Wild Bloom Home breathes new life into former Company C building

When Company C’s retail location in Concord shut down in August, Jody Johnson “didn’t really know” what she would do next.

After 19 years with the company, the former showroom manager found it difficult to move on.

“I had talked with a few other places, and working for somebody else and seeing their vision come to life,” Johnson said. “I wanted to do something on my own.”

Her husband gave her the push she needed with a simple question: “Why not?”

With that, she decided to found the company Wild Bloom Home. The name is a call for customers to “live life in full bloom.”

Johnson admits that it wasn’t the best time to start a furniture business. While she was getting everything in order, the government shut down. Tariffs have driven up costs. The supply chain is struggling. She knew it wouldn’t be easy but said she’s “had some mentors [say] if you could make it through the tough times, then you can thrive in the great times.”

Wild Bloom Home opened its doors on May 1, celebrating its first-ever First Friday with a flower bar hosted by the Soulful Flower Bar & Co., fitting the day’s “Petals & Pedals” theme.

Inside the simple gray building on Storrs Street, plush chairs and couches sit on colorful rugs around various coffee tables, accompanied by shelves with throw pillows and decor complementing each scene. Rugs act as paintings on the walls, showing how different options can go with the same furniture.

“The world went very gray during COVID, and now color is back,” Johnson said.

Kate Russo, a client who came to furnish her recently purchased Bow home, echoed that sentiment. When she first moved into the house, “everything was in black and white,” she said. Having worked with Johnson back in her Company C days, Russo knew just where she needed to go.

Cari Bos felt similarly. As Wild Bloom Home’s sales and design manager, she said that the area “just feels like home. So, it’s nice to be a part of it, really, in a bigger way.”

Bos, a lifelong Concord resident, first met Johnson while working at Company C, joining the team as the assistant sales manager on the showroom floor. After a break from the industry to stay home with her kids, she came back to help as Company C closed last summer, “and just loved being back in that kind of design world and working with customers.”

When Johnson asked Bos to join her at Wild Bloom Home, she was “more than excited” to work with her, especially in the community in which she grew up. “There are a lot of Main Streets and a lot of towns, and they don’t have what Concord has.”

For the pair, getting involved in downtown life is a major goal. They joined the Greater Concord Chamber of Commerce, and are excited to join as many events as they can.

“Concord does a great job with that anyway of having the community get together in ways that you wouldn’t naturally think of, which is really, really great,” she said. “So we want to try to be a part of that. Be part of the Concord community.”