Entrepreneur Stories

Burt’s Bees Founding Story

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Burt’s Bees is a famous American personal care products company known for using all natural ingredients in its products.  The Company was founded in 1984 in Maine under some unlikely circumstances. Burt’s Bees was founded by Burt Shavitz, a photographer turned beekeeper and Roxanne Quimby, a candle maker. 

Burt Shavitz, whose face has been gracing all Burt’s Bees products since the Company was founded, was a famous photojournalist who had his photographs featured in Time and Life magazines.  Shavitz considered his life unfulfilled in the city of Manhattan and escaped to rural Maine, where he started a honey business.  During this time, Shavitz met Roxanne Quimby, an artist and candle maker. 

The two struck up a partnership to start a candle making business using the beeswax from Burt Shavitz’s honey business.  They started the business with an investment of $ 200 in an abandoned one room schoolhouse. Shavitz and Quimby started selling their beeswax candles at a high school craft fair.  The business flourished and within a year, the duo made a $ 20,000 profit. In 1989, they increased their production after getting a large order from a New York boutique and moved their headquarters to an abandoned bowling alley.

During this time, Quimby came across a 19th century beekeeping book which included homemade personal care recipes using beeswax.  This prompted the Company to change its direction from candle making to personal care products. Burt’s Bees became a legal corporation in 1991 and introduced the most famous product of the Company, Burt’s Bees lip balm.  By 1993, the Company’s main focus was exclusively on personal care products. The Company slowly started expanding to international market and started selling its product in Japan by the late 1990s.

However, during this time, Roxanne Quimby forced Shavitz out of the Company over personal issues.  In 1999, Quimby bought Shavitz’s stake of the Company and offered him a $ 130,000 house in Maine. Quimby went on to sell the Company to the Clorox Corporation in 2007 for $ 925 million. 

Now, after 35 years since its inception, Burt’s Bees is still a popular brand, selling more than 100 products under its name.  The success of Burt’s Bees also made its founders, who were just small business owners earlier, millionaires.

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