How Not to Launch a Creative Business

There was no grand plan. It was just me, sitting in the passenger seat of my sister's car, designing a jumper with her dog on it.

It's an odd place to be designing a product, I know. But if I had to pick a beginning for Sojourn, that was it.

Here's how I muddled my way from there (a product idea in my sister's car) to here: launching a creative business that doesn't sell the jumper I promised my sister. 

I almost made this for you

If you're ever in a creative funk, I recommend making a gift for someone. When it's not about you then your ego disappears and your best creative self kicks in. 

For me, this person was my sister. I knew she'd love something with her golden retriever Murphy on it. And I was determined to make something that wasn't tacky. So I designed a white t-shirt with a black line drawing of Murphy's profile on it. I became so obsessed with getting the design right that I took my laptop into the car on a short road trip with her. 

Now I will make other joyful things

Instead of finishing the top for Nat, I got excited and decided to make a whole line of clothing, homewares and artwork featuring black line drawings that would make people happy. Laughing Dove is what I would call it. 

This, as you can see, is not Laughing Dove. There are no line drawings or golden retrievers. Sorry, Natty. 

This isn't quite right

Creating and selling artwork wasn't new to me. I've been illustrating for around 10 years now. I've started Etsy shops. Taken them down. Put them on my Squarspace website instead. And wondered what's the best way to be an artist in business. 

When I looked at the kinds of products I wanted to offer, they didn't quite fit together. There were the line drawings I'd made for my sister, along with some others I'd done earlier. And then there were watercolour style illustrations that I'd been working on.

So I scratch Laughing Dove and the line drawings and went back to the thing I'd always been trying to do: make beautiful artwork. Start there. No accessories. Just really great prints.

Let's throw some money at it

 The thing that makes you gulp when you're starting your own business is investing money in it—return totally not guaranteed.

I feel like it's the creativity gods testing you. It's as though they're saying, so you think you have an idea. Will you back yourself? Will you dare to put money behind it?

I did. I found a photographer and hired a studio to shoot my prints. I knew that I would need great lifestyle photography to match the idea in my head. 

I backed myself and then I had to do it again when I realised I actually needed a second shoot. It turns out I should have shot in a house, not a studio. It's nothing I could have known beforehand, but it was costly.

Don't forget to earn some money 

Backing yourself by putting money on the table also means you have to go and earn more of it. Soon I found myself in the thick of freelance copywriting work, the other work I do besides illustration.

If you've ever wondered how freelancers manage their time with a side project I can tell you it's not really managing. It's more like finding little snippets of time to get your side project done while still making money elsewhere.

By this stage, eight months after my original idea, I needed to turn away from what would become Sojourn and focus on copywriting again. Ach, money.

C'mon, just launch it

Eventually you reach a point where it is simply too embarrassing to keep working on your creative business any longer and not launch it.

Your friends have given up on asking you when the site will be live. They are silently hoping you won't message them again asking about the new business name you've come up with. 

For me, this period has been November of this year. I returned home from a trip to Europe and it felt like it was now or never. I settled on 8 of my favourite prints and built the website around these. 

A friend asked me recently, what will I do for the launch? We used to work in PR together, so I guess she thought I'd have a PR plan. There is none. Well, for now. 

For now, I'm just pleased that I took an idea for a gift and turned it into a creative business of my own. What happens from here? Let's see. 

It's almost Christmas, so I guess I should really finish that gift for my sister.