Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
IKEA Hacks, Lift Safety, and the Hours We Forget to Bill | Banter with Annie & Lauren
Season 7 · Episode 11
Wednesday, October 28, 2026 • Duration 22:28
Two seasons of furniture-flipping guests have been whispering their magic in Annie Bolding's ear, and she's finally ready to take her brush off the wall and onto an IKEA shelf (under a strict no-husbands-allowed assembly policy). In this banter episode, she and Lauren Cooper dig into the dopamine decor takeover on their feeds and the one room Lauren says should never go colorless. Then they get real about the hidden costs that sneak into every project, including the design hours most artists never bill for and the one question that saved Lauren money on equipment. Plus, Lauren has a theory about what your job-site setup says about your personality, and Annie weighs whether to finally share the stripe-taping method everyone keeps DMing her about.
🖌️ Grab your brushes and creative tools at enjoyzibra.com and use code BANTER10 for 10% off.
In this episode, we discuss:
Why Annie thinks millennial gray has had its moment
How two seasons of guests got Annie ready to flip furniture
The shade hack Lauren is glad she skipped on the lift
Why tracking your design hours changes what you charge
What to do when a client moves the dates after signing
What your job-site setup says about your personality
Why you don't need to be an expert to start teaching
The 1" angled brush is finally here! Designed in collaboration with Marilena Madio of WallWear, this brush is the versatile tool artists have been waiting for. Grab yours today at https://www.enjoyzibra.com/products/set-of-3-1-angled-brushes.
Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
Why Mike Sherman Started Zibra Before He Had a Product | Behind the Brushes Part 2
Season 7 · Episode 10
Wednesday, October 14, 2026 • Duration 34:09
Zibra’s first breakout product was not a paintbrush. It was a universal package opener that sold 110,000 units in five weeks after Mike Sherman and a small group of former colleagues spent six months working nights and weekends on a company that still had no product. In Part 2 of Behind the Brushes, Mike and his daughter Brie trace Zibra from a virtual business model and an idea bank to television appearances, Home Depot shelves, and the Square, Round, and Triangle brushes that still anchor the collection today. Mike explains why he entered a paintbrush category his industry friends warned him to avoid, how Zibra proved its value to major retailers without relying on old relationships, and why creative painters became such an important part of the company’s growth. He also shares what it has taken to pass leadership to his daughters, survive the higher highs and lower lows of owning a business, and accept that an interview on Brush & Banter occasionally feels like an appointment with a shrink.
Mike Sherman founded Zibra in 2004 after selling a power-tool accessory business and deciding his next company needed to be faster, leaner, and more adaptable. His approach to product development, retail strategy, and paint application helped move Zibra from a universal package opener to an innovative paintbrush brand carried by major retailers.
How Zia Sherman Engineers Zibra Paintbrushes for Longer Runs | Behind the Brushes Part 1
Season 7 · Episode 9
Wednesday, October 7, 2026 • Duration 33:54
Before Zia Sherman engineered Zibra paintbrushes, she formulated lipstick and foundation at Estée Lauder. In the first installment of Behind the Brushes, Zia sits down with her sister, Brie, and their dad, Zibra founder Mike Sherman, to explain what actually makes a brush hold more paint, release it smoothly, and maintain a crisp line. They get specific about filament shape and diameter, why Zibra has used the same proprietary formula and manufacturing process since 2005, and how Zia tests paint pickup, release, run length, stiffness, and flexibility before a new brush makes it into an artist’s hand. Zia also shares the near-disaster of finding a factory capable of producing brushes smaller than one inch and the Cut-In Brush prototype she shaped on Brie’s front porch with her husband’s electric razor. Mike brings up his secret two-and-a-half-inch Palm Pro, everyone defends their favorite brush, and rapid fire confirms that ranking your daughters is considerably harder than designing a paintbrush.
Zia Sherman is the engineer and product designer behind Zibra’s paintbrushes. After developing cosmetics and managing manufacturing processes for Revlon and Estée Lauder, she joined the family business and introduced new testing standards, quality controls, and product-development processes.
Mike Sherman is the founder and CEO of Zibra. He started the company more than 20 years ago with a simple question: Why were painters being asked to choose between so many brushes that all claimed to do the same thing? That question led to Zibra’s proprietary filament, application-specific brush shapes, and a family business now run alongside his daughters, Brie and Zia.
