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Entertainment
Erin McDowell
2023-05-17T17:14:49Z
- Martha Stewart began her career as a model and later became a stockbroker on Wall Street.
- The first issue of Martha Stewart Living magazine was published in 1990.
- Stewart has since built a media empire, despite a short stint in federal prison in 2005.
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From building a media empire to going to prison and learning what a "thirst trap" is, Martha Stewart has had quite the career journey.
Stewart began her career as a model and later became a stockbroker on Wall Street.
She went on to become one of the most famous celebrity chefs in the business, with thriving home-decor and furniture lines, cookbooks, and a media empire with shows like "Martha & Snoop's Potluck Dinner Party."
Most recently, the 81-year-old returned to her modeling roots as a Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue cover star — the oldest in the magazine's history.
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Here's a complete timeline of Martha Stewart's expansive career.
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Martha Stewart started working as a model while a teenager.
Stewart grew up in the working-class neighborhood of Nutley, New Jersey. She started working as a model when she was 13, and she continued throughout college to help pay for her tuition at Barnard College in New York City.
She worked with clients from Unilever to Chanel, telling the 2013 PBS documentary "Makers: Women Who Make America" that she could sometimes make up to $50 an hour through modeling, HuffPost reported.
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Before she started a media empire, Stewart worked as a stockbroker in New York City in the 1970s.
After she graduated with a degree in history and architectural history, she worked on Wall Street as an institutional stockbroker.
"The job taught me so much about what it takes to build a real business, a real company—a meaningful and useful enterprise," Stewart wrote in a 2022 post on her website.
"Yet it was not until I left Wall Street that I discovered my true entrepreneurial bent. I loved ideas. I loved building. I loved creating. I loved making things that would enhance everyday living. And I loved making money as a result."
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In 1973, Stewart left her career as a stockbroker to start her own catering company from her kitchen.
Stewart launched the business from her historic Westport, Connecticut, farmhouse, and all of the food she prepared was made from scratch, according to MarthaStewart.com.
The recipes she used in her catering business would go on to inspire Stewart to write her first cookbook.
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Stewart published her first book, "Entertaining," in 1982. It quickly became a smashing success.
In 1977, Stewart and her catering business were hired to make the food for a book-release event.
At the event, Stewart was introduced to Alan Mirken, the head of Crown Publishing Group, a subsidiary of Random House, at the time. The two got talking, and Mirken encouraged Stewart to write a cookbook that included the recipes she used for her catering events.
After "Entertaining" was published in 1982, it sold more than 625,000 copies, according to Entrepreneur. The book "was considered unusual at the time for having all color photographs," according to MarthaStewart.com.
She has since published almost 100 cookbooks.
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The first issue of Martha Stewart Living magazine was published in 1990.
Due to the continued popularity of her cookbooks — she'd released "Martha Stewart's Hors d'Oeuvres" in 1984 and "Weddings" in 1987 — she signed a deal in 1990 with Time Publishing Ventures, Inc., to publish a magazine,Martha Stewart Living.
Subscriptions to the magazine soon grew to over 2 million and, in 1991, Martha Stewart and Time launched Martha Stewart Living as a quarterly magazine.
Soon, Time was publishing an issue of Martha Stewart Living every month.
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In 1996, Stewart founded the media conglomerate Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, and the following year, she reportedly borrowed $85 million to finance the acquisition of her magazine.
In 1996, Time magazine listed Martha Stewart as one of "America's Top 25 Most Influential People, and People magazine listed her as one of the "50 Most Beautiful People in the World."
Stewart saw the value in owning all of her brands outright as part of the media conglomerate Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, so reportedly borrowed $85 million to buy her magazine. The magazine, along with her other products, were overseen by Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia.
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When Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia went public in 1999, she became the first self-made female billionaire in the United States.
On the day Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia launched its initial public offering, stocks were priced at $18, according to CNN Money, but the stock tripled in value before closing. Stewart's 70% stake in the company was now worth more than a billion dollars.
"That was a great day," she told Insider in 2016. "I drove up Madison Avenue after the offering. I was an instant $1.6 billionaire. It was a fabulous day and I thought, huh ... I can buy anything on this street!"
Stewart not only became an instant billionaire but America's first self-made female billionaire.
"I had opposition, and that kind of opposition to a woman-built business was really outrageous," she told People in 2020. "Even my own lawyers were negative about the possibility of success. I remember one lawyer sending me an orchid, saying, 'Oh, you did it. Wow. What a surprise.' What a piece of garbage that guy is."
Oprah Winfrey, another lifestyle icon,became a billionairejust a few years after Stewart, in 2003.
According to Forbes, Stewart lost her billionaire status in 2001, and in 2002, the value of Stewart's stock in her company had "plummeted" from $591 million to $162 million, according to ABC News.
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In 2004, Stewart's reputation suffered a hit when she was convicted on multiple felony charges. She spent five months in a minimum-security prison,followed by five months of home confinement.
