I had an opportunity to sip hot chai and learn more about the intersection of creativity and entrepreneurship when I visited a local coffee shop to talk with Lily Laramie, director of the Small Business Center at Western Piedmont Community College.
The Small Business Center is a service provided by the North Carolina Community College System in every county in the state that offers free classes, confidential consulting and resources for small business owners and those looking to start a business.
Lily herself is a creative entrepreneur who owns her own photography business. She advises people trying to monetize their creative endeavors and had lots of sound advice to share.
A recurring theme in our conversation was the importance of aspiring entrepreneurs and small business owners to ask for help when they need it.
“The hardest part for me as a business owner was knowing, ‘Hey, I can’t do this on my own – I have to know when to ask for help,’” Lily said. “Working with other creatives, that seems to kind of be a theme.”
She, along with many creative entrepreneurs, tend to struggle the most with “the numbers” – bookkeeping, taxes, financials, etc.
“A lot of business owners, especially creative business owners, if they’ve gone to college, they’ve gotten an arts education,” Lily said. “They haven’t gotten that education to help them with business. Utilizing your local resources like the Small Business Center, like the Chamber of Commerce, is really the way my business survived. Before I became the SBC director, I used the counseling services at the SBC, and they connected me with a local tax accountant who donated their time.”
Those who qualify to work with the SBC are eligible to receive free tax services for their business finances. To qualify, people must live in Burke County, own a small business in Burke County (with five employees or less) or want to start a business in Burke County.
“It’s a fantastic way to help entrepreneurs who don’t have that business education or aren’t interested in learning how to do it, because, as a creative, that takes a lot of time,” Lily said. “You’re creating artwork, so if you can take the finances, bookkeeping and taxes off of your plate, it gives you that much more time to build your business into something more successful.”
I asked her if entrepreneurs selling original creations or creative services should approach running a business differently than a traditional entrepreneur.
“In selling original art and artist services, you should always take care to protect your work,” she said. “That’s usually through copyright. In the digital world, anything you post people can take and sell as their own if it’s not copyrighted or has some sort of watermark.”
This is another great opportunity to ask for help. She said the SBC can connect creative entrepreneurs to information they need to copyright or watermark their original creations, including free resources offered by the North Carolina Bar Association.
“They’ll help with counseling people through any sort of legal processes, and that does include copyright,” Lily said.
I visited the NC Bar website at https://www.ncbarfoundation.org/our-programs and found information on two free programs that may benefit creative entrepreneurs. In The Entrepreneurs Assistance Program, attorneys “provide pro bono business law advice and counsel to small business owners through webinars and clinics held in partnership with nonprofit organizations throughout the state that advise small businesses.” In the Patent Pro Bono Program, volunteer patent attorneys “provide pro bono legal services to low-wealth solo inventors, nonprofit organizations and small businesses by assisting them with their applications to the United States Patent and Trademark Office.”
Talking about securely posting your creations online led to a discussion of the impact of digital technologies on creative entrepreneurs’ ability to be successful. Lily noted that the internet has created a worldwide marketplace with many people competing for market share.
“To define who you are, to be discovered, is a lot more difficult than it used to be,” Lily said. “Coming from my personal experience as a business owner and a photographer, I have my style, and it is different, but there’s going to be someone else out there who has something similar. When I try to market myself on social media and Google, it’s harder for me to find people interested in my work, because I’m not just the local artist anymore.”
To stand out in such a distracting, overcrowded space, she suggested doing some “guerrilla marketing.” This involves deploying unconventional marketing tactics within your local community. She gave the example of a crochet artist in Asheville who decorated trees in her town with “tree sweaters” to raise awareness of her work.
“That was an amazing way for her to differentiate herself and get local fans instead of just those social media fans,” she said. “That’s really the best way I’ve found to market myself. As a photographer, I go downtown areas, I go to car shows – I’ll take my Polaroid and ask people (to take their photo). I’ll snap a couple pictures, show them what it looks like and get that local engagement with my business.
“If you’re a potter, get out there and make sculptures you can leave. Make some wind chimes you hang in the trees. If you’re a glassblower, make some ornaments you can hang up around Christmastime.”
She advised checking local ordinances before attempting an unusual marketing stunt to make sure it’s legal.
“Do something that’s not going to cost a lot of money, but will really draw attention,” Lily said. “Focusing on that local attention is where I think I get most of my business, and where a lot of successful artists here in Burke County get their business.”
This led to us musing on how creative entrepreneurs enrich the communities in which they live and how cities should facilitate their activities whenever possible.
“Asheville has a graffiti wall that’s a huge wall where anyone can come and practice their art,” Lily said. “They have so many co-op studio spaces where (people can say), ‘I can’t afford a pottery wheel and a kiln, but I can afford rent at a place that has those services.’
“When I got started as a photographer, I was very fortunate that my parents had an ancient Nikon B50, so I started with that, but then I needed to update, and the cost of equipment was insane. So if you can have those spaces that allow people to practice their art and give them the equipment they need, that’s just an amazing way to draw in artists and it supports them in building their art and their businesses.”
She hopes city officials and business owners in downtown Morganton will come to see the value in supporting creative endeavors.
“If local artists were willing to open their shops to teach classes, to rent out their kilns to new artists who are trying to get going, that would be amazing, but – art is competitive,” Lily said. “When you start asking established business owners, ‘Hey, let your potential competition come in and use your space,’ they can get very defensive.
“I wish Morganton had a studio space like the downtown arts council, but instead of just being a community of established artists, being a community of artists who are new and want to build their businesses. We have a space downtown that would be perfect, but it’s getting the city and county on board, getting everyone working together to make that push for artists. It’s tricky, (because) it has to be profitable. In my experience, I think it would be.”
Until city and county leaders are able to see that vision, local creatives can consult with the SBC to search for funds to launch a business venture. The SBC also has a free lending library at its location at the Foothills Higher Education Center in Morganton that is filled with books on every aspect of business that visitors can check out.
“The most common question I get as Small Business Center director is, ‘Where do I get money to start my business?’” Lily said. “Grants are very hard to come by. If you’re a minority-owned business or a woman-owned business, it’s a lot easier. Sadly, loans are kind of the best option.”
Lily has exercised her creativity on behalf of local entrepreneurs and launched a business pitch competition called “Elevate Burke – Expedition Innovation,” in which small business owners and those who aspire to start a business can compete to win funding for their business ideas and endeavors. Applications for the contest are due by Friday, May 24 and can be downloaded from the SBC website at wpcc.edu/sbc. The competition is free to enter, and finalists will receive specialized business training, also for free.
Lily also noted that creative business owners should consider forming partnerships with related businesses. She used the example of a glass artist partnering with a metalworking company to produce one-of-a-kind chandeliers.
“Find other artists who can complement your work, but not necessarily compete with it,” Lily said.
So how do entrepreneurs decide when it’s time to ask for help?
“I think a lot of self-reflection goes into it, a lot of looking at other creatives who are more successful and realizing they all have help – they all have that support system – so you have to be able to build that,” Lily said. “There’s one Small Business Center at every community college across the state (NC), so even if you aren’t in Burke County, there’s a Small Business Center to help you.”
Ultimately, the most important thing creative entrepreneurs can do is to stay true to their original vision for their business.
“Make sure you stay true to the goals and the dream you had in the beginning,” she said. “I meet so many people who start a creative business, and in jumping through the hoops of figuring out how to be a business owner, they lose sight of that original goal. Make sure you’re keeping true to yourself, your ideas and your art.”
Comments