Stephanie Odegard started her home furnishings company in 1987 with a dual mission: to sell finely crafted rugs and other products from around the world while also helping dev-eloping communities preserve their artisan traditions. Her business, Odegard, Inc., is based in New York City, and has been a leader in socially responsible enterprise as well as a pioneer in the creation of high-end, handcrafted rugs with modern designs.
Odegard, a native of Minneapolis, started her career as a buyer for Dayton-Hudson, but soon found herself working as a Peace Corps volunteer working with artists in Fiji to create high-quality indigenous crafts for export—a new model for building economically sustainable communities. Odegard spent 12 years overseas leading similar projects with the United Nations, the World Bank, and the governments of Nepal and Jamaica.
She cultivated relationships with Tibetan rug makers
in Nepal, and then launched her New York company to import their work. As a result of her efforts during the past 20 years, now more than 10,000 people are employed in yarn spinning and weaving in Nepal.
“We’ve been a socially responsible company since the beginning,” Odegard says. “That was my major goal, and I’m quite pleased this is becoming something important to everyone.”
A vocal advocate for preventing child labor in rug making, Odegard was a founding member and largest U.S. contributor to RugMark, a carpet industry foundation that certifies rugs made without child labor. RugMark offers education and training to youths affected by child labor, and works to create financially independent communities with its health clinics, adult literacy programs, and training.
Odegard has achieved her childhood dream of interacting with and helping people from around the world. Along the way, she created a business that helps indigenous communities preserve their craftmaking traditions and build sustainable industries. “It was a calling for me,” she says. “I knew I could do it, and I needed to do it and I wanted to show it could be done.”
