'Shark Tank' CEO's Meredith Jurica Homegrown Story: Building a Travel & Fashion Accessory with Over 10 Million in Sales

Founder/CEO Meredith Jurica (aka MJ) has a remarkable Texas homegrown success story. She started from nothing to being named by USA TODAY as “One of the Top 10 Travel Bags” with more than $10 million in sales and a breakout appearance on ABC’s “Shark Tank.” 

It all started after making several bags for herself, and when MJ’s friends loved them she began to make bags as gifts for her friends and family. It didn’t take long for the cosmetic bag to become the hottest thing on the block-on lots of blocks. With her Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in speech pathology, she didn’t feel qualified to start a business, not even a small one based in her home. But she loved her cosmetic bag and became Founder, Owner, and Lead Seamstress of Makeup Junkie Bags. She had a “baptism by fire” into the business world-swindled, robbed of her designs (even though patented), text on her website shamelessly pirated, and $100,000 of inventory lost to Hurricane Harvey. She persevered, and her bags brought in $1 million the first year.

The Makeup Junkie Bag’s magic that sets it apart from every other travel makeup bag is that is lays flat, which allows easy and full access to all materials while eliminating the chances that the bag will fall over sending products everywhere. Please look at the website and let us know what makeup bag you would like along with a shipping address.

Makeup Junkie Bags are handmade in Texas, sold in more than 2,000 stores nationwide, and come in more than 400 trendy styles and seven different sizes. Each of the bags are characterized by a signature brightly colored zipper, a suede tassel, and MJ hand-selects each designer fabric for each of the lines. From the trademark “Glam Stripe Bag” to the newer “Later Alligator,” Makeup Junkie Bags are on a constant quest to find the fabrics that reflect their customers’ lives. They are the company for the working woman, the loving (and often exhausted) mom, the grad student, and the social butterfly.