Kim Jaynes: From $6hr to a business mogul

PERSONAL SPOTLIGHT

“Anyone who has a dream to own a business, do it. Do it in your own way. There’s not a template.”

Kim Jaynes from $6hr job to a business mogul

by Michael Young

Inside her fashionable office, dressed to the nines, you’d never believe that Kim Jaynes started her career slinging eyelashes from the trunk of her car.

At age 19, Kim found herself $50,000 in credit card debt after her parent’s divorce sent her into repeated rounds of “Nordstrom therapy”. She earned just $6/hour working for a hairdresser and felt like she had no prospects for the future.

“Borboleta, which is the Portuguese word for “butterly.” The butterly is a symbol. All of them are unique and so is the beauty of each person.”

Within a year, she has a full list of clientele and had paid all of her debts.

Building on her initial success, Kim teamed up with her husband to create a “bootstrap business” out of her three-bedroom condo and the trunk of her car. Up to that point, her business hadn’t even had a name—she had simply operated under “Kim who does lashes”. So, she settled on the name Borbaleta, which is the Portuguese word for “butterfly”.

“The butterfly is a symbol. All of them are unique and so is the beauty of each person. Beauty is diversity and should be celebrated in different ways.”

Still, the operation was hardly a tower of industry. They did most of their work from a simple website, and most of their inventory

In fact, her first forays into the world of beauty products were outright disasters. Her first eyelash client got her eyes glued shut. Luckily, her early eyelash disasters did not sink her career. Even though she thought about giving up on the thought of doing lashes, the next day, she had someone else call her up and so she tried again.

“They gave me a chance when they shouldn’t have given me a chance,” Kim says. “I’ll never forget the first time someone called me back for a return appointment.”

resided in the guest bathtub and under the bed. Kim even admits to giving out her personal cell phone as the “customer service number” and playing the role of agents and supervisors herself, all while changing her voice to fit the part.

With her husband acting as a manager and Kim acting as the creative visionary, they established a business with a proper headquarters, warehouse, and education center.

“MY DRIVE IN THIS BUSINESS HAS ALWAYS BEEN TO CHANGE WOMEN’S LIVES. MY LIFE WAS CHANGED SO MUCH BY WOMEN WHO GAVE ME A CHANCE.”

Even with her booming success, there came a point where Kim had become obsessed with work, pouring 70-80 hours a week into the business and not thinking about much else. Still, she and her husband had always thought about starting a family, but wondered if it was even possible with their hectic life.

Then a friend told her something that, at first, made no sense: that a baby would bring a wonderful balance to her life. Though it seemed impossible, Kim and her husband took the plunge and gave birth to Scottie, a beautiful little girl diagnosed with cystic fibrosis.

Her entire life changed and a wonderful thing happened. “I found the balance I had been looking for and realized there’s so much more to life than a career. Work is work. But this is life.”

Kim hopes her story will inspire others to run with their big ideas. “Anyone who has a dream to own a business, do it. Do it in your own way. There’s not a template.”

Though she has been very successful, she says the focus has never been about making money. She admits that she has never gone out and built her dream home, but only takes what she

needs and then reinvests the rest in the company.

“My drive in this business has always been to change women’s lives. My life was changed so much by women who gave me a chance.”