10 Years of Olive Ave: The Origin Story
Learn more about the origin story of Olive Ave Jewelry
2026 marks ten years of Olive Ave, and the anniversary has us doing what we do best, slowing down long enough to notice the details. In the middle of new launches, new milestones and a brand that has taken on a life of its own, we sat down with our founders to trace the thread back to the beginning. Not the polished version, but the real one with late nights, secondhand surfaces turned into photo sets and a street name that still feels like home.
Below, TJ and Kayla share the moments that built Olive, in their own words, along with a few pieces that carry that origin story forward.
The Family Roots Behind Olive Ave
TJ’s connection to jewelry started at home.
“I was introduced to the jewelry industry from a really young age. My parents had a store growing up and so I got exposed to it obviously through them owning that store and going in as a kid to help do even little things like passing out flyers or standing on the street, holding a sign, helping in any way I could with the rest of my siblings.”
Those early days became the foundation. His parents owned and operated The Diamond Consortium for nearly 30 years, and the work was hands on and communal. Cleaning showcases, helping wherever help was needed, learning what trust looks like in a business built on meaning.
“Olive Ave is rooted in a long history in the jewelry business. My parents owned and operated the Diamond Consortium for nearly 30 years until they closed their doors to pursue other passions. In 2016, we co-founded Olive Ave, taking the family history we had in the jewelry industry and launching into the online retail space.”
Even as Olive evolved into something new, that origin stayed close. The idea of being a trusted jeweler, the kind people return to when the moment matters, never left the blueprint.
The Diamond Consortium
Tj & Kayla Searle, Olive Ave Jewelry Founders
THE SPARK
Their first workspace was a small apartment in Gilbert.
Kayla balanced a camera over a marble coffee table she found secondhand. TJ worked from the couch with his laptop open, uploading listings late at night. They were newlyweds building something after work hours. It didn’t feel big yet. It just felt worth doing.
“The spark that really led to Olive Ave was when Kayla and I got married. I at the time had been selling jewelry just kind of on the side to people and she came in and said, ‘Let me do the photography. Let me do the branding. Let’s put a woman’s touch on this and I think we could really make it into something.’”
Kayla describes it as a natural lane split. She made it pretty. He made the business run. The partnership was equal and the learning curve was fast.
“Building Olive Ave together at such a young age was, I think, the ultimate education.”
The name came from something simple and that simplicity is part of why it stuck.
“Olive Ave was the street that we lived on when we first got married. Our first apartment was on Olive Ave in Gilbert and so we felt it was fitting to name it after that since that’s where we started our family, our marriage, right? And then starting this business together.”
Those early days are easy to picture.
“Those early days too, we worked out of our apartment. I was taking photos on this marble coffee table that I found secondhand and TJ had his laptop there on the couch building our website.”
And the first proof point wasn’t a viral moment or a big launch. It was a single order.
“I remember our first order. It was a pair of oval stud earrings and I remember us being there for that sale together and it felt cool. It felt real.”
“The name Olive Ave really does remind us that this business started in our first home, not in an office, not in a boardroom, not somewhere like that, but somewhere real.”
Original Olive Ave Logo
Throwback Photography - 2016
Our Founders at the Olive Ave Apartments
First Sale
MEANING IN THE DETAILS
For TJ, the goal has always been memory.
“One of our strategic objectives as a company is to produce jewelry that people can attach core memories to. We really hope that the jewelry can capture the memory of that moment and the feeling people felt in that moment and be a way for them to recall those times in life and those experiences and attach core memories to them.”
Kayla’s lens is more personal.
“Women wear a lot of hats throughout their lives and move through so many seasons. Jewelry is a way of honoring you, the parts of you that have always been you and will always be.”
For Kayla, that idea isn’t abstract. It’s literally on her hand.
“I have a ring now that I wear called Teddy after my daughter that is my ultimate heirloom piece.”
“The amount of rings I’ve named after loved ones, designs inspired by people I love or that have inspired me, has been so fun.”
Her personal history is threaded through our catalog.
“Frances named after my great-grandma, there’s Constance, there’s our Lynn band, my Denny band after my son.”
Some pieces feel like a timestamp for a creative era, the kind of design that becomes part of the brand’s DNA.
“There's been pieces that have come along over the years, June, for instance, that feel so uniquely Olive.”
It all circles back to one thing.
“We just want people to remember the feeling.”
Ten years in, TJ and Kayla are still building Olive the same way they built it in the beginning, together. The apartment has turned into a home filled with kids, dogs and the kind of chaos that comes with both.
What started on a marble coffee table now lives in showrooms, in homes across the country and on hands that carry their own stories. Olive has grown up alongside them, but the work remains the same. To create pieces that carry meaning, mark milestones and become part of someone’s story long after the moment has passed.
