Enterprising
Sep. 17th, 2016 10:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
offcntrHad a nice conversation a few weeks back with a young guy who came out to the studio to pick up a pair of moose mugs his girlfriend had ordered. He was a woodworker with a job detailing motor homes and a small home shop where he did the occasional free-lance job (with the hope of one day starting his own business.) I showed him my studio, talked about how I'd gotten my start, and how I developed into a full-time, self-supporting potter.
He thanked me at the end, said he always appreciated the opportunity to talk to successful entrepreneurs.
Wait, what? Me? An entrepreneur?
I dunno about you, but to me, an entrepreneur is that guy who has a great idea (or at least a marketable one), gets someone to invest money and six months later is on the cover of the Wall Street Journal--or WIRED magazine--and I'm never really sure how he got there. It's like the famous Underpants Gnome's business plan: Step 1. Obtain funding. Step 2. Buy underpants. Step 4. Profit! I'm kinda hazy about Step 3.
Of course, if you outlined my business plan, it'd be even less likely:
1. Obtain an advanced degree in something really practical, like Ceramics.
2. Search for full-time teaching positions.
3. Accept part-time teaching position, with studio access, while continuing part 2.
4. Take other part-time jobs to make ends meet, e.g. holiday phones sales with Harry & David, washing dishes (Seriously, 4 days at the Red Lion, before my ankle gave out. Got a very good recommendation from the chef, though). While continuing steps 2 and 3.
5. Get connected by a former student to a production potter with a catalog contract. Spend two years throwing all his 2 lb.-and-under forms. (9 dozen hummingbird feeders a week...)
6. Get laid off just before Christmas. Spend three months making pots to sell at Saturday Market.
7. Take pots to Saturday Market. Try to sell pots. Come home and make different pots. Rinse. Repeat. (All the while continuing steps 2 and 3.)
You see what I mean? Who in their right mind would fund this business plan?
Somewhere in there, I got and lost my first couple of galleries. (Both closed within a year. Got so we joked that I was the kiss of death to any thriving art business.) Got my first wholesale contracts. Lost one to an acrimonious divorce that split the business in two and left me out $700 on an unpaid delivery. Learned HTML and built a website that grew, piecemeal, into www.offcenter.biz.
Discovered that, even with Market, teaching and wholesale orders, I was still pinched for funds, so I began applying to out-of-town art fairs.
Today I do five or six road shows a year. I have three galleries--two on consignment, one that pays wholesale. I still do Saturday Market and Holiday Market, and get a fair number of inquiries through the website that I started in 2002 and still update every month or two. It's the kind of diversified, mutually-reinforcing-revenue-streams business plan that would have been wonderful to have back then. It only took me 23 years to figure it out.
Still, I can't complain. I'm making my living as a potter. I've built up my physical plant one piece of equipment at a time, paying as I went. We borrowed money precisely once, to buy our first van, and paid off the loan ahead of time. Never was beholden to anyone for capital, never ceded artistic control to anyone but my customers, and even there I've been really fortunate. They like to buy the kind of pots I like to make.
So I guess I have a successful enterprise. By that definition, I guess I am an... entrepreneur.
But I'll never feel comfortable with the label.
He thanked me at the end, said he always appreciated the opportunity to talk to successful entrepreneurs.
Wait, what? Me? An entrepreneur?
I dunno about you, but to me, an entrepreneur is that guy who has a great idea (or at least a marketable one), gets someone to invest money and six months later is on the cover of the Wall Street Journal--or WIRED magazine--and I'm never really sure how he got there. It's like the famous Underpants Gnome's business plan: Step 1. Obtain funding. Step 2. Buy underpants. Step 4. Profit! I'm kinda hazy about Step 3.
Of course, if you outlined my business plan, it'd be even less likely:
1. Obtain an advanced degree in something really practical, like Ceramics.
2. Search for full-time teaching positions.
3. Accept part-time teaching position, with studio access, while continuing part 2.
4. Take other part-time jobs to make ends meet, e.g. holiday phones sales with Harry & David, washing dishes (Seriously, 4 days at the Red Lion, before my ankle gave out. Got a very good recommendation from the chef, though). While continuing steps 2 and 3.
5. Get connected by a former student to a production potter with a catalog contract. Spend two years throwing all his 2 lb.-and-under forms. (9 dozen hummingbird feeders a week...)
6. Get laid off just before Christmas. Spend three months making pots to sell at Saturday Market.
7. Take pots to Saturday Market. Try to sell pots. Come home and make different pots. Rinse. Repeat. (All the while continuing steps 2 and 3.)
You see what I mean? Who in their right mind would fund this business plan?
Somewhere in there, I got and lost my first couple of galleries. (Both closed within a year. Got so we joked that I was the kiss of death to any thriving art business.) Got my first wholesale contracts. Lost one to an acrimonious divorce that split the business in two and left me out $700 on an unpaid delivery. Learned HTML and built a website that grew, piecemeal, into www.offcenter.biz.
Discovered that, even with Market, teaching and wholesale orders, I was still pinched for funds, so I began applying to out-of-town art fairs.
Today I do five or six road shows a year. I have three galleries--two on consignment, one that pays wholesale. I still do Saturday Market and Holiday Market, and get a fair number of inquiries through the website that I started in 2002 and still update every month or two. It's the kind of diversified, mutually-reinforcing-revenue-streams business plan that would have been wonderful to have back then. It only took me 23 years to figure it out.
Still, I can't complain. I'm making my living as a potter. I've built up my physical plant one piece of equipment at a time, paying as I went. We borrowed money precisely once, to buy our first van, and paid off the loan ahead of time. Never was beholden to anyone for capital, never ceded artistic control to anyone but my customers, and even there I've been really fortunate. They like to buy the kind of pots I like to make.
So I guess I have a successful enterprise. By that definition, I guess I am an... entrepreneur.
But I'll never feel comfortable with the label.