Back to My Southern Roots

Julie Pollitt, Founder

Clearwater, Florida

2022

Julie Pollit is teaching her readers how to re-make their favorite childhood meals.

Back to my Southern Roots is a food blog started by Julie Pollit with inspiration from her Grandma's cooking.

Bringing back memories through food

Migrating from Colorado to Tennessee each summer as a child, Julie Pollitt always looked forward to her Grandma’s cooking. “We’d arrive and the first thing we’d do was pick out a favorite jelly that she canned and that’d be ours for the summer. She’d always have two pies ready from scratch and got to work immediately making biscuits and hearty breakfasts for us. It was a real way for us to bond and I always loved it looking back.”

Decades later, now with two kids of her own, Julie would explore new recipes on Pinterest and decided to start a blog of her own. “I started Back to My Southern Roots in 2016, the title being an homage to my summers in Tennessee. And around that time I discovered Mediavine through my blogger network.” Julie started dedicating her time to writing new posts and increasing her traffic – “every time I set a new goal I get a little obsessed and try to see how much more I can do now.” That effort has paid off - Julie has increased her site’s monthly sessions from 25,000 per month to nearly 600,000 and turned the site into her full time job. “I never expected to be an entrepreneur but I love it, there’s always something new to learn,” she says.

Julie pictured with her Grandma and some of her delicious cooking.

“We’re in an age now where Google has given people an opportunity to become entrepreneurs and be able to live the kind of life they want to live by working online. I’m constantly telling my dad about the blog and he’s in shock - because it’s such a different and unique business that didn’t really exist before.”

Growing from her roots

To earn money from the site, Julie has continued investing in her partnership with Mediavine, a Google Certified Publishing Partner who helps her manage her ad revenue. “Ad revenue has given me the opportunity to continue sharing budget-friendly and easy recipes with people all over the globe,” Julie highlights. “And I’m able to expand and invest - I recently hired my sister to help me work on the site. So it’s not only a full time job for me, but a job where I can hire other people to help.”

Transporting her readers to their favorite childhood meals

Though it takes a lot of work to manage the website - “I’ll spend tens of hours testing recipes, writing, filming, editing, and publishing” - Julie has built a career that works for her schedule. “We’re in an age now where Google has given people an opportunity to become entrepreneurs and be able to live the kind of life they want to live by working online,” she says. “I’m constantly telling my dad about the blog and he’s in shock and happy for me - because it’s such a different and unique business that didn’t really exist before.”

All the hard work is worth it when Julie hears from her readers who are missing their grandparents cooking as well. “I get a lot of emails from people saying ‘I love this my grandma made it this way’ or ‘this is what my mom used to make for Christmas’ – being able to bring back memories for people is so important to me.”

About the Publisher

Julie Pollitt was born in Houston, moved to Denver at six, and spent summers on her grandparent’s farm in Tennessee. She loves to write and has written several Christian fiction books. She was the editor of a small newspaper in Colorado and ended up doing payroll for a pipeline construction company out in the field before starting her blog. She now lives on the west coast of Florida with her husband and two teenage sons. She loves to cook and share easy recipes with her readers.