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 The Solopreneur Life | Passive Income | Home Business

How I Made My First $10,000: Marie Segares

  • By Gregory Rouse
  • 06 Mar, 2019

This is “How I Made My First $10,000,” a new, ongoing feature that gives all of us a glimpse at how other solopreneurs hit the challenging $10k milestone. Click here to read other Solopreneur Success Stories. If you would like to be in the “How I Made My First $10,000,” please send me an email.

Marie Segares
Marie Segares

Name of solopreneur:
Marie Segares

Name of business and city:
Underground Crafter,
New York, NY

Website address:
Blog
Ravelry designer page
Etsy shop

Type of business:
I’m a yarn crafts solopreneur. I teach crochet and knitting lessons, design crochet and knitting patterns, and offer social media and community management services to other craft-related companies. I also work full-time in another industry.

When did you officially go into business?
I formalized my business in 2008.

Why did you start your own business?
I was finishing up graduate school and starting a new full-time job that was supposed to be less stressful, so I thought I’d have more time on my hands. My grandmother (who originally taught me to crochet) passed away the year before and I found myself crafting more as a way to stay connected to her memory. It seemed like a great way to combine my passion for the needlecrafts while paying down some debt.

What was the financial situation for the business when it launched?
I am a fairly cheap person and luckily, my business isn’t very capital intensive. I used my existing crochet supplies to launch the business. I spent probably about $300 before making any money between getting a business certificate and setting up my website. (If I could go back in time, I would have waited to start up a website. My hosting plan was overpriced and the templates are terrible.) I used free resources like Craigslist to advertise my classes. Eventually, I landed some semi-regular teaching gigs, which brought in predictable income.

My big cash outlays for the first few years were for entrance fees for craft shows. I soon discovered the craft show circuit wasn’t for me. I’m too much of an introvert so I didn’t shine at bringing people to my table. And my sales would basically cover my entrance fees and possibly the supplies – my labor was never covered. Also, I got horribly ill after my last craft fair (standing in a damp, freezing basement for two days in the dead of winter can do that, especially after you’ve already worked a full week at another job, and carted all of your goods on the subway to save money on cab fare). I took it as a sign that I should never do another one.

In 2010, I had my first patterns published ( stocking caps and snowball hat/scarf set ) in a magazine, and since then I’ve been regularly submitting to magazines as well as publishing my own patterns. Designing has been more rewarding for me and fits into my lifestyle better – I can do it from home, I can arrange it to suit my full-time work schedule’s ebbs and flows, and I can earn more money per project than I could from selling finished objects.

I had two long-term freelancing gigs in 2012, working for other companies in the industry on social media and community management. Both companies switched directions and my full-time job got very hectic in 2013, so I haven’t pursued anything similar recently.

What worked — and didn’t work — for landing new clients/customers?
One of the advantages of having a part-time business is that I don’t rely on it for my income. Honestly, I’ve just pursued opportunities as I’ve become aware of them (and when they fit into my schedule). For example, I responded to a posting in my local crochet guild’s newsletter looking for a teacher in 2008, and have been teaching at that same gig for about 30 Saturdays a year since. In 2011, I was working with a yarn company and their designer liaison had to resign due to a family situation. On a whim, I contacted the owner to see if she was hiring, and after interviewing, I freelanced for her as a social media coordinator for about 14 months. Through that position, I learned about a new online crafter’s community, and I freelanced for them for a year as they were getting started to help with their crochet and knitting community. If this was my full-time job, I’d probably take a much more orderly approach to finding clients.

I am active on social media in my industry, and I’ve managed to build up a fairly large network of professional contacts even though I only do this work part-time. That has been really helpful, because my full-time job schedule has kept me away from all the big industry conferences I should be attending! When I started my blog in 2011, I contacted some well known designers about interviews, and they said yes. I realized that most people in my industry were fairly approachable. Since then, I’ve posted a lot of interviews on my blog. Through these interviews, I’ve “met” a lot of people in the industry I wouldn’t otherwise know, and I’ve also had my work introduce to potential customers who wouldn’t have otherwise seen it.

How long did it take for you to reach $10,000?
About 3 years. I didn’t start earning more until I started devoting more time to my business.

Describe your support system when the business started.
My biggest support has been my boyfriend. We moved in together shortly after I started my business, and he has endured me working from home and all the madness that entails. He’s been there to rub my hands when I’m recovering from frantically crocheting samples at 3 a.m. to meet deadlines, as well as to sign for packages of yarn that show up at random times. He’s becoming more involved with tech support for the business, and is even working on an awesome website for me. (His pet peeve is probably that I never sit down with him to explain what I need in a website!) I also have a few friends who have been willing to listen to horror stories and serve as sounding boards even though they don’t work in this industry.

I also stay connected to industry supports. I am a professional member of the Crochet Guild of America and participated in their mentoring program when I was first starting out. I had a wonderful mentor, Mary Nolfi ( crochetasylum.com ), who introduced me to the ins and outs of submitting designs to magazines. I’ve recently been paired up with Marty Miller ( notyourgrannyscrochet-marty.blogspot.com and thecrochetdoctor.blogspot.com ) as a mentor because I’m interested in doing technical editing. I also participate in several designer groups on Ravelry (a social-media site for yarncrafters).

After you reached $10,000, was it easier to earn the next $10,000?
My earnings are really variable because the amount of time I devote to the business is often based on what is going on in my full-time work. Last year, my full-time job was really much more involved that it had been previously, and I had to cut back on a lot of activities for my business. My new work schedule is much more flexible so I have a good feeling about my earnings potential in 2014.

What was the best thing you did on the way to $10,000?
I think the best thing I did was to abandon things that didn’t work. I was really convinced initially that I was going to be selling my hats and scarves on Etsy and at craft fairs. But I just couldn’t make the numbers work — it took me too much time to make samples that I couldn’t sell for much. Because this isn’t my major source of income, I’ve had the freedom to change course.

What’s the biggest mistake you made on the way to $10,000?
I’ve had some negative experiences with publishers that probably could have been avoided if I did a little more research up front on their history. On the other hand, I treat all of those experiences as lessons. I try to apply what I’ve learned from the bad experiences to the next ones.

How did you deal with fear/uncertainty?
For me, I am able to accept the uncertainty because I have another (larger) source of income. My loved ones and friends are very supportive, and that helps quite a bit.

Did you ever consider quitting?
Not really, although I’ve come to accept that I’m human and can’t do everything! I will probably never do another “blog every day this month” challenge — does that count as quitting?

What would you have done differently?
I would have waited to set up a website. These days, you can just have a blog, which is sort of what I’m doing now anyway since my website is so unappealing. I just haven’t had the time to sit down and plan out what I’d really like it to be/look like — there always seems to be another project taking precedence.

What’s your advice for aspiring and brand-new solopreneurs?
I’d actually recommend that people start their businesses part-time, if possible. It gives you a safety net and also allows you to explore. I would recommend reading Joanna Penn’s “Career Change,” which talks about this quite a bit.

I think you need to have your partner/family on board, and be realistic about what it means to own a business, even a small one. A solopreneur is responsible for everything in their business, and as a result, domestic activities, social activities — really, anything that isn’t essential — will often fall to the wayside if there are priorities going on in the business.

Networking — whether in person or online — is key.

And, finally, I think solopreneurs have to be flexible. One of the advantages of being small is that you can make changes more quickly than a large, bureaucratic company, so use that your advantage.

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