Tucked away in a Scottsdale business park, business for Shari Lott is really good.
Sales for her online retail website for children is up over 1,000 percent from this time last year. It seems people just can't get enough of everything babies on Spearmint Love.
This all started over a blanket Lott had made for herself. On a whim, she got a few more and tried to sell them online.
"I was really happy to get one order a day," says Lott. "But there were days where I got zero."
But then something started to happen.
"If I got an order I would literally jump up out of my chair and be like, I'm going to go ship an order."
Her business was taking off.
Eventually, she started reaching out to other small businesses to sell their stuff. Today she has hired staff, moved to a 5,000 square foot warehouse in north Scottsdale all while relying on social media.
"I didn't really have any money for marketing so Instagram was - it was everything to me," says Lott. Now a few years later, social media is still key to all of this.
Spearmint Love has 124,000 Instagram followers and 330,000 Facebook fans. Her following is so strong, Facebook asked her to be on its U.S. Small Business Council. It's a rare opportunity for 10 other small businesses to help the social media giant craft tools to help other small businesses grow.
"I think it's awesome but I think we're just getting started,” says Lott.
