Imagine turning your weekend DIY project into a multimillion dollar business that sells out every year with virtually no advertising.

It sounds like a dream, but it's actually a teal and blue dream come true for three North Carolina beach buddies.

"Carolina Impact's" Jeff Sonier and videographer Russ Hunsinger take us to the Carolina Coast for more on the friends and family company with an unusual name and its one of a kind product.

- Yeah, we're riding the ferry from Southport to Fort Fisher on our way to the beaches near Wilmington for a story about what might be the single most recognizable thing that vacationers bring for a week of fun in the sun.

Made here in North Carolina for shade here in North Carolina.

♪ V A C A T I O N ♪ In the summer sun Yeah, vacationers come to the sunny North Carolina coast for the surf, and the sand, and maybe a tan.

♪ We're on vacation ♪ We're gonna have a ball But when you're ready for a little cool-off time, shaded from all that vacation sunshine, well, put away the tents, gents, and forget the umbrellas, fellas, because here in the Carolinas it's this blue and teal wind sail that's got you covered.

♪ V A C A T I O N ♪ We're gonna have a ball They're called Shibumi shades, and most of them you see here were also made here by a company that was founded here, too.

You'll find a sea of Shibumis on nearly every beach and boardwalk this summer.

Easy to spot, but maybe not so easy to pronounce.

♪ Shaboom, Shaboom ♪ Ya-Da-Da-Da-Da - What did they call it, Kathy?

Sashimi?

(Jeff laughs) - [Jeff] We found our Shibumi here at Ocean Outfitters in Southport, where manager Lauren Broadwell says they started selling Shibumis after so many beach goers started asking for Shibumis by name.

Well, sort of.

♪ Shaboom - The majority of the people come in going, "It's that sh."

And you have to fill in the blank.

Yeah, it was every pronunciation you could probably think of.

Sashimi, sha sha, I mean, I can't even think of all of them.

It's got a really unique name and a really unique design, and that's one of the things I think that makes it stand out.

- Shibumi, where did you come up with the name?

- So I started Shibumi with my brother Scott and best friend Alex, and we all three went to UNC Chapel Hill.

We lived in a very small apartment complex called Shibumi.

So that was the first time that we had ever heard of the word.

- [Jeff] We're talking with Dane Barnes, Scott Barnes, and Alex Slater sitting on new Shibumi beach chairs at the Shibumi warehouse in Raleigh.

Now it's two hours from the ocean here, but this is where the Shibumi shades are labeled and shipped by the thousands to buyers and beach goers all over the Carolinas and beyond.

Over 300,000 Shibumis since 2016.

That's more than $75 million in sales.

And it all started with some PVC tubing from the hardware store and a sewing machine in Alex's spare bedroom.

- We wanted to make a product that we would enjoy using on the beach, and pretty soon other folks on the beach would come up and ask us all about it.

What is this thing?

Where did you get it?

And then ultimately, can you make me one?

- For the first several years of Shibumi, the only employees were these three, and it really wasn't even our day job.

We had day jobs.

This was just a nights and weekends sort of project for us.

- And we just had no idea that so many people would want a Shibumi shade.

And it just took us by surprise.

When we would walk out to the beach and we'd get out to the dunes, and we'd look right and look left, and all you could see, for miles it seemed like, were the blue and teal Shibumi shades.

- [Jeff] Shibumi's founders say that one key to their success (wind whooshes) (upbeat music continues) is the simple color scheme, which made the shades easier to produce at first, but now gives every Shibumi on every beach that blue and teal ocean feel.

- I think when folks see it on the beach for the first time, something clicks and most people really get it.

- It also came to be a sort of a trademark for the brand that when you went out, it was hard to miss that every shade that you saw was just the same blue and teal, and it became kind of iconic for us.

(upbeat music continues) - [Jeff] And now as the company comes up with new products, including new colors for new customers, the founders are using drones to help measure their success from above.

And they're giving us a sneak peek at this first ever Shibumi commercial.

- Ma'am, did you just say shampoo me?

- That's right, the first many years of Shibumi, we didn't advertise at all, and it was a hundred percent word of mouth.

- I do think the first time seeing drone footage, that was one of those just like, I cannot believe that this is happening.

Like, I mean, and I'd been on the beach, I'd seen it in person, but it just still felt just so unbelievable.

- [Jeff] Shibumi also rented a NASCAR wind tunnel to test new fabrics and stitches for its shades before building its own mini wind tunnel, here in the Shibumi warehouse.

- [Scott] And for example, these shades might run in the wind tunnel for 100 hours, 200 hours total.

- And then learn from that experience.

- [Jeff] But the founders say, no amount of new technology at this family and friends company will ever replace the feedback they get from actual Shibumi users here on Carolina Beaches.

Why'd you get one?

- Probably the same reason most people did.

- We've done a lot of the pop-up tents and broke our backs with the carrying, and we were excited to have a lightweight option.

- Almost every day I'll get a text or a photo from someone being proud setting up their Shibumi shade on the beach.

People taking photos of their children's artwork at school, and they're drawing the beach, and they draw an arch and it's, I mean, just such a gift that we have become part of the fabric of going to the beach.

- [Jeff] Yet, for a whole new generation of family vacations, Shibumis are billowing in the breeze of those summer memories.

(upbeat music continues) So what's next for the homegrown company that's covering these Carolina beaches in blue and teal?

Well, how about more beaches?

East Coast, Gulf Coast, West Coast, they're all on Shibumi's to-do list, along with maybe more colors, too, because it turns out that Shibumi lovers apparently aren't just partial to blue and teal.

In fact, last year's limited launch of orange and pink, well, it sold out in two days.