Send us a text You’ve just walked into a new gallery exhibition, and immediately you start thinking about the artist who created these amazing works in front of you. You dream of working in the arts and what that would be like. But have you ever thought about all the other ways you could also work in the arts? To put on that one exhibit there is also a gallery, and thus, a gallery owner (not to mention gallery employees), there’s potentially a marketing company that helps the gallery spread the ...
Nov 11, 2022•1 hr 11 min•Season 3Ep. 67
Send us a text Should I sell online? Or should I sell at in-person markets? Should I accept wholesale? Should I teach? These are just a handful of the myriad of questions we makers often ask ourselves when trying to figure out how the heck to get our small businesses off the ground. But it’s hard to know what the right choice is for yourself until you try many of these things. And when I say try, I don’t necessarily mean just throwing up a table at one in-person market, where it rains on one day...
Oct 28, 2022•1 hr 5 min•Season 3Ep. 66
Send us a text Pricing your art… It’s part math, part alchemy, and a whole lot of emotion. It should just be simple math, but somehow it's never that simple. On today's solo episode I dig into the differences between cost-based pricing and value-based pricing (and why the second one is so important specifically for artists). Of course, as is true with most things in life - The topic is a bit more complex than we would probably prefer. If you are looking for more support and help in nav...
Oct 21, 2022•39 min•Season 3Ep. 65
Send us a text Most of us dream about quitting our full-time jobs in order to do what we love. In fact, that might just be why you are listening to this very podcast. But what if, instead of thinking of your full-time job as the thing holding you back from being creative, you approached it from the perspective of the thing that allows you to be creative. Maybe not necessarily while doing that job (although this week’s guest one could argue gets to do that too), but thanks to the reliability of t...
Oct 14, 2022•1 hr 7 min•Season 3Ep. 64
Send us a text How many of us feel like we need to have every single detail figured out before we start something? I know I sure do. If this is your first podcast episode, you will soon figure out, I am awfully (obsessively) Type A for being a creative. And while at times that has served me really well in systematizing processes and being organized in order to use my time efficiently, at other times… it’s slowed me down. Analyzing every pro & con to every website platform out there for month...
Sep 30, 2022•1 hr 10 min•Season 3Ep. 63
Send us a text Today on the podcast, I’m discussing one of my favorite, most insightful, yet most difficult to stick to topics… growing slowly. If I could do it all over again, and go back 12 years in time, the one thing I would do differently would be to actually hold onto the work outside of starting my own business longer. I was in such a rush to feel the false legitimacy of being “full-time” that I missed out on the benefits (and support) that was possible when you weren’t only relying on yo...
Sep 23, 2022•49 min•Season 3Ep. 62
Send us a text There are two very exciting things happening on the podcast this week! #1 - I’m excited to announce that for the first time since starting this podcast, we have a bit more support to help me get new episodes out into your headphones! For the next couple of months, the one and only Amaco is sponsoring the Maker’s Photography Styling System! And I couldn’t be more grateful & excited. #2 - This week’s interview with Ben Carter is actually Part 2! Part 1 can be found over on Ben’s...
Sep 16, 2022•35 min•Season 3Ep. 61
Send us a text Why do you want to have 10,000 followers on Instagram? What will that do for you? Or rather… what do you think that will do? Today’s world is full of encouragement to grow - have more followers, make more content, do more, diversify income streams - do more and grow, grow, GROW! But have you ever stopped to ask yourself, “Why?” On this week’s episode, host Rebecca Ickes Carra sheds a bit of light on the Myth of Growth and how it might not solve the problems we think it will (it co...
Aug 26, 2022•28 min•Season 3Ep. 60
Send us a text On today’s episode, Tom Kemp manages to hold space for both a deeply philosophical conversation while at the same time providing pragmatic advice for all of us working to figure out how the heck to make a living from the things we make. I personally, have never connected much with the philosophy and the “what is art?” conversations that often spring up, but when married side-by-side with the realistic, and the pragmatic - the benefits of things like social media for artists to tes...
Aug 18, 2022•1 hr 14 min•Season 3Ep. 59
Send us a text Is the thing you are dreaming of doing actually going to provide you with the life you are dreaming of having? On today’s episode, I sit down with Becca Otis (yes, from Wheeltalk Podcast!) to dispel some of the myths behind a lot of goals we self-employed artists often set. Dream of owning your own studio & hosting classes, she’s done it. Dream of selling your work to make a living, she’s done it. Want big-name brands to contract you for elusive wholesale work? That’s how Becc...
