PLEASE TELL US ABOUT YOURSELF AND THE BUSINESS YOU STARTED.

Hi, my name is Tonya Thornton and I’m the founder of Bles Sensation, a personal care product  business that makes and sells high quality personal care products at an affordable price.

I have been through a lot of challenges in my life. I became a mother at 16 to one of the most driven, intelligent, amazing and beautiful young women I have ever met. I married at 18 and widowed at 28. I became homeless at 29 and was living that way for 3 years of my life. 

In 2009. I had a double heart surgery where my cardiologist told me there was no medical reasoning for me to be alive but I looked at him and said “God said I shall live and not die” after that experience I started building my life and I have not stopped since. 

I am a poet and I became a published author and motivational speaker. I knew there was so much more for me and my life. One night I prayed and asked God to bless me with an ability to be able to provide a stable living. After two days I had a dream and, in that dream I saw myself making a product, a body scrub, today it is known as Blessed Body- Body Scrub and I could smell peppermint. When I woke up, I went in my kitchen and made it, as I washed it off my own hands I was amazed at how soft they felt.

Being a scrub user myself I had never felt that softness and moisture when using the other products. Now I had a vision!

I started going to parking lots asking people to try my products and when they did, they all loved them. I did parking lot demonstrations for 8 months. I dreamed of one day having the money to get started. September 2016 was bittersweet for me and my life. A very special friend committed suicide and three weeks later my nephew was murdered in a drive-by shooting and while raising money for my nephew’s services my sales began. 

I started Bles Sensation with $22.00 and in the first year of business the sales were phenomenal.  I knew I was going to comfortably stop working my daily job in 2018 and that’s what I did. I was able to live off the proceeds from my company. 

In 2018 I went to Ohio and pitched my products for HSN (Home Shopping Network) American Dream, where my products were chosen and I was assigned a mentor, only to have that American Dream snatched from me. I got used to disappointments so when the program ended because of a merge I just kept moving and decided to continue to build my empire no matter what. 

I believe since God gave me the vision; he would also give me the provision. In 2019 I sought out funding sources and it was disappointment after disappointment but in the midst of that, I was nominated for the United States Chamber Of Commerce award. I knew if I wanted to take my company to the next level, I was going to need more money to invest in myself. 

I went back into the workforce and started saving every penny. A young lady saw me on social media and her marketing team did some amazing work for me with rebranding the company. They redesigned my logo, changed the colors and in October 2019 the rebrand began. 

Each and every day I know I have to build brick by brick; nothing is too small. The bible says, “don’t despise small beginnings”. When I see the growth, I am so appreciative and grateful to be building something bigger than me, a legacy that will live past me.