In July 2004, Stewart was found guilty of one count of conspiracy, two counts of making false statements, and one count of obstruction of agency proceedings, and she spent five months in a minimum-security prison, followed by five months of home confinement. She was also fined $30,000.
The charges stemmed from an incident in December 2001: After receiving information that was not publicly available, she sold off her ImClone Systems shares a day before their value plunged, avoiding a loss ofmore than $45,000, according to the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Prosecutors said she later lied about receiving the tip-off,according to an Associated Press report.
In 2017, she called the experience of prison a "very, very awful thing."
"It's not a good experience and it doesn't make you stronger. I was a strong person to start with and thank heavens I was. And I can still hold my head up high and know that I'm fine," she told Katie Couric on the host's podcast in 2017.
Stewart was the butt of jokes on late-night shows like "Saturday Night Live."
However, her sentence had a surprising financial effect while she was serving her time — she even became a billionaire again, according to Forbes. However, the company's stock fell by 40% shortly after she was released and she lost the title again.
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In 2015, Stewart sold Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, which includes her branded products and magazine, to Sequential Brands Group for $353 million.
After the sale, Stewart continued to receive a salary reported to be upwards of $6 million in 2017, according to theNew York Post. Her salary included $406,941 for "non-business" travel, $114,620 for "utilities and telecommunication services," and $146,880 tied to "personal fitness, wellness, beauty, and wardrobe."
In 2019, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia was sold for $215 million to Marquee Brands, according toForbes.
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In 2021, Stewart's brands were pulling in roughly $900 million in combined annual retail sales.
Stewart has her hand in a variety of industries, from a CBD-gummy brand to a wine partnership with 19 Crimes and various home accessory, improvement, and furniture lines with department stores like Sears, Kmart, Home Depot, and more.
In 2021, Forbes reported that Stewart's brands pull in roughly $900 million in combined retail sales annually and her branded products can already be found inmore than 70 million households.
Forbes also estimated that Stewart's kitchen-goods brand, Martha Stewart Kitchen, would bring in as much as $1 billion by 2025.
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In 2016, the first season of "Martha & Snoop's Potluck Dinner Party" aired. It was a major success for the media empress, who was now recognized by a whole new generation.
"Martha & Snoop's Potluck Dinner Party," which features recipes tested by Stewart's and Snoop Dogg's celebrity friends, debuted to 3 million viewers. According to the New York Post, Stewart was paid $1 million for the first season of "Martha & Snoop's Potluck Dinner Party."
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In 2022, Stewart opened her own restaurant, The Bedford, at the Paris Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.
The restaurant has been criticized for its high price tags — the roast chicken entrée costs a whopping $90.
Reviews have also been mixed, with one New York Times reporter writing, "The Bedford is decent enough that it will probably make money for the Paris and Marquee Brands, but it's ho-hum enough that it just might dim Ms. Stewart's reputation for dazzling competence in everything she touches."
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In 2020, Stewart caused an online frenzy when she posted a poolside "thirst trap" on Instagram.
Stewart went viral over the summer for a selfie taken at her home in the Hamptons. The photo showed Stewart in her pool looking at the camera with a sultry expression, while the caption went into detail about construction work on her pool.
"I didn't know what a 'thirst trap' was, but now I do," Stewart told People magazine after the photo went viral. "Now I'm looking for the next thirst trap. I love doing those promiscuous, provocative things, because it's just fun."
Since then, Stewart has posted multiple selfies on her social media to much fanfare from her 1.8 million followers.
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Stewart is now a millennial darling, winning over younger fans than her brands previously attracted.
In 2022, Stewart proved her cultural relevancy by appearing with Kris Jenner and Khloe Kardashian on an episode of "The Kardashians" on Hulu.
In the episode, Stewart met with Jenner and Kardashian, who were both visibly excited to be meeting her. The group shared lunch and snapped a few selfies before Stewart left.
"I love Martha Stewart," Kardashian said in a confessional interview, according to Entertainment Tonight. "I love entertaining. I love organization. I love animals. I love flowers. I love all those things. I also love that Martha's not a snitch and it's like my kinda gal."
Other famous millennials are also trying to emulate Stewart's seemingly effortless homemaking.
"It's less people, more trees. I want to live this bucolic life," influencer and dubbed "New York It Girl" Cory Kennedy recently told New York Magazine. "I want to garden, like a freaking hipster Martha Stewart."
"The myth of the millennial trapped in an endless cycle of trashy dive bars, avocado toast, and dead-end jobs has given way to a prosperous batch of new homeowners and parents slowly but steadily building wealth," Insider reporter Bartie Scott wrote of the trend.
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Most recently, Martha Stewart graced the cover of the 2023 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.
At 81 years old, Stewart is the oldest person to appear on the cover of the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.
The magazine described Stewart as "the very definition of "influencer" due to the fact that Stewart reaches more than 100 million fans each month through her magazines, television shows, books, and products.
"I hope this cover inspires you to challenge yourself to try new things, no matter what stage of life you are in. Changing, evolving, and being fearless — those are all very good things, indeed," Stewart wrote alongside the cover on her Instagram.
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