When Kim Miller walked into William Chapman’s salon to get her hair done, little did she know that she would soon be helping him launch his company, beginning with cottage production of his hair care products.
“I made an appointment, but of course I never got my hair done – until after we got married,” she said.
William Chapman’s Grandma’s Secret potion for damaged or thinning hair launched Chapman Products in 1991, Kim Chapman said. The couple worked to mix ingredients and package the hair potion in an 800-square-foot building located near their Greenville home and salon, she said. “We would go in there and make the product, bottle it, cap it, box it and ship it out,” she said.
When the business started growing, shuttling between the work centers, raising a young family and communicating between them all was awkward, Chapman said, and soon the young company was ready to move.
The couple rented a space, later building a custom-designed production facility and corporate offices on Howard Creek Drive that opened in Fountain Inn in 2004. Along with adjoining land for expansion, the company purchased a neighboring structure that they use as an event space. The office building also includes a training space and area for photo shoots, Chapman said.
While William Chapman works in the lab developing and refining products, Kim Chapman oversees staff and training along with other front-of-house duties. She has also contributed to product development, including a cradle cap remedy and hair serum. Salons across the United States and in Europe and Africa, along with beauty supply stores, use Chapman products and sell them, she said.
“My husband is a stylist, barber and chemist and works with the chemical companies to ensure we have the best ingredients for our products,” she said. Since its launch, Chapman Products has expanded into a multi-million dollar company.
Growing within their means
The Chapmans have worked to remain debt free whenever they expanded their business along the way, Kim Chapman said.
“We don’t have loans,” she said. “We’ve always taken our time to pay for stuff because we feel like if you’re in debt, you’re not really doing business. We just go one day at a time.”
Watching the bottom line is one of the main reasons the company launched Sheen, a lifestyle magazine featuring hair, beauty and fashion in 2005, Chapman said. “I started Sheen because of the advertising rates in magazines,” she said. The magazine has evolved from a few pages, newsletter-style, to a glossy publication distributed nationally and internationally.
Relative contributions
As Kim Chapman gives a tour of the facility, she stops into the on-site salon to chat with her daughter, Antonia Chapman Merced, 22, and greet her first grandson, RafiDiyn. Kim and William’s children, Antonia and William III (Tre), 24, are also learning the family business with Antonia working as a stylist and Tre as a distributor.
Antonia’s husband, Rafi-Diyn Merced, also works as a stylist. Charles Miller, Kim’s father, has been a part of the business for years and is the company’s longest-employed staff member.
The team now includes approximately 20 staff who work in product production, administration, Sheen magazine production and operating the Chapman Foundation, which donates approximately $100,000 annually in scholarships.
“Our products are geared toward the stylist and the barber, and we wanted to give back to them. We give a lot of scholarships to stylists’ and barbers’ kids who are going to college,” she said.
The ‘pledge’
As Kim Chapman introduces each staff member, she shares her company culture philosophy: “Your whole journey here is about you… You are brought in because of your expertise, your knowledge and who you are. You have to more or less be ‘pledged.’”
She likens the company to a small town where everyone has to learn its norms and procedures before they can contribute. “I try to give all that information along with being profitable.”
In addition to the staff in Fountain Inn, Sheen has contributors in many locations, as well as some staff in Atlanta. Chapman Products has traveling stylist educators who work with salons, Chapman said. The stylist travel board lists destinations such as Greensboro, N.C.; Brooklyn, N.Y. and Slidell, La.
“Our networking is very large. We have a lot of people who know and love us,” she said.
While individual staffers may move on, Chapman said it is part of her mission to mentor the company’s employees. “In my world, I’m supposed to service people, do what I’m supposed to do. I think this world is about love and servicing one another.”
What’s up next
As for the next steps for the family business, Chapman said she wants “for our products to be No. 1 in the world.” The company is looking at expanding the manufacturing facility and Sheen magazine’s reach, she said.
Whatever comes, the company’s mission of service must remain central, Chapman said. “In business, people will try you to see if they can make you move, and we have stayed focused. We’ve stayed the way we are supposed to stay.”
Chapman Products will continue to reflect the Chapmans’ vision, she said. “In order for us to have longevity, we [must] continue to do what we are supposed to do – that we are always servicing people and not becoming a bigger conglomerate just to have money to show that I have money.”
