Proof to Product 022 | Emma James & Bailey Rivera, Antiquaria on pivoting in business, prioritizing personal happiness, and working with a business partner
Emma James and Bailey Rivera are the owners of Antiquaria. These savvy business women have made some big transitions in their business over the last 7 years. They started selling vintage pieces, hand calligraphic work and now focus their product line on stationery products such as gift wrap, notebooks and greeting cards.
They attended our Paper Camp E-Course in 2013 prior to launching wholesale. Their products are currently carried in Anthropologie, BHLDN, Paper Source, Terrain and independent boutiques internationally.
On today’s episode, they’ll tell their story of starting the business, talk about how pivoting at different points strengthened their business model and how prioritizing their personal happiness has enabled them to grow too. They also shared nuggets about what inspires them when creating new products as well as logistics for how they determine which product categories to tackle next.
ON TODAY’S EPISODE:
- How Emma & Bailey first met
- The history of Antiquaria and the pivots they have made in their product offerings
- What inspires you when you're developing new artwork and new products
- Emma & Bailey’s thoughts on how much inventory to order & how much they keep on hand
- The importance of knowing your numbers and ensuring you maintain your profit margins
- How Emma & Bailey share the responsibilities of Antiquaria from different cities
- Working through transitional periods together
- How they make their packaging stand out while also still being conservative with production costs
- How they define success in their business
- What’s next for Antiquaria
KEY TAKE-AWAYS:
“Bailey and I are really good at knowing when to make changes and not being scared to do it.” - Emma James
“The cost of expanding, adding a new product, is super expensive, so we try to be smart and conservative about where we expand” - Emma James
“It's okay to start small. And as your business grows and you start to hone in on your numbers, and you start to see what your selling patterns are, that's where you want to reassess and start to increase your production amounts, your volume.” - Katie Hunt
“We're all running businesses, and therefore, we need to look at the hard costs, and we need to be paying ourselves, and we need to be thinking about things like retirement, or just scaling the business, and all of these different things that, when you're just starting out, it might feel a little overwhelming.” - Katie Hunt
“We have to make sure our margins work on every new product.” - Emma James
“When there's something that's not working for one of us, we actively work for a solution to it.” - Emma James
“How can we get all the information that's needed on there without having to pay for an additional labor or people and the labor of putting it on? That's just a graphic design challenge.” - Bailey Rivera
“If you're not making money on this, you shouldn't be selling it. It's not a viable business at that point.” - Katie Hunt
“I want to both fulfill my creative desires and create a very successful business that can continue to grow.” - Bailey Rivera
“Success for us is getting reorders and knowing that, not only buyers like our stuff, but people are going into stores and picking our products over all of the other products in that store.” - Emma James
“Success for me is having a healthy work, life balance.” - Emma James
MEET EMMA & BAILEY
Emma has a BFA from Parsons the New School for Design, The New School for Design, and worked as a trend forecaster for several years before co-founding Antiquaria. Emma loves art, design, horses and resides in Austin, Texas with her daughter, Sydney.
Bailey has a BS in Retail Merchandising from the University of Texas at Austin and was a stylist in her former life. Bailey gets teased endlessly for being the old lady of the duo she loves to knit, garden, and bake homemade bread (yum!). Bailey lives in Littleton, Colorado with her husband and two cats.
CONNECT:
Website: www.shopantiquaria.com/
Facebook: @antiquaria
Instagram: @antiquariadesign
JOIN THE TSBC FAMILY:
Our Paper Camp E-Course is now enrolling! If you’d like to see your products on the shelves of your favorite retail shops or if you’re considering exhibiting at large scale wholesale shows, join us this fall for our virtual Paper Camp course. Get more details and snag your seat here.
ABOUT PROOF TO PRODUCT:
Proof to Product is brought to you by Tradeshow Bootcamp and hosted by Katie Hunt. Since 2011, TSBC has worked with hundreds of product based businesses to help them up level, scale, and build profitable sustainable companies. You can find our show notes and additional resources at ProofToProduct.com. If you like what you heard today, please head over to Apple Podcast to leave a five star review and subscribe. Thanks so much for listening. We'll be back next week with a new episode.