What Worked, and What Didn’t. A Reflection on 2024

As we come to the end of yet another year, I think it’s only natural to find ourselves in a state of reflection on what happened in the past 365 days. I find myself quite dazed at everything that has happened for me in the past year. It was certainly one for the books! I had several life-changing opportunities come my way as well as some hard learning curves. I wanted to take a little time to share these with you all as many of you have joined me this year on my small business journey. I value authenticity above all else, and sharing what worked and what didn’t this past year is a great way for me to express that. I hope by sharing these things you will get to know me better not only as a small business owner, but as a person as well. If you are a fellow small business owner, I hope you fine these reflections helpful for you as you take on the new year for yourselves!

Without further frivolities, here is what worked for me in 2024.

Finding Consistent Childcare

As a small business owner who is also a mom, finding the balance of caring for my child and doing my creative work is always a moving target. When I started out this year, I did not have a consistent childcare plan for my young daughter. I had a few sitters here and there, but no one routine. I was limited to working on my craft while my daughter was sleeping or I was able to find someone to watch her for a few hours while I completed a pressing task. I also did work with her in the Creative Space while I could, but you can imagine this was not my most focused work sessions. Come May, after asking around yet again for available childcare options for my daughter, I landed the best situation imaginable. One of my dear friends who is also a small business owner mentioned that her teenage daughter was available to help me. I quickly took her up on the offer, and we quickly fell into a rhythm in which we all thrived. Our sweet sitter was able to drive to our house on certain days of the week and hang out with my daughter in the afternoon while I got uninterrupted work done in the Creative Space. My daughter and the sitter were still in the house while I worked, so I was close by if they needed anything from me, but the sitter and my daughter formed a quick friendship in which they happily got along for the 3 hours I needed to get work done. This childcare situation was able to continue even after school started which meant I didn’t have to find a new sitter, and my child didn’t have to adjust to a new person. If you are a small business owner with small children, you know how lifegiving it is to have someone you trust watch your kids so you can focus on your work. I am forever grateful for my current childcare situation, and I know I wouldn’t have been able to get the work I did done without our dear sitter. It can be a long and frustrating process, but I can’t recommend finding consistent, trustworthy childcare enough if you are a small business owner with small children.

Pulling Out of Unprofitable Shops

This one was a little messy, but ended up being a huge game changer to the mental and physical load on my business. At the beginning of this year, I was in over 10 shop locations, and nearly half of them were draining my resources. These less-than profitable shops were part of a growing chain of stores that was actively seeking to grow and expand their locations, which meant they pressured vendors like myself to pump out more product and hold sales so they would attract more foot traffic. At first, I was excited to be a part of these shops because their growth meant potential growth for me as well. However, as time went on, I found myself losing money and product to these shops. I was being charged high booth rent fees as well as commission on my product sales. Between these shop locations combined, I was paying over $300 a month just in rent. Even if I did make my rent because of sales, I was still only getting a fraction back of what my product was worth after rent and commission were pulled out of my sales. These shops were also being horribly managed which meant product was not being kept track of, sales were not properly recorded, and employees were not treating product with the same care and respect the makers would. They also started filling the shops with fast fashion clothing and cheap filler items which went against my business model of sustainability and ethically sourced products. My macrame began to look cheap in these shops, which led to less sales for me. I pulled out of one or two of these shops at first to see if that would help balance my profits and losses, but eventually I decided to pull out of these shops entirely. It wasn’t just about the money anymore, but it went against how I believed a business should be run and how makers should be treated. I faced significant backlash from the store chain, but this only solidified my decision to pull out. I was greatly discouraged when I went to pick up my product and found there were multiple totes of my macrame that had been stuffed in the back for “back stock” even though they had pressured me multiple times to bring in fresh items because of highly anticipated sales which never seemed to happen. These totes were stuffed with my plant hangers, keychains, wristlets, and other items all tangled together. I had such a surplus of product from these shops now, I had no idea how I was going to redistribute them. On the plus side, I never had to make a keychain again for the rest of the year… This whole experience was a bit of a double edged sword for me. I include this in the “what worked” category though, because I can tell how much this decision has benefited me since then. I have a greater appreciation for the shops who put in the hard work for their vendors to make a profit at their locations, I have red flags to look out for when considering selling at new shops, and it also gave me good insight on how to run my own shop. (More on that later). While I was not bringing in 5 potential checks anymore, I was also not having to pay $300+ a month to something that wasn’t even treating me or my product well. This was no longer a stressor I had to take into consideration every month, and it freed up so much mental space and energy for me to use on growing my business in other areas.

An example of just one of the totes I brought back from one of these shop locations.

