

This is the startup story of Billionaire Entrepreneur Sara Blakely. Blakely, the founder of SPANX, started her empire at 27 with only $5,000 from personal savings. This is her 15 year journey.

Founder of SPANX: Sara Blakely

Age at Founding: 27

When: 1998

Industry: Fashion & Apparel

Annual Revenue: $250MM

# of Employees: 100

Famous For: Undergarments

The Founder's Start: Generating initial sales by calling everyone in her year books from kindergarten through senior year of high school.

Prior Experience: Selling Fax Machines.

Startup Capital: $5,000 from personal savings.

Follow on Funding: None. Sara Blakely owns 100% of the company and has self funded the company since the beginning.

First Year Revenue: $4,000,000

Years to Profitablity: Spanx was profitable in it's first year of business.

Important Startup Milestones for SPANX:

1998: Sara Blakely starts SPANX while selling fax machines with $5,000 in savings.

1999: Spanx's first year revenue tops $4,000,000.

1999: Blakely gets her product distrubted into Neiman Marcus.

2000: Oprah names SPANX her favorite product of the year and sales take off. Sales hit $10,000,000 in revenue.

2001: SPANX is featured on QVC and sells over 8,000 units in under six minutes

2013: Sara Blakely becomes a billionaire.