Mural Minimums, Mom Guilt, and a Bob Mackie Tribute | Banter with Annie & Lauren
Season 7 · Episode 8
Wednesday, September 30, 2026 • Duration 35:04
Lauren Cooper has breaking news: after years of announcing that she hates painting, she likes it again. In the first banter episode of Brush & Banter, Annie Bolding and Lauren Cooper skip the guest and catch up like the mural besties they are. Annie, 28 weeks pregnant and about to leave a rental full of gray walls, talks about the artist version of nesting, the nursery mockups piling up on her iPad, and a Disco Day aesthetic that's growing up a little. Lauren shares baby news of her own, confesses that her toddler's room still has no mural, and makes a case for the hustle phase, including why she'll still go below her minimum five years in. They trade working-mom advice, get honest about comparison once your business hits a comfortable plateau, and rapid-fire their best studio habits before dreaming up tribute murals for Dolly Parton and Bob Mackie.
🖌️ Grab your brushes and creative tools at enjoyzibra.com and use code BANTER10 for 10% off.
In this episode, we discuss:
Why Lauren still goes below her minimum five years into her career
Why the hustle phase deserves more credit with new artists
How Annie is preparing her business for maternity leave
How to lean into each season as a working mom without the guilt
How comparison creeps in once your business feels comfortable
Why new muralists should track every paint color from day one
How Marilena Madio Built Her 20+ Year Mural Business to 300K Followers While Raising Three Kids
Season 7 · Episode 7
Wednesday, September 23, 2026 • Duration 42:28
Marilena Madio didn't start with a business plan. She didn't register her company name for years. She raised three kids while building WallWear into a 20+ year mural powerhouse, and she did it by simply saying yes to work and showing up consistently. In this episode, she walks through how she grew incrementally around her family, priced her work fairly from day one, built a thriving membership community for other muralists, and watched 22 years of daily social media posting finally explode into 75,000 new Facebook followers in a matter of months. She also reveals the unexpected 5-year journey with Zibra behind creating the 1-inch angled brush… the most requested product the brand has ever made.
Marilena Madio is a Toronto-based muralist and founder of WallWear Inc Murals, a 20+ year mural business spanning residential, commercial, and large-scale installations. She built the business while raising three children, grew it incrementally without formal business registration for years, and has since expanded into a membership community for muralists, live masterclasses, and one-on-one business consultations. Her collaboration with Zibra on the 1-inch angled brush has become one of the most requested products in the brand's history.
How Furniture Flipping Content Helped Abby Askew Buy Her First Home
Season 7 · Episode 6
Wednesday, September 16, 2026 • Duration 41:13
Abby Askew hit a massive milestone last year when she bought her first home as a direct result of building her furniture flipping business and content brand, @FlippedByAbby. Now she's been taking viewers along the renovation journey, filling it with vintage treasures and DIY projects. This is Abby's story of how she started with curb alerts and Facebook Marketplace flips as a side hustle, scaled it into millions of followers across platforms, and turned the transformation documentation into income. She believes in spilling the tea, sharing the actual numbers, the strategies, the profit margins, because transparency doesn't threaten your success; it builds community. In this conversation, she walks us through how she actually monetized it, what quality furniture really looks like (solid wood vs. the stuff that won't resell), the brutal reality of comments from strangers, and why she deleted social media off her personal phone to protect her peace.
Abby Askew is a social media influencer and content creator with a BFA in Furniture Design from Savannah College of Art and Design. Based in Orange Park, Florida, she built Flipped by Abby into a thriving content and business brand across Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and Facebook. She created online courses to help followers learn how to flip furniture for profit and maintains a blog with DIY project guidance.
How Seasonal Window Painting Became Predictable Revenue with Lindsey Mae Art
Season 7 · Episode 5
Wednesday, September 9, 2026 • Duration 51:24
Most artists treat seasonal work as a gamble - feast when demand peaks, hustle for leads when it doesn't. Lindsey Stimpson Lewis - owner of Lindsey Mae Art - flipped the script. By building a loyal roster of clients who lock her in a full year in advance, she's turned seasonal work into predictable, recurring revenue. In this episode, she walks through her "Christmas in July" booking strategy, how she manages capacity with a priority system, and why eliminating the constant churn of new client acquisition is the real business move.
Lindsey Stimpson Lewis is a Winston-Salem–based muralist and window painter who specializes in large-scale custom work for residential and commercial clients. After spending years painting sculptures at her husband's metal fabrication company, she went full-time with her own business and built it around predictable, recurring seasonal revenue by cultivating a roster of year-in-advance clients.
