This was a successful endeavor as the company utilized the vast skill set the elder Blenko had for making numerous colors of glass.

[3] Blenko's first attempt to start a glass factory in the United States was in Kokomo, Indiana, during January 1893.

[1] The reasons for the failure are: (1) an economic depression (the Panic of 1893) and additional recessions throughout the decade; (2) increased foreign competition because of the Wilson–Gorman Tariff Act of 1894; and (3) Americans believed that European glass was superior.

[13] Blenko abandoned this glass works when he built a factory in Clarksburg, West Virginia, where fuel was cheaper.

He posted in classified advertising that he wanted a position in glassmaking, and that he could make "every variety of color including opal and opalescent".

[24] Another innovation for the elder Blenko was his 1924 success in developing a formula for ruby-red glass that could be reheated without altering its color.

To keep the business from failing, William Henry Blenko championed producing an additional line of glass: decorative glassware.

[29] Because the Blenkos only knew how to make flat glass, they hired two Swedish-American brothers from the Huntington Tumbler Company to train Eureka employees in glassware production.

The brothers were Louis Miller (a finisher) and Axel Muller (a glassblower), and they had been trained at the Kosta glass works in Sweden.

[20] The Eureka glassware products were originally sold by Carbone and Sons of Boston, which was a reseller of high-quality Italian goods.

Eureka wares had Italian and Scandinavian influences on the designs, and took advantage of the company's ability to create hundreds of shades of colored glass.

Carbone's sales brochure called the glassware "Kenova" glass, and said it was made in the foothills of West Virginia by foreign craftsmen.

[20] An advertisement in the December 1931 edition of a Charleston newspaper said that "distinctive and different hand made" glassware could be purchased at the Milton factory, and used the name Blenko Glass Company.

[30] During 1932, Blenko glass was used for windows in the American Memorial chapel on the Meuse-Argonne battlefield at Romagna, France.

[34][Note 6] The original quality and shapes of the Williamsburg glassware were determined by glass fragments found on site.

[53] Blenko had produced the glass globes for lights at the United States Capitol, and was involved with replacement windows for the White House.

[59] He also said that plastic did not exist 100 years ago, and people stopped having family meals after World War II.

[59] The Great Recession, beginning in December 2007 and ending in June 2009, accelerated the American glass industry's decline.

[70] The COVID-19 recession began in February as governments shut businesses in an attempt to slow the spread of the disease, and it lasted until April of the same year.

In June, the company began to gradually reopen to produce glassware, and most of the workforce was hired back by August.

[72] Blenko Glass survived, and even prospered, in part because of a new product: a figurine of West Virginia's mythical Flatwoods monster.

[43] After World War I Blenko glass (named Eureka at the time) was used to rebuild the Reims Cathedral in France.

[82] Blenko stained glass was also used in secular places such as the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio and Grant's Tomb.

At that time, the company was still producing flat glass blown to look antique, and it could create over 1,300 colors.

[38] The 384S Water Bottle, which has straight optic lines on the glass, was featured in the Holiday Gift Guide section of the December 2013 edition of Martha Stewart Living magazine.

[90][Note 11] One collector considers Myers to be "Blenko's most famous and accomplished designer" and "one of the most exhibited and recognized glass artists in the world".

[96] A team of two designers that began working with Blenko in late 2017 were Emma Walters and Andrew Shaffer, and they continued the relationship until March 2020.

[67] Designer and illustrator Liz Pavlovic partnered with the company in 2020 to create the limited edition Flatwoods monster glass piece.

[98] The company's creative director, James Arnett, designed the 2024 West Virginia Day art glass piece.

[100] As an example, Blenko's 1995 design was a cobalt blue vase with clear handles, and it was sold at a Charleston department store.