On a weekday morning in Nashville, the room filled quickly — heels clicking across the floor, coffee in hand, women greeting each other like old friends or future collaborators. Some came with businesses already in motion. Others came with ideas still forming.
Years earlier, influencer and entrepreneur Mallory Ervin said she had walked into rooms like this with a stack of homemade business cards tucked inside a Ziploc bag — each one stamped with an eyelashes and lips design, a scrappy attempt to be taken seriously.
Now, standing at the front of the room as the opening speaker for Network+ Women: She Means Business, hosted by the Nashville Area Chamber of Commerce, she looked out at a crowd that seem to mirror her own early ambition.
“Some of the people I met in rooms like this had a really big impact on my journey,” Ervin said.
A path that was never linear
Ervin didn't set out to become an entrepreneur.
“I always thought my path would be country music,” she said. “Every Wednesday, from the time I was 10 years old, my grandpa would drive me two and a half hours to Nashville for voice lessons. I thought that was it for me.”
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Instead, her path veered. She won beauty pageants, becoming Miss Kentucky in 2009 and finishing among top-5 finalists in one of the yearly Miss America competitions. She competed on the Amazing Race reality TV series three times.
She experienced much public success that, from the outside, looked effortless. But behind the scenes, she said, she was unraveling.
“What you see on the outside is not always what’s going on on the inside,” Ervin said. “I started attaching my self-worth to my titles and my achievements, and I began to feel really crippled under the weight of that success.”
What followed was a period she now describes as the hardest season of her life, including time in a treatment program for prescription medication addiction and anxiety. But, this period was also the turning point.
“I believe that sometimes our darkest moments can be the platform for our greatest success,” Ervin said. “The hardest season of your life might end up leading you to your greatest purpose. It might not just be something you make it through, it might be something that makes you who you are.”
Out of that experience came Nashville-based Living Fully Co. (Mallory Ervin LLC), which was first a goal to transform her life from “just fine,” then a public message, eventually a brand, and now a business that she said has generated tens of millions in revenue.
She didn’t have a business plan or formal training. She just had the desire to start.
“I built a rocket ship as it was sailing,” Ervin said. “I had no idea what I was doing. I just started sharing what I knew how to do and that was enough to get going.”
Starting before you’re ready -- the journey's never linear
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| Getting started is key |
That same mindset carried into everything that followed, from her early content creation days to launching merchandise that would sell-out in minutes.
“All you need is a phone,” Ervin said. “You don’t need an LLC to start. You don’t need a full plan. You don’t need to have it all figured out. You just need to start doing the thing that you love to do.”
Her first product launch was as scrappy as her business cards.
“I snuck to the side of somebody’s white brick house, took a picture in a sweatshirt, and we sold $100,000 worth in five minutes,” Ervin said. “And I was like, oh my gosh, this works.”
Ervin eventually built a multimillion-dollar business. She has garnered a million followers on Instagram and 141,000 subscribers on YouTube. She started a podcast and wrote a book, both entitled Living Fully. She also created the affordable-luxury pajama brand "In My Sundays."
Yet, she said that even as her portfolio of business initiatives began generating tens of millions of combined sales, Ervin resisted pressure to follow traditional playbooks.
“Journeys in business are rarely linear,” she explained. “You have to trust your gut. I didn’t go to business school. I didn’t have a five-year plan. I just followed what felt meaningful.”
Building where you are
For Ervin, staying rooted in Nashville has always been intentional.
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“Nashville has a spirit and a soul,” Ervin said. “It’s collaborative. It’s creative. It’s not cutthroat in the same way other cities can be. And I think that’s why I’ve chosen to keep my roots here.”
Even as her company grows, she’s committed to scaling locally. Ervin shared she recently hired a COO out of New York, and she has committed to commute to Nashville rather than move the business to New York. For Ervin, the philosophy of building locally is deeply personal.
“My dad built a huge business in a tiny town,” Ervin said. “He could have moved somewhere bigger, but it mattered to him to create opportunity where he was. And that’s always stayed with me.”
Then she paused, returning to a lesson from childhood:
“My mom used to say, ‘Bloom where you’re planted,’” Ervin said. “Make the most of what you have, where you are. And I really believe that.”
Redefining Leadership, Together
The idea of building where you are, and bringing others with you, carried into the subsequent panel discussion, which was moderated by Leisa Gill, director of growth for LBMC, the Nashville-based accounting and consulting firm.
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| Ryan Wood |
For Ryan Wood, executive managing director and Nashville market leader at Colliers, leadership has meant learning how to create space for others in industries where that hasn’t always been the norm.
