Referral Friday is part of an ongoing series inspired by John Jantsch's Make-a-Referral Week. For more about that, and loads more referrals for everything from cobblers to coaches to gee-tar teachers, start here. Pass it on, baby!
Marty Stevens-Heebner doesn't just make great bags, she re-makes them.
Via her latest business venture, ReBagz, outrageously colored rice sacks and old juice boxes are transformed into stylish totes and buckets and messenger bags, all impeccably cut and stitched to showcase the graphic tigers and stallions and European conquerers to maximum awesomeness.
ReBagz is Marty's third (at least) business venture, after book author and jewelry designer, and a natural outgrowth of the way she's lived her life, which thus far has been one not only of curiosity (she's learned first-hand that penguins in their native habitat are quite stinky) and expansiveness (she did extensive human rights work in post-Zapatista, 1990s Mexico) but principles: ReBagz are made by women, under fair working conditions which are personally certified by Marty. Because she's like the Pollyanna of eco-commerce, I shit you not. And she somehow does it all without making you feel bad about what a lazy, first-world Cheeto-eater you are. And by "you", I mean "me".
Full disclosure: Marty gave me a bag, as a ridiculously generous gesture of thanks for some information I threw out about Twitter and marketing in a webinar I did a ways back. Also, she's a consulting client. (Yes, a client who gives me a thank-you gift. I think I brought my G.I. doc some almond-flour muffins once, and that was only because I wanted to woo him into signing on with the Specific Carbohydrate Diet.) Cranky-butt, Grinchy cynics might mutter (they're always muttering, the cynics) that this was a PR ploy on the part of Miss Heebner, who was gleefully rubbing her hands together at the thought of a whopping 1,500 more people hearing about her already popular bags. (America Herrara wore one on Ugly Betty, for crying out loud!)
Pfft, I say. You'd have to meet her, but trust me, it's not how the lady rolls. Marty is about peace and fairness and designing kickass handbags with lots and lots of pockets.
And pandas. Of course...
xxx
c
- To buy awesome bags at the ReBagz site, click here.
- To learn how to become your own lady ecopreneur, click here. (There's automatic video and the design ain't rockin' my world, either, but her info will most likely rock yours if you're the right person.)