Why Lindsey Mae's "Christmas in July" booking strategy works and how to use it with your own client base
How a priority system for repeat customers eliminates constant new lead acquisition
Why capacity planning is actually the competitive advantage in seasonal creative work
What Lindsey Mae's business coach helped her figure out about strategy and scaling
How predictable seasonal revenue beats year-round client churn
Welcome to —the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
What Lacey Hennessy Does to Build a Flexible and Profitable Creative Business
Season 7 · Episode 4
Wednesday, August 26, 2026 • Duration 43:24
Lacey Hennessy’s art career started with painted fraternity coolers at Clemson and a Facebook business page she named during accounting class. Years later, one Instagram post about wanting to paint a mural led to a taco restaurant project that paid the equivalent of one month of her corporate salary in three days. In this episode, Lacey explains how she grew that experiment into Lacey Does, a commission-driven business with more than 300 murals and a client process built around clear expectations. She breaks down her “box method” for matching a mural’s scope to the client’s budget, why she collects 50% before beginning the design, and how detailed contracts helped other muralists take over her scheduled projects after a colorectal cancer diagnosis. Lacey also shares the hands-on Instagram strategy that grew her audience, her plans to build income beyond murals, and how she protects roughly 10 weeks each year for travel. Plus, why it would take a truly unreasonable amount of money to get her painting fraternity coolers again.
Lacey Hennessy is the Greenville, South Carolina-based artist, muralist, and entrepreneur behind Lacey Does. Her bold, playful work spans murals, custom commissions, originals, prints, textiles, licensing projects, and coaching for other artists.
How Snowboarding Led Hannah Eddy to Being Creative for Vans, Patagonia, and More
Season 7 · Episode 3
Wednesday, August 12, 2026 • Duration 44:53
Hannah Eddy has built a career across murals, snowboards, apparel, products, and gallery walls while keeping her bold colors and playful characters easy to spot. Her roots in skate and snowboard culture helped turn old camp connections into collaborations with Vans, Patagonia, Hydro Flask, and more. She opens up about the project choices, business boundaries, and lifestyle decisions that protect her creative energy. You’ll hear how she stays easy to hire while keeping the work unmistakably hers.
Hannah Eddy is a Reno-based artist and muralist known for bold color, crisp lines, playful landscapes, and recurring characters influenced by skateboarding, snowboarding, and the outdoors. Her work appears across murals, gallery walls, skateboards, apparel, products, and collaborations with brands including Vans, Patagonia, Santa Cruz Skateboards, and Hydro Flask.
Why a recognizable style can make the right brand projects easier to land – and the wrong ones easier to decline.
A look at how years inside the skate and snowboard community opened doors no cold pitch could force.
How Five Golden Brush Award Winners Turned Creative Risk Into Confidence
Season 7 · Episode 2
Wednesday, July 29, 2026 • Duration 40:51
One artist joined the voting push with 26 votes while another submission had more than 300. Another almost skipped the application altogether. In this Golden Brush Awards roundtable, Eugene O’Neill, Sophie Groenstein, Julia Kenyon, Sydney Rae, and Sabah Bardhan unpack the decisions behind five winning pieces: painting a monumental portrait of Buddhist nun Jun Son while working until 2 a.m., layering exterior house paint to create a saturated hometown portrait, earning a client’s trust for bright orange-and-blue peacocks, experimenting on the wall to recreate coffee-watercolor texture, and wrestling with a human figure and one particularly stubborn set of hands inside a Denver restaurant. The recognition gave each artist fresh evidence that the risky idea, unfamiliar technique, or last-minute submission was worth following through.
Eugene O’Neill, Sophie Groenstein, Julia Kenyon, Sydney Rae, and Sabah Bardhan are the artists behind five winning projects from Zibra’s 2025 Golden Brush Awards. Their work spans large-scale community murals, portraiture, restaurant interiors, coffee-inspired realism, and a peacock-covered anniversary chest.
How Mike assembled a team with complementary skills and spent six months testing ideas during nights and weekends before asking anyone to leave their job
Why an offhand complaint about impossible-to-open Christmas packaging became a product that sold 110,000 units in five weeks
How an idea bank helped the founding team filter scattered concepts into products that could support a standalone business
Why Mike pursued paint applicators after industry colleagues told him the category was too competitive to enter
How the Square, Round, and Triangle brushes helped Zibra earn its first Home Depot launch in 2007
Why Zibra has an “i” – and what Brie and Zia have to do with the company name
Why proving customer demand and better paint application mattered more than Mike’s previous retail relationships
How Mike is passing leadership to Brie and Zia while staying close enough to help when the proverbial crap hits the fan
The 1" angled brush is finally here! Designed in collaboration with Marilena Madio of WallWear, this brush is the versatile tool artists have been waiting for. Grab yours today at https://www.enjoyzibra.com/products/set-of-3-1-angled-brushes.
Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
🖌️ Grab your brushes and creative tools at enjoyzibra.com and use code BANTER10 for 10% off.
In this episode, we discuss:
How Zia turned her experience formulating cosmetics and managing manufacturing for Estée Lauder into better quality systems for Zibra
Why the Cut-In Brush began with an electric razor, a test wall, and Mike trying to turn the Chiseled Wedge into something else
What nearly went wrong when Zibra needed a new factory capable of producing artist brushes smaller than one inch
How filament shape, diameter, packing, and processing affect paint pickup, release, durability, and line control
Why Zibra has used one proprietary filament formula across its brushes since 2005 rather than asking painters to choose among confusing blends
How Zia weighs paint pickup and release, measures run length, and adjusts filament length to find the right balance of stiffness and flexibility
Why the Square and Chiseled Wedge brushes hold so much paint—and how factory partnerships have helped Zibra protect that performance without dramatically increasing prices
Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
What a Dolly Parton or Bob Mackie tribute mural could look like
The 1" angled brush is finally here! Designed in collaboration with Marilena Madio of WallWear, this brush is the versatile tool artists have been waiting for. Grab yours today at https://www.enjoyzibra.com/products/set-of-3-1-angled-brushes.
Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
🖌️ Grab your brushes and creative tools at enjoyzibra.com and use code BANTER10 for 10% off.
In this episode, we discuss:
You don't need a business plan to start, sometimes slow and steady actually wins
How raising three kids while building a business forced her to make smarter decisions
What happens when you post on social media for 22 years and then suddenly get 75,000 new followers
The day Property Brothers called and changed everything
Why one high-profile project can shift how an entire market perceives your work
Client communication skills matter just as much as your paintbrush
Building a membership community that generates recurring revenue and helps other muralists avoid costly mistakes
The 5-year story behind creating one of Zibra's most requested brushes
Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
How Abby turned furniture flipping from a side hustle into full-time income and eventually homeownership
The business side of things like sourcing, pricing, and selling, etc
How to spot quality furniture (solid wood, dovetail joints) vs. the stuff that won't move
Why her content shifted from "making money off flips" to "documenting the transformation itself"
Harsh internet comments, unsolicited ADHD diagnoses, and why she deleted social media off her personal phone
The truth about the 17 to 1 rule, from an actual psychologist
Filling her first home with intention, one small project at a time (and loving what you've made)
Why she "spills the tea" about money and numbers, and why transparency on income doesn't threaten her success
House hunting for the ultimate fixer-upper in Florida (Where the Crawdads Sing energy)
Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
How one Instagram goal led to Lacey’s first mural… and $6,500 in three days
Why she replaced Hennessy in the Home with a personal brand that leaves room for murals, textiles, licensing, and future partnerships
How the “box method” gives clients clear choices based on their wall, priorities, and budget
Why painting is step seven in Lacey’s 10-step mural process
How collecting 50% upfront protects the value of the concept and design work
Why detailed contracts and a trusted muralist network kept her projects moving during cancer treatment
How targeted engagement, batch content, and shameless self-promotion helped grow her audience without turning every post into a sales pitch
Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
What Hannah’s camper, six off-grid years, and low-overhead life taught her about protecting creative freedom.
Why a one-year licensing term can keep an artist’s characters from quietly slipping out of their control.
What artists often overlook when Instagram starts replacing gallery openings, local art nights, and actual conversations.
Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
🚨 Zibra’s most-requested brush size drops July 30… The NEW 1/8-inch Detail Brush will be available in square, triangle, and round. Use code BANTER10 for 10% off when you shop the launch at enjoyzibra.com!
In this episode, we discuss:
How Eugene rallied real-life community groups after seeing his 26 votes next to another entry’s 300-plus
Why full creative freedom became its own challenge when Eugene chose to paint Buddhist nun and peace activist Jun Son
How Sophie layered exterior house paint to give Tulsi its saturated color and velvety softness
How sample swatches helped Sabah earn a client’s trust for a bold orange-and-blue peacock design
Why Sydney spent extra time experimenting with coffee-inspired texture instead of falling back on her usual crisp lines
How Julia used a human figure, difficult hands, flowing smoke, and white space to create movement inside a Denver restaurant
How recognition helped Sophie advocate for bolder color, Julia pursue travel work, and Sydney seek more textured commercial murals
Welcome to Brush & Banter—the podcast where creativity meets real-life hustle. Brought to you by Zibra, we go beyond perfect brushstrokes to explore the messy, magical, and meaningful side of being an artist. We’re here to bring you conversations with working artists, practical tips to grow your creative business, and a built-in painting companion for your next project.
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