“There are seasons where you’re climbing,” Wood said. “You’re trying to get that next role, that next opportunity. And then there are seasons where you can pause, look around you, and lift others up.”
That perspective didn’t come easily.
“I thought early on that all women supported women,” Wood said. “And then I realized that wasn’t always the case. So now, I’m really intentional about making space because there’s so much opportunity, and we don’t all need the same seat.”
Leading Through Change
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| Kelsey Cornillie |
For Kelsey Cornillie, Market President and Publisher at the Nashville Business Journal, leadership today is defined less by certainty and more by adaptability.
“The pace of change right now is incredibly fast,” Cornillie said. “The plan you set out for yourself may not be the one you end up following and that’s okay.”
What matters, she said, is how leaders respond.
“I think women are particularly skilled at saying, ‘We don’t have the exact roadmap, but we’re going to figure it out,’” Cornillie said. “And I think that’s why you’re seeing more women stepping into leadership roles right now.”
She also emphasized a shift in mindset.
“It’s not about just me,” Cornillie said. “It’s about being a steward and building something that will last beyond you, for the community and the people around you.”
Reinventing The Path Forward
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| Darci Bolenbaugh |
Such willingness to pivot also showed up clearly in the story of Darci Bolenbaugh, who very recently transitioned from a 25-year global consulting career into acquisition of Emerson Grace, the retailer that recently relocated to 12th Avenue South from Commerce Street.
“I was a ‘what’s next’ person,” Bolenbaugh said. “I wanted to do something totally different—something hyper-local, something rooted in community.”
Rather than starting from scratch, she chose to build upon the existing foundation that Emerson Grace achieved under its previous owner, Kimberly Lewis.
Bolenbaugh said she hopes both to honor and to evolve the cornerstone vision of Lewis, while remaining fixed on helping women dress modern and feel confident in an elevated casual style.
She explained that her approach remains grounded in curiosity, confidence built over time, and in realization that her skills from global consulting are still applicable.
“At some point, you just have to dive in,” Bolenbaugh said. “You realize you’ve been building skills your whole career that you can take with you into something new.”
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| Kimberly Lewis |
It bears note that a year ago, prior to selling to Bolenbaugh, some of original founder Kimberly Lewis's comments appeared online in a fashion spread for a New York City-based boutique company.
In that piece, Lewis explained that she was born and reared in Honolulu, and moved to Nashville with her family in 2014, prompted largely by her husband's plans to open a restaurant on 12 South, where he had also spotted space for her store, which she described as serving "the fashion-forward woman."
Lewis added, "I’m proud of myself for taking leaps of faith and seeing growth within myself and my businesses because of it."
In the same piece, she said the women who inspired her entrepreneurial career included her mother, other women in business, dear and talented friends, and her own daughter, of whom she added, "I love seeing the world through her eyes."
In January, Lewis referred via Instagram to her ambitions not ending, but evolving, and expressed confidence and pride in Bolenbaugh's undertaking. Displaying the same enthusiasm via Instagram, Bolenbaugh thanked Lewis and promised the stores patrons continuity and quality.
Opening doors, not guarding them
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| Delfine Fox |
For Delfine Fox, senior risk management consultant within RiskVersity, leadership is about access and responsibility.
“My job is not to guard the door,” Fox said. “It’s to leave it wide open so others can come in, pull up a chair, and sit at the table.”
Her own journey, from working in a male-dominated government environment to leading a major business organization, shaped that perspective.
“Many times, doors are not open for you,” Fox said. “So when you get there, it’s your responsibility to open them for others.”
Even in the face of challenges, her approach remains the same.
“You can give out, you can give in, but you should never give up,” Fox said. “At the end of the day, when you put your head on that pillow, ask yourself: Whom did I help? If I help one person, I am doing it right.”
Reflecting on the power of showing up
Across every story during the Chamber's March 26 event, a pattern emerged. No one had a perfect plan. No one followed a straight path. No one built success alone.
Instead, they showed up, again and again, figuring it out as they went, leaning on others when needed, and offering that same support in return. Through the event, the message wasn’t about perfecting strategy or waiting for the right moment. It was about starting anyway.
“If you have an idea, take the first step,” Ervin said. “You have no idea where that step could lead you.”
A decade ago, that step looked like a Ziploc bag full of business cards. Today, it looks like companies, communities and a room full of women showing up to Network+ Women ready to build their own business journeys in Nashville, together. VNC
• Rhea Patney is a senior at Vanderbilt University studying public health and science communication. She has spent eight years in student journalism, covering news, women’s sports and lifestyle beats in St. Louis and Nashville. Next, she is to attend Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, to pursue a master's in healthcare administration, while continuing to write freelance.
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.last edited 1618 28 March 2026
