Makers Month: Women who create

We are back with Makers Month for September and what a month of treats we have in store for you.  We are going to be chatting to some business folk and some makers who will of course impart their wisdom over to you guys.  Cos we all need some wisdom sometimes right?!?!  Here's me looking for the adult in the room!

Live it. Sew Crafty's New Chapter

If you know me or if you have been a reader for a while you may have noticed I have been a little quiet when it comes to talking about my shop lately. If you are new here you may not even realise that my day job is running our family business, a little sewing shop in my home town of Maidenhead called Sew Crafty. Well today I am letting you in on a not so secret, secret. We are opening an online store!

It is a project that has been over a year in the making, you may remember a post from last year where I hinted at making some big decisions 'Never Making Mistakes is a Mistake' and the day is almost here that I can direct you all, our lovely readers from all over the globe, to shop at my little home away from home on the interwebs. To be honest I am still finding this thought very overwhelming.

I have spoken before about how our family business came to be, how I have always been a person who wants to work for myself and how much I love what I do. But I am not going to lie to you the last year has been one of the hardest times in my life.

Sew Crafty, like many shops on our British High Streets, has been struggling to break even (to make enough money to pay our bills). Despite filling our shop, floor to ceiling, with beautiful things and sewing essentials to supply our lovely little towns every sewing whim, it has just not been enough. We are just not reaching enough people, so last year we made the decision to invest some of our family savings in setting up Sew Crafty Online.

It has been a year of lots of stress and tears, mixed with excitement and anticipation but it is almost time to reveal all our hard work to the world. I wanted to take the chance to share some advice for any of you who are at the beginning of a journey like mine. (by which I mean' things I wish I had done sooner')

• Plan, LOTS. But be prepared to alter your path. Don't be too fixated on your ideas of how you think things should be. You may find better ways of doing things, you just haven't thought of it yet. 
• Don't be afraid to ask for help. Think hard about your friend's talents and skills, they are your friends and they want to help you and see you succeed.  Find ways they can help you.  Most importantly talk to them about it because they are on your side, and if they can help they will.  
• Do your research.  Find out what people expect from what you are hoping to do. Think about what you expect, what do you like and not like about existing businesses like yours.
• Work with people you trust.  Make sure the people who are helping you, are people that will help you to achieve your goals.
• If you are working with a designer/supplier/estate agent or other professional, don't be afraid to ask them as many questions as you need to.  Don't feel like they are going to think that you are stupid, it is their job to answer those questions for you.
• Don't be afraid to nag those professionals to do their job if you feel you are being ignored, or don't have the information you need, but do be kind and appreciate them when they go the extra mile. 
• Aim high.  Make whatever you do, be the best it can be. 

I really hope that this may have helped some of you who are thinking of embarking on a new project or business, if you have any questions feel free to leave them in the comments or find me on twitter @sammytvr. 

If you want to find out more about my little shop head over to our website or check out some of the posts in our archives, Sammy's home away from home, Sew Crafty...We are TEN, Live it. Sammy's Day Job and look out for the launch announcement very soon. Or sign up to our Sew Crafty Newsletter (bottom of our web page) to be the first to know!

Sammy xxx

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Live it: The Makery Re-visited

When we visited Bath a few weeks ago, we just had to go visit The Makery again.  Since we last went for a visit, they have moved to larger premises and so been able to expand what they do.  Plus they now have a gorgeous bright yellow door and a rainbow staircase!

They gave us such a great welcome and let us wander around checking out all their different rooms they now have.  'The Snug' and the larger workspace were our favourites.

We also got to have a chat with the lovely owner Kate about everything that has been going on lately...

For everyone who doesn't already know how long has The Makery been a business?  and a passion?
As a business - since 2009. We got the keys to our first location just 10 days after we had our first baby! We had been planning for a couple of years at that though.
As a passion - lifelong. It sounds so cliche, but it's really in my blood. My mum, Gran and Grandma were are/were all keen seamstresses.

How has the business changed since you started your journey? 
It's changed dramatically - reading our first business plan from 2008 the direction of the company was very different. We were purely workshop-based at the beginning. Our aim was (and still is) to teach as many people the joy of crafting as possible. Over the years, we have just keep finding more and more ways of doing that. 
We've just signed a deal with a company which has licensed our brand to release a range of kits and haberdashery in the UK and internationally, which is something we would never have dreamed would happen already. We'd never have thought we'd go on Dragons Den - I mean, seriously! But it turned out to be a great move for our business and a big learning curve for us too. In fact, we'd never have dreamed about the books either really - it's all exceeded our wildest expectations!

What are your most popular workshops? And what is your best seller in the Emporium ?
The sewing workshops always sell well, and upholstery has always been popular too. I suppose it feels like a really meaty skill where you can have fun revamping furniture. In the shop, we always try and stock a beautiful range of fabrics so they're probably our best seller. And our book sells really well too!

You have just moved premises, what motivated the move?
We hadn't anticipated having 2 premises at the start, but opened the shop just a year after we opened the workshop. It used a lot of energy and resources (financial and human) running the 2 separate premises. And we just felt that it would be beneficial in so many ways to house everything under one roof. It's not been an easy road though - the amount of space we needed in a central location was a big ask! We'd been looking for over a year. It's been incredibly stressful, but our team of staff have been wonderful. 

What is your favourite space in your new building? 
Ridiculously, I love the stock room! We've never had a proper stock room before! But in terms of the space it has to be our largest workshop room. It's so large, it gives us the opportunity to host all sorts of events that we could never have dreamed of before. Things like our weekly yoga classes that we run for all our staff members too - it's truly multi-purpose!

Any new furniture favourites you have picked up for the new space?
We salvage and get donated all sorts of things, and a couple of items are favourites in the new place. Firstly, a very old display model singer sewing machine donated by our surveyor's wife. It belonged to her grandma called Maud, who was a demonstrator for Singer. It's beautiful, so has pride of place in our shop. And we've called it Maud too! Then a shop in Bath was refurbishing the other week and were throwing out their old drawers. They're beautiful - perfect for us! They are glass-fronted like old apothecary drawers. We display all our pretty buttons and ribbons in them!

Did you enjoy writing the book? How did you find the publishing process? 
I love writing the book! It's like the ultimate school project - a dream come true! Some people come in knowing about the book, others find out about it when they're here. The publishing process was great for me - I have an agent who kept on my back telling me what I needed to do and why by. She was wonderful. 

What advice would you give to someone starting their own workshop space now?
Don't underestimate the amount of work involved! You need to REALLY want to do this!
Have a clear vision of where you're going: Plan things, write them down. I modify our business plan frequently to suit our business, but it's always good to have a document that I can refer to whenever I'm having a wobble!

Some very sound advice there from Kate.  We really enjoyed our visit, all the staff we met were so very friendly and we got to meet Rufus the dog, how gorgeous is he?!  I think that having a pet around always makes a space really homely.

Have you been?  Do you have a space like this near you?  We always love finding new workshop spaces and so do let us know in the comments.

H & Sammy