Made with Love Market — Stylish Storyteller

MEET CODY WALTZ AND MARIBETH SUBLETTE, CO-OWNERS OF MADE WITH LOVE MARKET, WHICH PRIORITIZES COMMUNITY AND A FAMILY-FRIENDLY EXPERIENCE

Home is where the heart is—and it doesn’t always have an address and a front door. At Made With Love Market, co-owners Cody Waltz and Maribeth Sublette want you to feel like you’re home in a friendly environment from the minute you arrive to the minute you say goodbye for now.

Made With Love Market in Gilbert was established in 2018, its first season opened in September 2018 and ran until April 2019, and received positive reception in the community from vendors and patrons alike.

Cody and Maribeth opened their second season in September 2019 to full vendor capacity at 70; up from their first season with around 45 vendors. With 400 active vendors in their system, an expanded email list, great attendance and a strong social media following, Made With Love’s second season is poised to be even more successful than the last.

Made with Love’s vendors sell handmade products including children's clothing and accessories; women and men's adult apparel; men’s wallets; jewelry; home decor; candles; children's toys; soap and skin care products; food and sweet treats and drinks.

So what made two former teachers decide to start their own business? A vision for a better market experience. Cody and Maribeth were vendors- Cody sold handmade organic baby clothes and Maribeth sold Mommy and Me t-shirts that she designed- they met at a pop-up shop when their booths were next to each other, and began meeting for monthly happy hours with other women vendors who are also moms and homemade shop owners.

Maribeth Sublette and Cody Waltz, co-owners of Made with Love Market

“It was an opportunity for us to have other women to relate to and connect with, and from there we would also have topics we would talk about every meeting, and one of those was markets that we enjoyed or markets that we thought could be improved on, and I had said something like, ‘Maybe we should just do our own,’ and Maribeth kind of laughed and she was like, ‘Okay, I’m in.’”

Cody began researching requirements for a market in Gilbert since she had lived in Gilbert at the time and decided to host Made with Love in Gilbert since she and Maribeth love the East Valley. Maribeth is from Gilbert and Cody has lived in Gilbert for more than 10 years.

“We just love the family feel and the community and the average age for Gilbert is early 30s with families so it hit our demographic and it was a community that we could really connect to,” Cody explains.

“And we didn’t feel there was a revolving market that really embodied that community feel among the vendors but also within families, so that’s something we’ve really tried to develop is that community feel within the vendor community too; our focus is community over competition with our vendors.”

Prior to their first season, Cody and Maribeth reached out to the Town of Gilbert to get licensing for the market’s location, in addition to confirming vendors, creating a website and developing a marketing and social media strategy, and thought the process would be easy, but Cody recalls it was hard work and effort that helped them open their first season successfully.

“Luckily we had a pretty good network of vendors from being vendors ourselves which I think really gave us a lead on knowing what would work for a market, what we wanted it to look like, what we wanted it to feel like,” Cody says.

“So we reached out to our network of vendors who have always been super supportive and word kind of spread that way and we also just spent a lot of time researching other vendors in the Valley who we saw had trendy handmade or hand-designed items--everything at the market has to either be handmade or hand-designed from start to finish by the vendor.”

Cody says both her and Maribeth’s experiences as teachers have helped them be organized and effectively communicate with people. “We just knew that we needed to do things a little bit different than the experiences that we had, so we’ve tried to incorporate that in everything we’ve done.”

We want to make people feel like we care about them because we genuinely do. My circle of friends and people I’ve met through doing this has expanded exponentially, it’s amazing how many incredible people have come into our lives because of this experience.”

Part of Made with Love’s success is in their values: community, a family-friendly environment and quality products. In addition to browsing products by vendors, Made with Love also has two designated vendors: Mama’s Cold Brew and Darling Three Photo Stop, which is Made with Love’s backdrop company that offers free photo backdrops at every market. Made with Love also has kid’s activities such as a free braid bar where people can get their hair braided for free, as well as music and food vendors. Something Made with Love has that demonstrates their commitment to providing a family-friendly and supportive environment is their Mama Bird lactation tent.

“Moms who are nursing, need to pump, bottle feed or just need a break, can come and get help from Alicia, the women who runs it and receive advice or assistance. That’s been a fun addition that nobody else really has,” Cody says.

Those values have not only led to positive interactions with vendors and patrons, but have led them to establish an engaged presence on social media with their 12,000 followers on Instagram.

