Lillian Vernon

Lillian Vernon built the first woman‑founded company ever listed on the American Stock Exchange.

In 1951, Lillian Vernon was four months pregnant, newly married, and looking for a way to make extra income.

So she took $2,000 of wedding gift money and placed a $495 ad in Seventeen magazine, offering personalized leather purses and belts.

The items were sourced from her father’s leather goods factory.

The ad brought in $32,000 in orders.

In 1956, she mailed her first catalog.

Sixteen pages, black and white, filled with gifts, jewelry, gadgets, and monogrammed everything.

She wrote a personal letter in every issue, often photographed in a Chanel suit with a fresh blowout, telling customers what she had found on her latest travels.

She walked Fifth Avenue to see what displays women were drawn to.

She studied sales.

She ran focus groups.

She called it her “golden gut.”

In 1965, she incorporated the company.

5 years later, she hit her first million-dollar sales year.

And in 1987, she took the company public, becoming the first woman in American history to found a company listed on the American Stock Exchange.

Her products were as varied as the women who shopped with her.

Pink Lady Tool Kits. Shards of Ming vases turned into pendants. Personalized mugs, robes, and passport holders.

A decorative bobby pin cup that caught the eye of Revlon and led to major contracts with Max Factor, Elizabeth Arden, and Maybelline.

Her sons Fred and David worked alongside her.

Fred, who joined full-time in 1975 after earning his MBA from Columbia, helped grow the business 40-fold.

He left in 1993 to join the Clinton administration.

In 1997, Lillian herself was appointed chair of the White House National Women’s Business Council.

By the 1990s, one in four American households received her catalogs.

The company processed nearly 5 million orders a year and brought in close to $300 million in annual revenue.

Her customers included Frank Sinatra, Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Steven Spielberg.

In 2003, after 52 years, she sold the company to ZelnickMedia for $60.5 million.

She was also a philanthropist and a board member at Citymeals-on-Wheels, the Lincoln Center, and NYU.

She endowed a chair for entrepreneurship at NYU and funded programs for the arts, medical research, and the elderly.

Her foundation also supported Ronald McDonald House and Toys for Tots.

When someone asked her if she was a feminist, she answered like this: “You’ve got Gloria Steinem and whatever her name is… Betty Friedan. They just talked about it. But you know what? I went out and did it.”