Chip and Joanna Gaines' business wasn't always successful. In a video interview for Salesforce's "Stories of Resilience" series, the longtime couples discuss what got them and their Magnolia empire through the toughest times.
"When I think back to those days, I remember moments when Chip and I would look at each other and just think, 'Are we going to make it?' And not seeing the end. Not understanding you could actually get through it," Joanna says. "We would look at each other and say, 'Do we just bail and get out of dodge?' That seems so much easier than actually having to figure out how do we make it through this?"
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Nevertheless, the couple kept going, in large part due to Chip's long standing optimism.
"Chip and his family have always had this thing that 'Gaines never quit.' And so he'd say, 'Jo, we're not going to quit. We're going to make it through this,'" Joanna shares. "...I did the books, I saw the numbers and I could not see a way out and I just remember thinking, 'OK.' We would look at each other every night and say, 'We're not quitting. We're gonna do this.' Something about that level of commitment even when it felt hard, I think, helped me just know [that] quitting isn't an option."
"... I think we leaned on each other's strengths in those moments of weakness where I typically would only see the glass half [empty] and Chip would see the glass half full," she adds. "That kind of thinking really helped me go, 'OK. I can do this.'"
Though the couple, who are now parents of five -- Drake, 15, Ella, 13, Duke, 12, Emmie, 10, and Crew, 2 -- decided to persevere, nothing was immediately fixed.
"That mentality shift... it changes the momentum of things, it doesn't change it overnight. For us, it was four or five more years of hard," Joanna explains. "Even though we were like, 'We're in it,' it didn't mean all the sudden everything was going to be easy and now we're gonna make it... It could be a decade before you actually see the other side of this."
Despite their challenges in the past, Joanna says that she is grateful they didn't quit.
"When I look back I'm so thankful [we kept going]," she admits. "We would've missed this moment! We would've have missed a lot if we had pivoted and gone another direction 'cause it was easier."
Watch the video below for more on the couple.
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