
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