Category: Business Development

apparel design, Business Development, business education, Customer Service, Entrepreneur, sewing contractor, Women Business Owners

Online Tutorials for Sewing Contractors

As a sewing contractor, I am always searching for more information to be able to create the best products I can for my customers. In this 20 minute blog post, I am listing four tutorial resources that I’ve found helpful.

Kathleen Fasanella

I can’t say enough positive things about Kathleen. Her singular devotion to the success of sewing contractors and apparel designers is legendary. I recommend her book, The Entrepreneur’s Guide to Sewn Product Manufacturing to many designers I meet. It’s thorough, easy to read, and chock full of useful info. She even includes examples of documents you can use to keep track of your garment production processes. In addition, her website, Fashion-Incubator: Lessons from the Sustainable Factory Floor contains her blog, tweets, class list and great links.

The Rowley Company

The Rowley Company is my wholesale supplier for pillow forms, tools and machine parts. I featured them in my post about suppliers a few months back. They also have a lengthy list of webinars and how-to videos about anything related to manufacturing home decor items. If you want to know how to make a home dec item and find all the necessary parts (except the decorator fabrics) Rowley should be your source.

Sewing Parts Online

I just came across Sewing Parts Online a week or so ago while searching for sewing machine attachments. Most of the blog posts and videos seem to be geared toward home sewists. But I found a few, including this one about types of thread, which can be helpful to designers and manufacturers alike.

YouTube

If you’re considering buying a new machine or attachment for your workroom, you can find great demos on YouTube. In the search bar, type in “Industrial __________Machine Demo.” Fill in the blank with the machine you want to see such as a coverstitch machine. Most of the videos are from manufacturers, so you can do some comparison shopping before purchasing.

Hope you find this post helpful! Be sure to add any tips you have on finding online tutorials in the comments.

 

Business Development, business ownership

The Wisdom of Seasoned Entrepreneurs

Jeff Haden’s recent article for Inc. magazine made me feel really happy for two reasons.

Meeting to scale up a business

1. He reassured me that I am in the right place at the right time.

2. He justified my opinion about what’s wrong with Facebook.

The article, “A Study of 2.7 Million Startups Found the Ideal Age to Start a Business (and It’s Much Older Than You Think),” expands on the conclusions of the study conducted by the Census Bureau and some folks at MIT. Here’s a demonstrative stat:

“A 60-year-old startup founder is 3 times as likely to found a successful startup as a 30-year-old startup founder–and is 1.7 times as likely to found a startup that winds up in the top 0.1 percent of all companies.”

Does this mean that 30 year olds shouldn’t bother starting companies? Of course not. I started my first successful business when I was in my 30’s while raising two kids. It does mean that as you age, if you pay attention, you pick up massive amounts of experience that can then lead to habits, thought processes, and abilities that will give you the wisdom to have a better chance at success. Older people have usually been through tough times, setbacks and situations where they had to ask for help. Having those experiences will support that great idea that you have. I’m scaling up my third successful business now in my 50’s, secure in my direction and my ability to execute because of what I’ve endured in the past and the knowledge that I have gathered.

Which leads me to the second, related reason why Haden’s article made me happy. The study he highlights has reassured me that my opinion about Facebook is justified. (We can view Facebook’s ongoing difficulties as a case study about the importance of developing wisdom as an entrepreneur.) The issues that Mr. Zuckerberg and his associates have created for themselves (and the rest of the world’s population that is, or will be, connected to the internet) are mostly due to lack of humility, the inability to foresee outcomes and the lack of understanding of human needs and nature. I am absolutely sure that, early in the formation of the company, they could have found numerous folks over 50 with enough experience to help them create a platform that is not so misguided, blatantly manipulative, and a haven for the worst behaviors of human kind. Just had to put that out there.

Please take a few minutes to read Jeff Haden’s article no matter what age you are. It’s short, and contains a lot of useful info. If you’re over 50, it will make you feel really good about starting your business!

Business Development, Business Success, Entrepreneur, sewing contractor, social enrepreneur, Women Business Owners

Entrepreneur Blogging: A New Model?

Blogging for Entrepreneurs Who Have No Time to Blog

Meeting to scale up a businessHere’s an idea! How about if entrepreneurs who blog as a part of their business get to compose, edit and market a blog post in 10-20 minutes? Here’s why I’m proposing this new model. As you can tell if you look at the frequency of my posts, they are infrequent! From what I have seen on websites I visit, I’m not the only one with this problem. When I review the analytics of this website, I can see dips in visits in between my posts. Not a good thing. Whenever I think about posting, I have no problem with generating ideas, I just can’t seem to set enough time aside to compose the recommended 700-1000 words complete with the proper titles, links, categories, tags, images, etc. Is this you? Is a 10-20 minute blog post optimal? Maybe not. But, is it better than nothing at all? Absolutely! So, until I have a break between filling customer orders which I can use to write a full blog post, I’ll be creating short posts on ideas, issues, and questions I’m thinking about in 20 minutes or less. I’m going to focus mainly on info that readers will find helpful and thought provoking. My first installment is below. Follow my blog for more!

The CT Small Business Development Center

I am currently working on scaling up United Sewing and Design, which is a daunting process but exciting and fulfilling as well. I can’t say enough about my mentor Jim Jackson from the Small Business Development Center. I meet with him in the Middlesex County Chamber of Commerce on Main St. in Middletown. He has experience in most of the business issues I’m working on: customer relations, manufacturing, lean practices, business structure, and more. And on top of all that good stuff, it’s free. If you’re an entrepreneur, a social entrepreneur like me, a business owner or are thinking of starting a business, I highly encourage you to connect with them right away.