Sara Blakely built Spanx on $5,000 savings

Sara Blakely spent seven years selling fax machines door-to-door for Danka before launching Spanx in 2000 with $5,000 of her own savings. She wrote her own patent to save money and self-funded the company for 21 years. Blackstone bought a majority stake in 2021 at a $1.2 billion valuation.