Company

Brothers Nadim and Rami Yahia grew up mixing together condiments and hot sauces to create their own concoctions. They turned this habitual sauce mixing into CustomHeats, a hot sauce business that allows customers to create their own sauces and labels by bridging the food industry with tech and data. In this episode of Shopify Masters, you’ll hear from Nadim Yahia of CustomHeats on marketing with a low budget, developing hardware, and how their $100 bottle of hot sauce went viral. 

In this series, we explore the lives of ordinary kids with not-so-ordinary hobbies. Between soccer practice and schoolwork and driving lessons, these young entrepreneurs also run successful businesses. Here, they share some of their favorite things—from sloths and STEM to bubble baths and beagles—and what it’s like to be the boss.

There is no better evidence of the power that failure holds than in the trajectory of small business owners, many of whom leap into a passion or a big idea without all of the answers—or the money. Reaching the other side, though, is the harder part. In our series, we asked successful business owners about their most spectacular failures, and how they survived them. These are their stories about overcoming adversity.

Need to wrap up your holiday shopping? There’s still time to find unique, inspired gifts for everyone on your list—without a panicked trip to the closest big box store. Today, we’re sharing hand-picked gift ideas you can buy from independent businesses on Shopify.

Signs of Christmas seem to pop up earlier and earlier every year. But for some, Christmas is evergreen. It’s not a holiday, it’s a way of life. Fans like Kelli Girsch have even built full-time businesses around the season—because they’ve found their people. Whatever your feelings about Christmas, the point is this: your unusual hobby probably isn’t just your own. Explore these seven Christmas stores and get inspired to turn what you’re into, into a business.

David Dennis was showing some of his photography for a fundraiser when he discovered the complexities of ocean conservation and how surfboards can be made more sustainably. Together with partner Martijn Stiphout, David runs Ventana Surfboards which sells boards made out of upcycled and reclaimed materials. In this episode of Shopify Masters, you’ll hear how David Dennis balances his career at Microsoft while running Ventana Surfboards, the key components of running an impactful sustainable business, and how Instagram drives most of their sales. 

Business and altruism can go hand in hand. Find out how.

Instagram has always been a powerful growth tool for brands, but with IGTV providing a new avenue for creativity, the ability for a brand to position itself as an originator of the tool is wide open. With the platform growing and brands experimenting with new forms of content, the ways in which IGTV will alter Instagram marketing are becoming more clear.

Investment in Black-owned businesses is a path towards closing the racial wealth gap, strengthening communities, and creating economic opportunities for everyone. The future, therefore, relies on Black entrepreneurs. But systemic racism and centuries of oppression have created barriers to funding and ownership. How do we build a future that includes more Black businesses?

In partnership with the late model and makeup artist Cindy Joseph, Ezra Firestone helped to build BOOM by Cindy Joseph, an age-positive cosmetic line for women of every generation. As an ecommerce growth expert, Ezra has been known to share insights on building brands that resonate with consumers and stand the test of time. In this episode of Shopify Masters, Ezra Firestone shares his life and business journey and the most important lessons he’s learned along the way. 

Elizabeth Grojean founded Baloo Living, a business that sells weighted blankets sourced from eco-friendly materials, after a trip to Bali left her questioning the corporate rat race. However, after unplanned press coverage left her scrambling to fulfill orders, Elizabeth started her search for a fulfillment partner—unfortunately, she found that most were rarely able to deliver what was promised.