Kentucky

When Erica and Reiss Baxter saw that the wedding venue known as The Farmstead at Shawnee Springs was for sale in 2022, it felt like fate. Erica, a teacher and floral designer, and Reiss, who also farms, had been wanting to start their own business and get more involved with the community. And the 25-acre venue was just minutes from their home. With her passion for florals and events, and Reiss’s landscaping skills and flexible schedule, it was a natural fit. “It fell into our lap, and we’re thankful it did because it aligned with who we are really well,” Erica says. They now organize more than 40 weddings and events each year on the property, which has a historic tobacco barn that’s over 100 years old–all on top of their day jobs, family, and renting rooms on site. “We pride ourselves on being really flexible and making people's visions come to life,” she adds. “Whether that's to get married in the middle of the field or the woods or behind the barn.”

The team stays organized and customizes each event with the help of Google Workspace. They use Google Forms to communicate with clients months in advance, schedule tours, and follow up with them about wedding preferences. They set up shared Google Drive folders where couples can add requests or ideas, and staff can access the info. “It’s a really easy way for us to communicate without having to text or email, because it’s all in one place. It makes our workplace a lot more efficient,” Erica says. One team member uses Gemini to help create social media posts and checklists for the couples. While weddings remain the main event, they’ve expanded to showers, proms, and vendor markets, hired two new employees, and have plans to add a second location. “Google tools have helped us grow to where we are,” Reiss says. “We really enjoy this, and we hope to keep adapting and continue doing it.”

As the first female plumber licensed in the state of Kentucky, Shelly Toles is used to forging her own path. “I started with my dad in 1979,” Shelly says. “I was the only female to take the class and the only female when I went in to get my license, so I felt really out of place. But my dad said I would have to make my own way in it.” After 18 years as her father’s employee and a brief stint with her own bathtub repair business, Shelly opened the full-service home plumbing company, Shelly Toles Plumbing, in 2009. Today, they serve 3,000 to 4,000 customers a year with new construction, services, and repairs. “I’ve got several builders who have been with me from day one, and then we’ll pick up new homeowners for construction or other new customers,” Shelly says. “We’re a small company and we like to grow things slowly.”

Shelly Toles Plumbing’s Google Business Profile has more than 100 reviews, and Shelly notes that the number of customers finding them through their Business Profile continues to grow each quarter. As for operations, the business decided to go digital a few years ago to keep pace with Kentucky’s Division of Plumbing, and they chose Google Drive to help them share information with inspectors. “The licensed plumber in the field will take pictures and a video of each job, and then we forward that to the division of plumbing, along with our permits, and everything is through Google Drive,” Shelly explains. “There's very little paperwork anymore. Virtual inspections have helped tremendously.” Shelly now has 45 years of experience under her belt, but keeps looking forward. “We still break barriers,” she says. “The world honestly still doesn't always look at women being able to run a male-dominated business, but there are plenty of women out here with the leadership to do it. You just have to stand your ground and let them know that you can do this.”

Kentucky native Ben Childers is one of those lucky people who’s turned his passion into a business. When he got a drone for Christmas as a high school junior in 2016, the avid hiker and photographer posted footage of local attraction Cumberland Falls on YouTube and got 180,000 views in two days. Within a week, local real estate agents had asked him to shoot similar videos for their properties. “They wanted to pay me to do what I was already doing for fun,” he says. “I decided to embrace it and create an actual business.” When he launched Ben Childers Photography in 2017, he’d already been using Google tools for years. “The ease and intuitiveness of Google products makes them a no-brainer for growing our business,” he says.

With help from Ben’s two YouTube channels, revenue grew by 40 percent in 2021 and another 25 percent in 2022. One channel is a hub for client work; the second shares his own photography, reaching potential clients worldwide, like agencies in California or overseas who need shots of Kentucky. “The ROI on our YouTube channels is immense,” he says. “Every week, I have people from tourism agencies and production companies asking to license content.” Ben and his five employees also make heavy use of Google Workspace tools like Gmail, Calendar, and Drive. “Google Drive lets us share content with each other quickly and efficiently,” he says. Clients collect their final videos from Google Drive as well. “We have 3.15 terabytes of data stored on Drive,” Ben says. “It gives us capabilities we wouldn’t have with other options.” Ben hopes to double the size of Ben Childers Photography in the next few years by expanding into new geographic areas and new services. Google Ads will be a big part of that strategy. “We’ll use Google Ads to put our brand in front of new eyes and break into new markets,” he says.

The most important element of the Kentucky Derby—after the horses—might very well be the hats. Commonplace at the race and popular at Derby parties around the globe, eye-catching headwear is a big part of the fun. So when high school friends Rachel Bell and Kate Welsh returned to their hometown of Louisville to attend the Derby together, they pooled their creative talents and designed some winners. Their styles were so unique that on their next visit, people remembered “the hat girls.” The two returned seasonally to Louisville in 2013, went into business together, and the name stuck. The upscale creations stand out in the crowd: Rachel describes their hats as “edgier, with bolder colors.” Selling first through local boutiques, they eventually rented their own retail space and launched a website. Online sales soared after their first Google Ads campaign in 2018—they quickly expanded from the region to almost every state. “Even with a small budget, business from outside of Louisville just exploded,” Kate says. Revenue doubled each year, and online sales grew to 30 percent of their business in 2019.

Being a niche business tied to a specific social event, The Hat Girls were especially vulnerable when COVID-19 forced the Kentucky Derby to ban all spectators in 2020. They used their Business Profile on Google to alert customers to changing hours, and the photos and five-star reviews kept their web presence current. Rachel and Kate adjusted their focus, designing some bridal pieces and using the extra time to build up inventory they can later customize. They've also outsourced a local, female-owned business to help design coordinating masks. As the Official Hat Designer of the Kentucky Derby Festival, The Hat Girls are looking forward to the next Derby season—typically a full two months of events leading up to race weekend in May. “We don’t really know what Derby will look like in 2021,” says Rachel. Adds Kate, “But when it does come back, it’ll be the biggest one yet. It’s such a huge event, regionally and for the country.”