Kenzie Heim opens online boutique, Freckles and Linens

During a season of postpartum depression, Kenzie Heim was stuck in the same loop – taking care of her two children and supporting her husband, Jonah, catcher for the Texas Rangers – day after day.

She was giving everything to others and took no time for herself.

“When you’re a baseball wife, you get so caught up in being behind your husband,” Heim said. “My dreams were on hold, so I can support husband and raise my family. I needed something for myself.” Heim had always dreamed of opening a boutique. From a young age, she’s had a love for fashion and styling people’s outfits. In high school, she was paid to purchase outfits for special occasions like prom and for someone’s day-to-day outfits. She also had experience modeling.

“I love that it’s (fashion) so different for everyone,” Heim said. “(Now) I can curate my own love for fashion and make lines that I love.”

After deciding to open a boutique, Heim didn’t know what the next step was. “A lot of it was the big push from her (childhood best friend Ashley Bleak) and Jonah too,” Heim said. “Jonah was like ‘just do it,’ but I didn’t know how to just do it. It’s easy to say, but like I didn’t know how.”

Bleak, who also serves as her marketing and communications director, set up the boutique’s LLC and told Heim all she had to do was go to market and buy their products. So, Heim spent several days in Nashville at a boutique market and bought items for her new online boutique, Freckles and Linens.

Attending market was an intimidating but great experience, Heim said, describing how the market is lined with booths full of clothes. At each booth, she said she would pull out clothes she wanted to purchase and place them on her rack. She said it was difficult to pick out items because she had to find high-quality pieces that were still at the price-point she wanted to sell.

“I don’t want to sell something, and then it fall apart when somebody gets it,” Heim said.

Since she was a brand-new boutique, she couldn’t buy from certain brands that only sold to established boutiques. There was a time she wanted to purchase jeans, and the company told her no. Heim stood there and convinced them to sell to her.

“You have to sell yourself to them – your business, your brand,” she said.

While at the market, Heim took a marketing class and a wholesale class. She met owners of bigger boutiques and still reaches out to them for advice. With her inventory purchased, she was ready to launch and, on May 19, the Freckles and Linens online boutique went live.

Her boutique sells dresses, shirts, shorts, pants, skirts, boots, sandals, hats and more. Heim said the style is “very girly.”

Heim’s goals for the boutique are to give back to the community, to open a storefront and to eventually design her own pieces. She said she’s looking for the “perfect location” for Freckles and Linens.

“I want to be able to give back,” Heim said. “I would love to, next year when we’re more established, do free prom dresses or free homecoming dresses. When it’s cold out, we can give coats out for free, no questions asked. I want to be able to give back and help the community. That’s my biggest goal.”

Heim and her husband, Jonah, are working on creating their own nonprofit for either ALS or postpartum depression awareness – both of which are important to the Heims.

“My mom has ALS, and I struggled hard with postpartum depression,” Heim said. “So, Jonah and I, with his platform and my platform, are trying to decide which one we want to do.”

Because she does not have a storefront, the Heims’ home in Waxahachie is boutique central for the online operation. Heim and her two assistants work at the house, so she can still take care of her two children, three dogs and a kitten.

“It’s chaos all the time, but we thrive in it,” Heim said. “When the kids are down for a nap, we just work, work, work.”

Heim said her days are spent working on the boutique and then going to baseball games to support her husband, Jonah.

“Something that was huge for me and helped my postpartum depression was to put time into myself, and my husband fully supported that and has been with us the entire step of the way … even while he’s playing baseball,” she said. “He’s been a huge help to me.” They’re currently designing a shirt that says “Heim Time” in Rangers colors for Jonah’s All-Star ballot.

“That will bring baseball to our site,” Heim said. “The ballot is still open, and we need votes. It would be amazing to let Waxahachie know. It’s really cool like all the people in our neighborhood that know him voted for him, so the community has rallied around him.”

For more information, visit https://frecklesandlinens.com/ or follow @frecklesandlinens on Instagram and Facebook. To vote for Jonah Heim in the All-Star Game, visit rangers.com/vote. Originally published June 19, 2023 - https://www.waxahachiesun.com/business/kenzie-heim-opens-online-boutique-freckles-and-linens/article_63aecdac-0ebb-11ee-8dcf-0b6a372e987b.html