It started simply enough: Alexandria artist Meg Biram was trying to come up with a fun and different gift idea for the 2020 holiday season. She had created ornaments in the past. But last year, she thought of something completely unique.
“I wanted to elevate the concept of a resin tray, but do it in an interesting, luxe way,” says Biram. “And no one else was really doing this at all.”
She tested the concept in August, a few months before she planned on selling the custom trays, and they immediately took off.
“I never had that much positive feedback on something I made,” says Biram. “People like something they can personalize that means something to them. When people make these trays, they pick out these vintage and luxe-looking items that remind them of the person they’re buying for, or that person’s favorite things. When people give someone a gift, they want to give a gift on another level. These custom trays are a great way to give a personalized gift that this person likely doesn’t have.”
Biram sold a vast amount of trays for the holiday season, and demand stayed high even after the new year. She raised the cost of the rather labor-intensive pieces (prices range from a six-inch tray for $275 to 15-inch trays for $1,200) to see if they’d still sell well for Valentine’s Day. They did. Biram figured she’d sell through the stock and then stop making the trays, but interest in creating them stayed high; after people got a glimpse of them on social media, she got surges of texts, DMs, and emails about the custom trays all the time, prompting her to keep selling them. Her seasonal gift idea had taken on a life of its own.
“I had zero plans of making these after the Christmas season,” she said. “And when demand stayed so high, it was then that I considered making this a separate company, separate from my artwork. A great studio space went on the market, so all of the pieces just fell into place.”
That’s how Mimi Ryan—Biram’s custom tray business, named after her mother—was born, complete with a tray bar she opened up in that new space (she still has her art studio in Del Ray). Customers can make an appointment to come in and look at the vast array of items to add to their tray, and then Biram or another consultant will help them choose pieces, a color scheme, and edit and create their own custom keepsake. Or you can pick out a tray online at mimiryan.co, where you fill out a form that asks for a plethora of details, including desired colors; shapes, like a unicorn, longhorn, skull, snake, anchor, wineglass, and much more; cities, states, and countries that have special meaning; animals; zodiac symbols; and sports teams. The tray is then packaged and shipped across the U.S., or, if you’re local, you can pick it up and deliver it to its recipient yourself.
“It’s amazing what people tell me, and it helps me make an amazing tray for them,” Biram says. “People like something that really means something to them, or something that tells a story, and I think that’s why these trays are still so popular.”
This story originally ran in our July issue. For more stories like this, subscribe to our monthly magazine.