Homestead Originals:
A Barthuly Family Business
By Donna Rees,
General Editor
Lisa Barthuly, her
husband Marc, and
their three youngest
children live in the
foothills of Mount
Rainier on their little homestead, along
with Shalom the Great Pyrenees, Nubian
goats, a flock of “chicklettes,” and lots of
wild critters. In 2005, they started a home-based business, Homestead Originals
( www.HomesteadOriginals.com), which
specializes in All Natural Soy Wax Candles
and other goodies for the homestead and
those in it.
Starting out with an initial investment
of less than $100, the Barthuly family
entrepreneurs launched their business. The
entire family participates, including their
children, who make various contributions
based on age and ability. For example, the
girls help with wicking, packing, and shipping, and they put stickers on the jar
candles. Lisa said, “Our youngest son, who
is almost 2 years old, is in charge of entertainment while we work, and he is
excelling with that job!
As both a sales representative for The
Old Schoolhouse® Magazine and the owner
of a home-based family business, Lisa is in
a unique position to offer insights about
advertising and marketing. “Over the many
years that I’ve worked in advertising at The
Old Schoolhouse, I’ve seen how the adver-
tising options we offer have helped many
other companies. . . . I am one of them!
“Our family has taken a multi-pronged
approach in our advertising, consistently
relying on print (always a ‘staple’ in adver-
tising, short- and long-term!), and the
Internet is just exploding as a highly
viable, results-oriented avenue as well. We
have done banner ads, button ads, and text
ads in The Homeschool Minute and are
never disappointed in the results. When all
is said and done, in advertising, it’s the
results yielded that really speak loudest.
“When you are doing your research for
options of advertising your business, look
around for those ‘gems’ of free advertising!
Yes, they are out there! There are a myriad of
options out there to try for very little, if any,
expense. Product reviews are a wonderful
way to get the word out, and bloggers with a
nice following often will do reviews for you
(posting them on their blogs and linking
back to you). If you have a blog associated
with your website, offer free giveaways or
have other web blogs/businesses offer a free
giveaway of your products and link back to
you. We all love ‘free stuff,’ and news of a
freebie on the Internet can spread like wildfire. Each time your website is visited, you
are introducing potential customers to your
business. It’s a great way to advertise
inexpensively.”
During our interview, Lisa mentioned
“networking.” I was unfamiliar with that
concept and asked Lisa if she could explain
it. She responded: “I have been so blessed in
this area! In my day job I get the blessing of
meeting tons of wonderful folks who have
turned into great friends. I can exchange
ideas with them or partner up on marketing
projects, and some of them are willing to
mention our company on their blogs.
“One lovely lady who is a dear friend and
mentor is Martha Greene over at
MarmeeDear ( www.marmeedear.com).
She is a great inspiration to me personally
and has such fun, interesting ideas! When I
talk to my clients, I often hear comments that
make me think, ‘Hey, now something like
that might work for us!’ Once I had a client
mention to me that she’d just been featured
by another website. She said she’d given
away an E-Book of hers, and her traffic went
through the roof! Well, I had been considering participating in that particular promotion, and after hearing her testimony of how
well it worked, I jumped on board. It proved
to the most successful advertising we’d done
via a promo/giveaway.
“The Internet has been a huge blessing
for home-based business folks, and friendship is the key to success. Friends talk and
share . . . the good, bad, and the ugly. We
are not a ‘brick and mortar’ shop, so
advice from seasoned Internet/home-based business folks is invaluable!”
