For the past three years, Mom and I have been doing an annual podcast together, in which I've interviewed her about various aspects of the holiday season. This year, we decided to do something a little different, and just record one of our many conversations on a subject we revisit again and again - Christmas cookies! We had so much fun, and laughed a lot, and we hope you'll get a kick out of the result.
5/18/2012 | Download File (27.41 MB) - right click to download
We've got a craft-businessy subject today: we're talking about getting started with wholesale. It's very wise, if you have a craft business, to think about ways you can diversify your sources of income, and doing wholesale is a great option. I'm talking with Jodie Rackley in this show. She's an Etsy seller who quickly branched out into wholesale, and now her products can be found in shops all over the country. What I like about Jodie's story is that it's really accessible - as you'll see, she didn't need any special equipment to get started with wholesale. She used simple, readily-available tools to get herself in front of stores, and she did it without having to pound the pavement and work up her courage to approach local shop owners. And it's made a very positive difference in her business.
5/4/2012 | Download File (24.51 MB) - right click to download
This podcast is filled with BIG, fascinating ideas about the intersection of creativity and spirit. How do you find your own personal meaning in making things? Can art or craft (or any other creative pursuit) actually become a spiritual practice? How can creative work be spiritual and exist alongside your existing spiritual beliefs? We have an excellent guide through all these questions this week: Bridget Benton is a mixed-media artist and a teacher who specializes in just this subject. Her book, The Creative Conversation, is based on classes she's been teaching for years. She helps creative people uncover the ways that making things feeds their souls - and how regular making can become an important path to staying grounded and understanding yourself.
4/20/2012 | Download File (25.33 MB) - right click to download
Since it's nearly Earth Day, Michele Pacey and I are talking about creative reuse. Michele does most of her crafting with materials from her recycle bin, and she comes up with all kinds of beautiful and useful projects. Her blog, Michele Made Me, is full of inspiration. Creative reuse involves a lot of experimentation, trial and error, and flat-out play. Michele has some interesting things to say about how she approaches crafting with recycled materials. And, I made her tell me what's in her stash right now – um, wow! There's a lot of creative potential there. I hope this show will inspire you to dig into your recycle bin and make some cool things this weekend.
4/6/2012 | Download File (29.85 MB) - right click to download
What do you think of, when you think of an "indie business?" And what do you think of when you think of a "corporate business?" I think that our community of small, independent craft businesses tends to think of anything "corporate" as being in some way soulless, perhaps evil, and definitely not worth emulating. Well, my guest, Beth Casey of Lorna's Laces, has a very different take on "corporate." Lorna's Laces is, in fact, a corporation - a small one, with just six people who work each day to produce and ship hand-dyed yarns to yarn stores all over. Beth and her crew espouse all the indie values you'd expect from a one-person craft business, but by working together in a larger organization, they've been able to accomplish a lot. So when is "corporate" not so "corporate"? And do we need a better term to describe businesses like Lorna's Laces? Have we reached a point of maturity as a business community where we might need to start thinking a little bigger? This interview should give you lots of food for thought.
3/23/2012 | Download File (26.84 MB) - right click to download
In this podcast, I talk with small business consultant Jackie Peterson about a subject I think many creative people stuggle with: how to come up with fair and profitable prices for the things you make. There's a lot of thorny stuff involved in pricing, after all – we creatives endure a lot of social programming about the value of our work. And, let's face it, the landscape of hobby-based and professional businesses we dwell in often creates confusion about the value of handmade work in general. And then there's the math/accounting parts – to do your pricing well, you need a clearer overall picture of the financial needs of your business, and for many creatives, that's intimidating stiff. As if that weren't enough, there's the fear of what our market will think if we charge more. I struggle with pricing as much as anyone else. But Jackie has a very clear and friendly way of talking about this subject that has helped me overcome a lot of my fears. Hopefully, in this interview she'll do the same for you.