Aug 12, 2022•54 min•Season 3Ep. 58
Send us a text Have you ever felt overwhelmed by all the things you think you are supposed to be doing as a maker in 2022? Post a reel every day to Instagram! Don’t use Etsy, build your own website! Raise your prices!! The world can often feel like it’s constantly yelling at us to change something, fix something, do something more, and more and more… And if you are anything like me, that ever-growing to-do list is impossible. There isn’t enough time in the day or resources available to accomplis...
Jul 29, 2022•1 hr 4 min•Season 3Ep. 57
Send us a text Do you think it’s too late to organically grow a large Instagram following? Did you only just start your Instagram and it feels like you’ve missed the opportunity? Maybe you tell yourself “there’s no possible way to grow on Instagram these days compared to before…” Or assume the advice someone gave you - maybe someone who already has a much bigger following - won’t work for you because they grew their following years ago - before reels, before there were so many potters online, et...
Jul 22, 2022•57 min•Season 3Ep. 56
Send us a text What if you stopped making the kind of work you don’t actually like to make and decided to only make the random thing that really interests you? And what if… what if doing that actually brought you more sales and more people interested in your work and excited about the same thing you are excited about than you could have ever imagined? That very thing is happening for Kate Schroeder and her Shelfies and on this episode, we get to hear all about the long road that led her to today...
Jul 15, 2022•2 hr 31 min•Season 3Ep. 55
Send us a text For most everyone I’ve spoken with in the last year and a half of the podcast, one thing has been true - As soon as they touched clay, they were hooked. It was like a siren call, an addiction, where their whole life they began to rearrange in order to figure out how to carve out more time to have their hands in the mud. That mesmerizing experience that is true for so many of us, often has us jump straight from our first class at the local community studio to “how do I sell this so...
Jul 01, 2022•1 hr 6 min•Season 3Ep. 54
Send us a text When you see a super well know potter's name somewhere - on the cover of a book, on a list of speakers at a conference, or anywhere else - do you ever wonder how they got there? Did they always know they wanted to do this? Or was their path a bit more windy (perhaps like yours and mine)? Have they reached this particular level of success because of a clearly laid out plan, or was it really most luck and timing? Well my friends, one of those names that pop up in my head as mor...
Jun 24, 2022•1 hr 4 min•Season 3Ep. 53
Send us a text 12 years ago, I had no idea what I was doing. I didn’t go to business school. And I definitely had never dreamed of starting my own business. But, I managed to keep putting one foot in front of the other and climb up the hill that is self-employment, learning when to adjust course or totally change plans when necessary thanks to the support of an incredible Community of peers. On today’s solo episode, I’m sharing why I’ve spent the last 4 months building a virtual home for makers ...
Jun 17, 2022•27 min•Season 3Ep. 52
Send us a text Kenny Sing of Turn Studio & I chat this week about how his Instagram originally started out simply as a place to share the processes he was testing out, without the intention of reaching 83,000++ followers. We also dig into his passion for teaching and why he's building his community studio space (plus how building a studio actually works and all the hard cost realities of doing that). Kenny's heart for building a community clearly hits home for me. If you don't...
May 27, 2022•1 hr 1 min•Season 3Ep. 51
Send us a text On this week’s episode, I virtually sit down with Lucy Fagella to discuss how she’s shifted her business over the course of the last 20+ years as a full-time studio potter. We chat about the realities of parenting and being a full-time maker as well as how to make sure you are taking care of your body amidst the physical demands of ceramics. Lucy has navigated the big shift from predominantly cash-based in-person market sales to credit card processing and online shops (and as may ...
May 20, 2022•1 hr 9 min•Season 3Ep. 50
Send us a text Have you ever talked yourself out of going after a goal because the logistics just felt impossible? Like pursuing a master’s degree when you can’t attend a school in person? Or setting up a home studio space when you work in a job that forces you to move locations every couple of years? Pretty difficult right? But not impossible. Or at least, you can’t use that excuse any more, because today’s guest on the podcast, Del of D Goode Art has managed to work with all of those logistica...
May 13, 2022•1 hr 2 min•Season 3Ep. 49
Send us a text We are back! Season 3 of the Maker’s Playbook podcast kicks off with Adam Field! In this episode, Adam and I dig into how he managed to say yes to a multi-year residency program at the Archie Bray with 2 kiddos in tow, how he integrates social media into his studio practice, and the vulnerability it takes to change the style of our work when also making a living from that work. This is a conversation I know I personally will be returning to frequently. You’ve heard me end every ep...
