Contestant's Case to Win
This is based on the number of votes received and does not reflect the quality of the business or chances of winning.From head to toe, Lydia Carson is more than a force of nature. As the Founder, President and CEO of Balm Innovations LLC of Little Rock, Arkansas, Lydia also works with nature. Along the way, she runs the gamut of amazement when it comes to being an entrepreneur, business extraordinaire, wife, and mom to two, young, very active children.
As the majority owner of Balm Innovations, Lydia’s company markets two, natural, “Made in the USA” personal care products under the brand name of Omnibalm. Omnibalm (http://www.omnibalm.com) is a multipurpose, “miraculous” skin cream that was developed by a pharmacist at University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences. Made with 13% of the highest quality Tea Tree Oil available, Omnibalm works on everything that ails skin from head to toe; sunburn, bug bites, dry and cracked skin, minor burns, cold sores, poison ivy, even tired and sore feet. Essentially, it combines numerous medicine cabinet remedies into one tube.
If it weren’t for Lydia, this miracle cream may have gone unnoticed. For nearly 15 years, Omnibalm sat quietly in a lab while its inventor gave it away to friends and family to use.
Six years ago – with less than six weeks to prepare – Lydia approached the pharmacist and asked if she and her MBA team could enter Omnibalm in a competition. The goal was to create a business plan for the 2004 Governor’s Award for Entrepreneurial Development competition. The team made the finals in the competition.
A short time later, Balm Innovations was born and the company moved quickly to shout the word about this secret skin therapy’s success. Today, Omnibalm Skin Relief Cream and Omnibalm Daily Foot Therapy are sold in hundreds of drug stores throughout Arkansas, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Mississippi, Missouri, Florida, Ohio, New Jersey and New York.
“I am very proud of Omnibalm’s success,” Lydia said. “It’s challenging to be the owner and sole employee of a growing business while also managing a household and taking time to attend baseball games and other family activities.”
Lydia is a prime candidate for the Leading Moms in Business Competition because she shows others how business success and motherhood can be amazingly accomplished together.
In her “spare time,” Lydia serves on several boards: Central Arkansas’ National Association of Women Business Owners, the Arkansas State Chamber of Commerce, and the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) Innovation Committee. Lydia has also received two federal appointments through the U.S. Department of Commerce. She serves on the Arkansas District Export Council and is Vice Chair of the Manufacturing Extension Partnership (MEP) National Advisory Board.
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