Taking on Custom Projects

With 3+ years of experience in tying fancy knots, I was now able to confidently take on bigger projects and creative custom work. I started my year out with making a custom tapestry for a customer who wanted to combine two of my works into one giant piece. This took me a full week to complete, but with it being in the early months of the year, I had the time to spend on it. I was able to document the process on my Instagram and bring my followers along on the process which was a fun way to show them that side of my work. Another custom project I took on was creating two macrame wall hangings from antlers that a customer had been holding onto for several years. They came from a beach in Alaska where she had a childhood cabin and wanted to have a special way to display these tokens of sentimentality. I had never done antler macrame before, but I readily accepted the challenge. The two pieces that resulted were stunning, and the customer was elated to have these special items showcased in this way. My last custom project of the year was a special baby mobile in which the customer requested macrame clouds and hot air balloons. Seeing as these were two elements I’ve never made as a macrame artist, I was excited to learn how to make them and put it together on this baby mobile. The customer and her mother were longtime followers and fans of my work, and they wanted to have a special individual piece for the soon-to-be baby in their lives. The mother wanted to surprise her daughter with the mobile even though it was her daughter who placed the custom request. I happily obliged both. The daughter was lead to believe that the mobile wouldn’t be ready until the beginning of next year, when in fact it was on its way via her mother for Christmas. While I completed numerous custom orders this year, these are the three that stick out to me the most as highlights of my custom work. I hope I am able to take on more custom projects in the coming year which will stretch my creativity and skill level!

My first custom project of the year!

Staying on Top of my Social Medias

One thing that I recorded in last year’s reflection post was that I wished I had kept up better with my social media engagement. Granted, that year had been the year I had given birth and was focused on taking care of a new baby, so it was understandable that my social media involvement took a hit. This year, however, I made it more of a priority. I can confidently say it boosted my visibility and my sales, and I am happy I put more effort into this side of my business. I even went viral for the first time on Instagram, where one of my reels had over 15 million views. This particular reel was about a market I participated in in which absolutely everything went wrong and I suffered some heavy losses from it. While this was not a very glamorous moment for my business, I believe it went viral because so many other small businesses related deeply to this circumstance. I am glad I thought to take some pictures and videos of the day as it happened, but I had no idea that this would be the reel that would gain me over 5,000 new followers in one week. I was also flooded with orders from these new followers which boosted my sales immensely. Now, while this all sounds like every small business owners’ dream come true, it had its sharp edges. the majority of the comments on this reels were positive and encouraging, but there were also nasty comments and hateful words thrown at me from this reel as well. It was very overwhelming as it was happening, and I ended up deleting and blocking a lot of the comments and commenters because of the increasing negativity on the reel. And when I say I got flooded with orders, I mean I got SWAMPED. I had over 100 orders placed from that reel alone, and I had to make close to 200 items within the span of 3 months. This also happened during Spring Market season, which meant I still had to make inventory for these shows. I emailed each customer individually to let the know their order might take a while to reach them due to these factors, and thankfully most everyone was understanding and their patience was deeply appreciated. This huge jump in my social media following definitely boosted my motivation to stay active on social media, and it was a deeply rewarding effort. I hope to continue my social media engagement as I head into 2025 and continue to grow my customer base through it, but also build relationships with my customers and small business friends!

Opening a Brick and Mortar Pop-up Shop

If you follow me on social media, you are sure to have seen the adventure that was Mountain Made. I found out about an opportunity to lease a large shop-front in my small town, and I immediately jumped on it. I have had the immense privilege of being a part of a number of Makers Markets, and I wanted to see one come to my own town of Elizabethton. This was the perfect opportunity to make that happen. I found out about the opportunity on the last day of August, got the keys the next week, and started moving things into motion. I only had 1 month to get everything set up if I was going to be open for the Holiday season from October through December. After doing several markets, small business events, and connecting on social media, finding fellow vendors was not a problem for me. I texted as many of my small business friends as I could think of and asked them if they would be willing to jump on this wild idea of mine with me. Thankfully, most of them said yes, and I was able to get a solid 30 local makers and artists to set up shop with me. It truly was an act of God that brought it all together. Using only my macrame account, I was able to have enough funds to get it all up and running. My small business friends came along and supported me. The town of Elizabethton graciously welcomed us and spread awareness of our adventure. Even with the added unforeseen challenge of Hurricane Helene devastating our area of the Appalachian Mountains, we were able to open our doors to the public after just one month of preparations. This ended up being a huge blessing to the community of small businesses as well as Elizabethton, as we needed something beautiful in the midst of all the chaos. Mountain Made was able to help the small businesses who were affected by Helene by helping make up for some of the losses they incurred from the storm, and it was also a positive presence for the people of the Tri-Cities area who were needing a break from the devastation around them. We were open from October 1st to December 24th, and every day was a learning experience. Even as I am writing this, I am still wrapping up the finishing touches to this venture, but I have so many ideas of what I want to do differently and similarly should an opportunity like this one open up in the future. There’s honestly so much I could write about when it comes to Mountain Made, but I think that will have to wait until its own post. But I can confidently say, opening Mountain Made was definitely a highlight of this year that I will never, ever forget.

