Growing up in the 1980s, my mom was a seamstress in Toronto’s thriving garment industry. She often brought her work home, cutting and sewing fabric as I did my homework or watched TV. I always appreciated my mother’s hard work and attention to detail, but I never imagined that one day, I would apply that same level of care and consideration to a manufacturing business of my own. 

In the 1990s, as companies moved to produce in countries with cheaper labour costs like China and Bangladesh, the garment industry in Canada went downhill. With my mother out of work, my family suffered. After seeing my parents struggle, I knew I wanted a stable career path. I decided to study computer engineering at Queen’s University. 

After graduating, I moved back to Toronto and started a career in management consulting. After a few years, I started my own consulting firm. I was more interested in how each business worked than the day-to-day technicalities of my job. I considered starting my own business, but I prioritized paying off my mortgage and supporting my family above pursuing my dreams. Over time, the entrepreneurial itch only got stronger.

At a dinner party in 2017, I bumped into my childhood friend Kenneth Mo. Kenneth was a pharmacist who felt the same way about his work as I did about mine. We bonded over a shared dream of starting our own company, and, as we reconnected, we realized how great Kenneth was at building and executing well-defined business practices, while I had the technology background to build an e-commerce platform. We decided to embark on a venture together.

Though the garment industry in Toronto had practically vanished by the early 2000s, the mattress industry had persevered: the rise of cheap labour costs overseas proved not enough to offset the high cost of shipping bulky mattresses to North America. The industry was now flourishing with “bed-in-a-box” businesses—mattresses that can be delivered and easily set up by customers themselves—and Kenneth and I were both interested in investing within the space. 

We saw a handful of other “bed-in-a-box” businesses that were excited by the novelty of the concept, but weren’t applying the attention to detail to their products that we thought Canadian consumers deserved. We started visiting mattress manufacturers throughout our hometown of Toronto—the first I’d seen since childhood—learning all we could about the cut-and-sew operations needed to make a mattress. We opened our bed-in-a-box business, Silk & Snow, later that year.

Mattresses are what we call a “grudge purchase”—customers need to buy them, but they aren’t excited to do so. We wanted to change that, but we needed to differentiate ourselves from the competition. Consumers were calling for more sustainability in consumer goods, so we strove to be as transparent as possible about how we crafted our product locally. I knew local manufacturers that could sew covers, and neighbouring companies that specialized in foam, coils and mattress assembly. In collaboration with local vendors, we began introducing bedding and bedroom furniture to our product line, hoping to grow the brand into a one-stop shop for all products sleep and home.

Our workflow was initially successful, but when COVID lockdowns began, we started facing major delays. Locked inside and forced to pay attention to their homes, people felt compelled to upgrade their living spaces, and we were flooded with thousands of orders. We quickly ran out of stock: still a small enterprise, we didn’t offer local manufacturers enough business to prioritize us. 

It became an all-hands-on-deck effort to bridge the gap. Kenneth and I stepped in on the ground level to speed the manufacturing process along, packaging items on the assembly line and driving delivery trucks to ensure customers received their orders on time. 

Though we were initially terrified at the start of the pandemic, these COVID years were imperative for our business. We optimised our SEO and search marketing such that when consumers searched for their next home purchase, our brand popped up. As we caught up with our orders, our company’s reputation grew, and our financial success was substantial enough for us to become a focus for our manufacturing partners.

Today, we make lots of our bedding and furniture in countries like Portugal, Vietnam, and Malaysia. Many businesses worry about tariffs today, but it’s not our first time encountering them. After the 2016 election, tariffs were temporarily applied in the mattress industry, and we were one of the few mattress retailers in Canada that had business both in Canada and the US. 

When we first heard the news, it felt like an existential threat to our business. However we focused our attention on developing quality products with some of the best manufacturers overseas in  countries with no tariffs. Having a diversified supply chain, rather than our business being entirely dependent on one country, has allowed us to feel fully prepared to face tariffs a second time.

For the first five years of business, our goal was to take business away from Sleep Country. So, when they expressed interest in acquiring our business in 2022, we felt torn. Ultimately, we realized that if we and Sleep Country could both succeed in such a competitive industry, there must be similarities in our values and operations. Our stance moved from one of competition to one of admiration as we started to understand how much more we could succeed with their help.

Related: How a Google Search Turned Into a $48-Million Blanket Empire

Sleep Country bought us the following year for $24 million, with an agreement to pay an additional $19 million in early 2026 if we met certain profitability thresholds. Since working with Sleep Country, we’ve opened our first four brick-and-mortar stores and plan to open at least four more later this year. As of this year, we are officially valued as a nine-figure business—something I only dreamed of in the early days with Kenneth.

When I started Silk & Snow, my mom would avoid asking me how the company was doing because she was nervous about me taking such a big financial risk. Now, the company is a source of pride for her. She sees all the work I’ve put into it, the great products we create, and the community I get to work with every day. To know all of it is inspired by her amazing work ethic is a truly special, full-circle moment for both of us. 

—As told to Samantha Fink