May 06, 2022•1 hr 13 min•Season 3Ep. 48
Send us a text It’s taken me longer than expected to finish writing this episode. But I suppose that should come as no surprise given the constant influx of world news being thrown at us. At times like this, just like in 2020 and so many other moments of social awakening in the last few years, our work as artists can feel disconnected with the immediate needs of the world. On this week’s solo episode, I’m peeling back the curtain on how I process that for myself. Alongside my originally planned ...
Mar 26, 2022•38 min•Season 2Ep. 47
Send us a text Do you think of the word “business” as a dirty word? Does the idea of starting a business seem like the last thing that might bring about the change we so desperately need in the world? Could a business possibly do as much good for our communities as a non-profit organization? Well, this week’s podcast guest is building a business on their terms. And it’s one creating quite an impact. Phi Le has built their community pottery studio, Illuminated Clay, specifically focused on not on...
Mar 11, 2022•1 hr 7 min•Season 2Ep. 46
Send us a text Burnout - If it wasn’t a word in your vocabulary before 2020, it probably is now. It’s a topic talked about a lot in the land of the self-employed and generally, the tactics for avoiding it are always given by someone who’s just recently, slowly, crawling out of it. But don’t worry - Nicole Dacey and I aren’t going to give you any of those tactics you’ve heard a million times. No, instead, we settled in for a simple, candid, straightforward conversation about the twists and turns ...
Mar 04, 2022•1 hr 21 min•Season 2Ep. 45
Send us a text What if you set up your life around one non-negotiable? How would that inform the decisions you make every day? How would that change your day-to-day schedule - where you live, what you choose to do for work (if it’s outside of the non-negotiable), how you commute… all of it. Maybe it’s a radical idea, but when I heard today’s podcast guest, Mike Tavares, describe this decision it was a big lightbulb moment. For full show notes visit: makersplaybook.com/podcast DON'T MISS OUT...
Feb 18, 2022•52 min•Season 2Ep. 44
Send us a text What’s the through-line for everyone thinking about going full-time with their art? Or even for those who are already full-time and self-employed? No matter what, aside from a slightly obsessive passion for our craft the big elephant in the room for us all is Risk. And today’s podcast guest stared risk in the face and said yes anyway. She said yes to moving cross country and yes to taking on the overhead of a storefront studio in the hopes of propelling her business farther forwar...
Feb 11, 2022•59 min•Season 2Ep. 43
Send us a text Our first ever panel is on the podcast this week! I’m chatting with not one, but two of the founding members of the Village Potters Clay Center in Asheville, North Carolina - a brilliant community studio that clearly has cracked the code on not only helping potters and artists push themselves creatively but also in creating sustainable partnerships and viable businesses. So basically, they are all living the dream… If you are searching for your own community of support, hang tight...
Feb 04, 2022•1 hr 15 min•Season 2Ep. 42
Send us a text The Big Announcement: We've added ONE MORE Free Webinar about the 4 Most Common Instagram Photography Mistakes (and how to avoid them. Yes, even with your cell phone). Click here to reserve your seat for this LIVE class on January 26th at 2:30pm CST. Today, my photography tips come directly from a recent email conversation I was having with another maker about how things “should” look on Instagram. As in, do all of your photos have to have the same colors so the feed looks co...
Jan 21, 2022•26 min•Season 2Ep. 41
Send us a text Photography can be overwhelming if you don’t have an efficient system for it. But it is possible to have an efficient system for it! And if you don’t believe on that - because you’ve been totally exhausted and frustrated by the google search results so far... Well, I’ve asked a few past students to share their experiences today on the podcast. If you are a maker looking to create your own efficient photography system, than be sure to join me in our Free LIVE Webinar next week! You...
Jan 14, 2022•34 min•Season 2Ep. 40
Send us a text Have you ever thought, "If I only had a larger Instagram following then..." But have you thought about what it would really take to do that? How many hours it would take to create the content to grow that audience? There's no one that knows that reality much better than the one and only Curt Hammerly of Hammerly Ceramics. And as Curt mentioned at the end, crucial to all of this is good photos! So if you are looking for a resource SPECIFIC to ceramicists and makers o...
Jan 07, 2022•59 min•Season 2Ep. 39
Send us a text Our final new interview episode before a little holiday and end-of-year break is an insightful one. So often all of us can feel like we're behind... As if we could be so much farther along with our making practices or small business had we only known 10 years ago that this is what we were going to want to do. But what if all those disparate life experiences are actually creating the precise set of skills you might need in the future to in fact launch your business? In big and...
Dec 17, 2021•46 min•Season 2Ep. 38
