Angie Cella’s path to becoming a millionaire toy inventor started with a prayer.
Cella shared the ups and downs of entrepreneurship with Rinker College of Business students, faculty and staff on Thursday, when she spoke about her recently-released book BLINGER: An Entrepreneur’s Faith-Based Journey.
Cella already had a successful career when she watched Soul Surfer, a movie about Christian surfer Bethany Hamilton, who lost her arm in a shark attack. At the end of the movie, Hamilton shared that two weeks before the life-changing attack, she asked God to use her to fulfill His purposes. Inspired, Cella prayed the same prayer.
Two weeks later, the idea for Blinger came to her in a dream. It took three more years, thousands of dollars and many risks and failures for Cella to bring the product to market and realize a profit.
“I never thought about quitting,†Cella said. “I was compelled. Nothing was going to stop me from finishing it.â€
Blinger is now carried by major retailers. It has sold more than $22 million wholesale and $50 million retail. In 2020, Cella received the Inventor of the Year Wonder Woman Award from .
Her success was anything but guaranteed. She hired four firms who failed to deliver a prototype for her product. A fifth mechanical engineer finished the job, but Cella didn’t have the cash in hand to pay him when she hired him for the job — and she was transparent with him. She urged students to always do what’s right, even if they pay a price.
“Your integrity is everything, and if someone won’t work with you because you’ve been honest, that’s OK,†Cella said.
At one point, Cella, a single mom to four children, sold her dream home and moved the family into a townhouse to finance Blinger. First, she called her kids together for a huddle in the kitchen. Her eldest piped up “You’ve got to do it, Mom.â€
Cella is passionate about sharing her faith and is navigating the tricky bounds of being a Christian business owner. She views Blinger and the book as a platform to share what God has done in her life. She is developing Bijou, a women’s version of Blinger, and looks forward to focusing on being a mom after that, she said.
She issued this encouragement to students as they find their way in the world: “Go out there and be your best. No one has authority over who you are or how successful you’re going to be except for God.â€