Maribeth runs their social media, and wanted to make sure their Instagram feed looked beautiful from the beginning, Cody says. “We’ve grown pretty fast which has been incredible and we have an all organic following which is really special to us too.”

Their feed consists of bright, high-quality images of vendors and their products, patrons and updates on Made with Love such as the market schedule, networking events, and recently unveiled a new logo.

“I think it’s so important to really be yourself on social media and let people see that, and that shows a lot through our Instagram stories...so connecting with the audience in ways that they can relate to--we talk about being moms sometimes and you see our families out at the market, so you’ll see our families on Instagram stories.

For example, we bought a little lemonade stand from Target, and Maribeth’s four-year-old daughter was at a market selling waters for a $1. So you really get to connect with us on a little bit deeper level than you would at some other places, because our families are a part of it; they come out to every single market.”

In addition to focusing on family and showing that in various ways on social media, Made With Love also puts a spotlight on their vendors to try to connect them to the audience by telling their stories, Cody says. “Sharing how they got into whatever they’re doing is important too because you see these people online but you don’t always know their backstory or why that came to be. We’ve also started sharing some quotes from our vendors about their experience at Made With Love; we’re just very proud of the magic--we call it magic because it’s a certain feeling that you get when you’re out at the market, and that the vendors feel, we hear it all the time from them.”

This aspect isn’t just a part of their social media strategy, it also incorporates their values of building relationships with their vendors, and knew from the beginning it was very important to them to know the vendors by their first names, Cody says.

“A lot of the times, for people who run the market, it’s all about money,” Cody says. They want to sign up as many people as possible, give them a map and then they’re done interacting with the vendor.

“It’s always been important to us to know vendor’s first names and connect with them; we make it a point to talk to all the vendors at the market so they know us and we’re not just words behind a screen emailing them all the time,” Cody explains.

“We have always talked about being on top of communicating with people, responding to emails within 24-48 hours, responding to Instagram messages; communication is huge for us. And making people feel like we care about them because we genuinely do. My circle of friends and people I’ve met through doing this has expanded exponentially, it’s amazing how many incredible people have come into our lives because of this experience.”

Cody says her favorite thing about Made with Love has been creating a supportive community of vendors. “Everybody is so kind and supportive between vendors who sell similar items. The friendships that people have developed and getting to watch that grow and getting to see the collaborations that have come out of it, you see our vendors collaborate on different products all the time. So getting to see that community grow and create what we feel is special about Made with Love, is probably my favorite thing.”

Part of Made with Love’s success is based on Maribeth and Cody’s strong (and sometimes challenging) relationship. “Having a business partner in this, there’s no way we could have done this alone, so being able to create a vision together. We’re so different, we are night and day different. So it’s just been such a fun experience to learn and grow, and we joke all the time that it’s like a second marriage because you have to learn how to disagree on something and then come up with ideas and respect each other, so it’s been really cool for us to do that too.”

“Sharing how they got into whatever they’re doing is important too because you see these people online but you don’t always know their backstory or why that came to be.
We’ve also started sharing some quotes from our vendors about their experience at Made With Love; we’re just very proud of the magic--we call it magic because it’s a certain feeling that you get when you’re out at the market, and that the vendors feel, we hear it all the time from them.”

With the markets doing well in the second season, Cody and Maribeth have set their sights on a new venture that adds value to the small business community: Thirsty.-- by Made with Love.

Thirsty is a monthly small business networking event that Made with Love launched (and sold out) in October. Thirsty is open to all small business owners and don’t have to be Made with Love vendors; they can listen to an expert give a 20 minute workshop on a specific topic and network, socialize and meet people, and enjoy drinks and appetizers for $30.

“Since we did the happy hours starting out, one thing Maribeth and I always talked about is it’s so hard when you’re at these markets to go to other booths and connect with other vendors, you might meet them or talk to them between customers, and there’s so many incredible people, so you’re really missing out on an opportunity to collaborate or expand your network or connect with somebody who might be able to relate to wherever are in your life.”

As for the future of Made with Love, Cody says they want to continue expanding to a few other locations across the Valley and would love to see Thirsty take off too. “We want to keep the crowd attendance high for our vendors, that’s really important to us, we always want them to do well, and we just want to keep creating a space that people can feel safe and respected in and celebrated.”

To view Made with Love’s 2019-2020 market schedule, click here.

-Stylish Storyteller

*Photos by Wildlings Photo Co.