Meet Emily Downey of Emagine Shop

Today we’d like to introduce you to Emily Downey.

Emily, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
My small business started out as a type of creative therapy. I was off work dealing with some mental health struggles, and I began to create soaps, wax melts, and a few other items. I was spending a lot of time on these projects, so I began to post about them on social media. Several of my friends indicated that they would be interested in purchasing my products. And everything kind of grew from there.

As I continued to make and sell products, my skill level and my customer base grew. I went from taking orders on social media to opening an Etsy site to eventually opening my own website. After my website orders began to take off, I started attending local markets in the greater Nashville area and continued to grow my customer base and make connections with other small businesses in the area.

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?
It definitely hasn’t always been easy. There have been plenty of physical challenges such as running out of space in our home to work on my projects and store my products. To account for that, we are constantly rearranging and coming up with new space-saving techniques to make sure we have plenty of room for everything we need. Another challenge has been transported to and from markets.

My husband and I share a car, and he works full-time, so we are constantly juggling our schedules to make sure everyone has transportation. There have also been some mental challenges as well. It has been far too easy to compare myself to other small businesses and to worry that maybe my business will never reach a point of success. Additionally, it has been very easy for me to let my self-doubts get in the way. There have been many times when I have almost talked myself into giving up and closing up shop, but I always remind myself of how far I have already come and how far I have left to go.

Thanks – so what else should our readers know about Emagine Shop?
Emagine Shop was started during the summer of 2020, and we officially made our first sale on Etsy in late September 2020. Emagine Shop specializes in soy wax products, such as candles and wax melts, and shea butter soaps. However, we are currently in the process of expanding to wickless candles and sugar scrubs. Our candles are our best-selling products, and we are known for having products inspired by pop culture and for our realistic novelty candles. Emagine Shop is set apart from others by two qualities we possess. One is that our products are almost all vegan friendly. The second defining quality is our realistic candle products. We have a couple of products in particular that our customers love; one of those is our realistic cereal bowl candle and our drink candles, which contain clear, squishy “ice cubes” made from gel wax.

One of the things that I am most proud of brand-wise is creating a diverse array of products and being able to connect with customers on a personal level and providing them a unique product that is perfect for them. In addition to our vast offerings of pre-made products, Emagine Shop happily accepts custom orders, wholesale orders, and event orders.

We will work with our customers to create the perfect product for their home, their business, or their event. We have worked with people on products for their weddings, for a small business event, and other such products. Emagine Shop makes sure, through testing, that all of our products are safe for our customers. Everything we do is done with the utmost care and love.

Is there anyone you’d like to thank or give credit to?
My husband deserves all of the credit in the world. He encourages me and supports me every step of the way. I am sure that I would have given up on this business by now without his support. From emotionally supporting me when I have my doubts to physically supporting me by helping me label products, prepare jars for candles, and taking packages to the post office, he is truly my number one supporter.

In addition to my husband, my parents and my grandmother have been huge supporters along the way. My mom drives up from southern Tennessee to help me attend local markets. My parents and my grandmother also test a lot of my products and give me feedback on what they think of the product and the presentation of the business.

Contact Info:

• Email: [email protected]
• Website: emagineshop.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/shopemagine
• Facebook: facebook.com/emagineshop
• Twitter: twitter.com/emagineshop