Martha Stewart1

Martha Stewart

American IconIn

Home Decorating

Early Years Born into a working class

Polish-American family, Marthagrew up with a strong workethic.

Performed many householdchores, helped her mother cookand entertained guests.

Learned business skills with hersiblings. They would trapmuskrats and sell their skins forprofit.

As she was fascinated withbusiness and money-making,Martha baby-sat as a youngteenager.

Getting Her Start Martha modeled during high school making about 35,000 dollars a

year which enabled her to pay for college.

She attended Barnard College where she studied art history.

Upon graduation, Martha married law student Andy Stewart andmoved with him into a rundown farmhouse dubbed, “Turkey Hill.”

Restoring the farmhouse was a great way for Martha to practice herhome decorating skills.

Dinner Parties thrown at Turkey Hill often caught the attention of themedia, and Martha's name became known.

Inspiration The 1980's was a decade of

conservationism andmaterialism.

It was the prime time for ahome decorator of Martha'smagnitude to emerge onto thescene.

A great deal of emphasis wasplaced on the presentation ofmeals and the interior design ofhomes.

The dinner parties thrown atTurkey Hill inspired Martha tocreate a catering company.

Business Ventures At age 32, Martha opened

her first catering businesswith a partner. It wascalled, Uncatered Affair.

After the success of herfirst company, she decidedto open a catering companyon her own called, MarthaStewart Incorporated.

Became the head of anupscale food court at theWest Common Market.Martha made the companya lot of money and was thecenter of much mediaattention.

Given the position offreelance food editor forthe magazine “HouseBeautiful.”

Signed a deal with Kmartand created a line of“Everyday” products forthe retail chain raking inmillions of dollars.

Signed on with TimeWarner Cable to produceher own magazine,“Martha Stewart Living.”Circulation reached about1.2 million.

Omnimedia After severing ties with Time

Warner Cable, Martha createdher own media company,“Martha Stewart LivingOmnimedia.

She was the CEO and thechairman of the company.

Omnimedia incorporated herTelevision and radio shows,along with the management ofher magazines.

Scandal Martha received classified information about her shares of Imclone

stock. When she heard from her stock broker that the stock was aboutto drop, she sold 4,00o shares.

When accused of insider trading, Martha lied about having known thestocks would depreciate in value.

However, the money Martha made on the transaction was a smallamount so she was not incarcerated for insider trading.

She did lie in front of a jury about having been informed of the stocks'decrease, so she was charged with perjury.

Martha was sentenced to 5 months in prison 2 years of probation, anda 30,000 dollar fine.

Work CitedGimbel, Barney and Keith Naughton with Peg Tyro. “Martha's

Makeover.” Newsweek. 19 Jan 2004.Mooney, Louise. “Martha Stewart.” Newsmakers. 1992.“Stewart, Martha.” Discovering Biography. Online ed. Detroit:

Gale, 2003.Toobin, Jeffrey. “A Bad Thing- Why Did Martha Lose?” New

Yorker. 22 March 2003