Mountain Made’s Grand Opening in October!

Now that you think that I’ve completely nailed this small business thing and I have it all together, here’s what Didn’t work for me in 2024.

Forgetting to Use My Planner

One thing about me is I am quite ADHD. This means I can get easily distracted and scattered in my workflow. One way I manage this is by using a business planner. I have a wonderful planner that I have been using for the past 3 years, from the Maker’s Toolkit, which is specifically designed for product based businesses. It helps me to not only have a big picture idea of what I want my business year to look like, but it helps me to break it down into monthly, weekly, daily goals. This tool is incredibly helpful… if you remember to use it. I used the planner religiously until I got swamped with the influx of orders from going viral. I was so busy actually making the product for my business, that I completely neglected to plan for my business. It was a time period where all I was doing was making. While I eventually caught back up, I still left my planner to gather dust. My year then proceeded to get busy all over again when I took on the project of Mountain Made. I was once again flooded with to do’s, that I didn’t even take time to write them down. I think a good way to summarize this whole kerfuffle was I just winged it. Not the best strategy and I wouldn’t recommend it. I think I would have found myself much less frazzled and overwhelmed had I taken the small amount of time to sit down and plan out my business goals and to-do’s. I have sitting in the room with me a brand new shiny 2025 business planner. My goal this coming year is to use it every month and to keep up with it. If you speak with me on a semi regular basis, please hold me accountable and ask me how my business planning is going…

Saying Yes to Quantity Instead of Quality

Every small business feels the squeeze of the dead months of winter. We stretch out our profits from the holiday season as far as they will go in hopes to make it to Spring market season. I felt this particularly strongly this year as April approached and I was applying for markets. I hit that application button for just about every single one of them. This turned out to bite me in the butt as it not only overcommitted me to several weekend events, but it also proved to be a less than profitable way to spend my time and resources. I embarrassingly scratch my head as I write this segment because this is a tendency I have over and over again. I tell myself I’m going to limit the amount of markets and events I will do, and then I go and sign up for all of them. While the majority of the events I did this year were high quality and profitable, I could have potentially done even better at these events had I been a little more choosy and discerning in what I signed up for. I would have had more time and product to put towards the quality events and I would have had more weekends free to spend with my family. This coming year, I will be welcoming my second child to the bunch, so I know for a fact that my market participation will be scarce. I hope with this natural priority adjustment, I will be even more selective with the events I decide to commit to.

Not Having Defined Work/Life Balance

It is so hard to figure this one out when the majority of your workload happens at home. It can be tempting to spend every spare moment where your family doesn’t need you to be doing work. I struggled with this one particularly hard this year as I had large amounts of orders and then taking on a pop-up shop. I was constantly trying to find time to get work done. Not only did this cause me to burnout or come very near to it multiple times, it also caused stress in my family life as I felt like I wasn’t able to just relax and enjoy life happening around me. While I can reflect and realize that a lot of this was beyond my control, I do want to actively avoid becoming so encumbered with work that I forget to have a life outside of it. I want to cherish these little years with my children, I want to find time to spend with my husband, and I want to rebuild my social life with my friends in this coming year. A huge reason I love doing what I do is because it does give me the ability to choose my workload. While this is a good thing overall, it can turn into a beast of your own making. I took on a lot this year, and I am so proud of everything I was able to accomplish, but I do want to take steps back this coming year and reassess on what realistic growth for my business looks like in this coming year.

Overall, 2024 was a great year for me and my business. More positive moments than negative, and hopefully a launchboard of a year into steady, consistent growth. I will never forget this year and all the wild things that came my way. As I head into 2025, I am wide-eyed with curiosity on what is to come. I will soon be welcoming my baby boy into the world, and it will be another season of navigating how to grow my business while growing my family. We will potentially be moving which will require me to be creative with how I set up the next Creative Space wherever we end up living. I want to take on more unique projects to continue to help the community of small businesses that I have come to know and love so dearly. Whatever 2025 holds, I hope it is a continuation of the good work that my hands have found to do. I want to thank you all so much for being here for me this year, and I hope you will stick around for whatever shenanigans I find myself in this coming year!

With much love and some sparkling cider,