Make and Decorate with Stephanie: Sew, Quilt, Knit & Home Decor

S7 E118: Guest Carina Gardner

• Stephanie Socha • Season 7 • Episode 118

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On this episode, my guest is Carina Gardner, a successful designer and entrepreneur, shares her journey and insights on how to make money as a designer. She emphasizes the importance of being a multifaceted designer and knowing when to pivot into different industries. Karina discusses her Design Suite program, which teaches designers how to make their design businesses profitable by offering a range of courses in various design areas. Carina highlights the misconceptions around building a brand and the importance of understanding distribution channels. Carina just launched her online University of Arts & Design. Online Courses for budding designers and artists that are flexible, fulfilling, and transformative.

Links: 

Carinagarnder.com

Carina Gardiner Shop

Design Bootcamp :  Intro to Design Suite

Design Suite

University of Arts & Design

Stephanie's Guest appearance on Carina's Make and Design Podcast

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YOUTUBE: Stephanie Socha Design

I'm very excited to introduce you to my guest on this episode, Karina Gardner. Karina has a PhD in design from the University of Minnesota. She taught design at the University of Minnesota and the Art Institute before starting her design business, which includes surface pattern design, SVG designs, and die cut for designer for silhouette. Karina was the creative director of Carta Bella scrapbook papers. Her kids brand, Mini Lou, has sold products for Nordstrom, Peek Clothing, and 500 independent retailers and museums in the US. Karina is the CEO of Design Suite, a surface pattern and crafting design program that teaches designers how to make money as they learn to design. And her popular, as if she's not doing enough, her popular Make and Design podcast also teaches aspiring designers how to make the transition from crafter and hobbyist to profitable designer. So welcome, Corinna. I'm so happy to have you. I I'm so excited to be here. I had you on our podcast earlier and I just think this is a really fun place because you're doing so many cool things in the makerspace right now too. Yeah, it's really interesting. I'm so happy that your people contacted me because you actually have people. I do not yet. anyway, yeah, so let's just talk about everything that's going on. But before, I just want to know, just give us a bit of your story of just how this happened and what is it that you enjoy about because you really have to like being a creative. making things or crafting or designing. Yeah, so first of all, I have to say like my undergraduate degree is actually in communications, not in design. And I made a transition when I started my master's degree and decided to do it in design and I ended up getting a PhD in design. And that really, in some ways felt like a very accidental path I ended up on. But I loved it. I loved design way more than marketing communications, which is what my undergrad degree was in. And so I started freelancing. I got into this crazy thing called digital scrapbooking early on, which led me into the crafting industry. I never thought I would be in the crafting industry. It was almost kind of like a naughty word in the world of design because it didn't seem like as cool and as sleek. As you and I both know, because we're both in quilting and we're in surface pattern and fabric and die cut, like this field is incredible. And it's one of the coolest fields because it's an actual active maker space. And so because of that, I just feel super grateful that I'm in this space because it's really incredibly cool. I have been in it now for about 16 and a half years. That's when I started Karina Gardner, Inc. Three and a half years ago is when we started Design Suite and it's only in the last two. We launched it, like officially launched it in July, our new university, the University of Arts and Design. And we'll talk about all those different things, but a lot of people, sometimes people think I've just gone really, really fast. I really went pretty slow, I would say, you know, because it's 16 and a half years. I've been doing this for a long time. I think the last, I would say three and a half years have been the craziest growth I've ever seen. was a solopreneur for many of those years, or I was the creative director of another institution. I have like a fly. I can't seem to get rid of it. So I don't know if this is videotaping, but I'm like sweeping away a fly as I'm talking. Anyway, the bottom line is that it's been a lot longer of a road than most people realize because a lot of people are finding me now. And they're like, my gosh, I had no idea. Like, yeah, I've bought your stuff before. And I bought your stuff at Michael's back in the day. And I bought your stuff at my mind's eye and your fabric lines. they like, you know, a lot of design is unknown. People don't know who you are and what you're doing. So you just like quietly just keep doing what you're supposed to be doing in order to create a massively successful design business. And really in the last three years, I've just kind of made that switch over to education. because I found that most people didn't know how to do it and I was happy to teach it. That is so true. Most people don't know. And there's just so many different ways to get into it. And what is out there tends to tell people you can only do it one way, which you know is not true. And I think it's really great that you are offering this because, like you said earlier, craft design is really not taken that seriously by the professionals or who the higher authorities may be. And so you've done something really interesting in creating design suite. And now just recently you are working on actual university. So that's an online university, correct? Yeah. online. It is based in Utah. So, and we're currently, cause it's brand new. We're only licensed in 23 states. So it'll take us the next three years to get fully licensed in all the states. So you'll just, it's like a crazy, incredible process, but yeah, I agree with you. People don't realize that there are lots of ways you can do this and it should be flexible with. who you are and what you wanna do. A lot of times people tell you, you have to do it this way and this is the only way to do it. Truthfully, there's a gazillion ways, but there are some things we all kinda have to do to get us there. Yeah. And so let's talk about your design suite, because that's been around for a bit. And tell us what that is and what it's intended to do to help people make their business profitable. Yeah, I mean, so life would have been a lot easier if I had just chosen one type of design and just taught people how to do that. What I found was that's not how I made a lot of money in my career. I made a lot of money because I was a multifaceted designer and I knew when to pivot. When something in an industry started going not so great, I could pivot into another industry. So I kind of became a little anti teaching single. focus things like if I only teach you fabric design and that's all you end up doing, I've kind of done you a disservice because I don't know how long that area is going to be popular trending that's going to make you money versus if I teach you how to do sticker design and I teach you how to do fabric design and I teach you how to do wallpaper and I teach you how to do printables and I teach you how to do SVG files. Suddenly you have a broad enough range of understanding how these different markets work and suddenly you should have the critical thinking skills so that when something new comes in, you can hop into it if you want or pivot into it. And because of that, our program in a lot of ways is very simple for the individual but complicated on our end. So one of the things that we do is we basically meet you wherever you want to start. We have some general rules and guidelines. We have a workbook that basically says, Here's like 12 different plans. These are the courses you should take based on the plans and what you should be doing. But then our coaches meet with you and you come to weekly meetings where we're still diving into the real particulars. What I've decided about design and what you guys will hear out there on podcasts, Instagram, YouTube, what I like to call it is like the MBA. It's general information. doesn't... actually, it tells you good things. Like it's going to tell you, got to be consistent in design. You got to do social media and you have to build a brand. But like when it comes down to it, the only way we actually build businesses that make money is on the individual level. So like if I literally come to Stephanie and I say, Hey, Stephanie, I really want to build a wallpaper business. Where should I go to open my first shop? Having someone on the other side say, I think you should go this place, this place, and this place. They give you three different places. And then by the way, these two shops I see people don't make very much money in. So I'd focus all my attention on this shop. That is where the money is. And that's what we do in Design Suite. We're actually, because we've dug into the numbers, we're looking across the field. We've got so many designers working in things. We can tell everybody what they're doing. And the other thing that we recently did is we finally, we were way above this. we finally started capping the number of members to a hundred, which, you know, for some people, they'd be like, I can't believe you capping it, Karina. But what we found was like, we could really reasonably work very closely with about a hundred members really, really well. And when we were too far under that, we didn't get enough information. When we were too far over that, we couldn't get to everyone we wanted to. And we do have weekly meetings. You have meetings with your coach and all that. But we just felt like we could service very, very well at that level. And so that's the way we feel like good business should be done. It should be up close, personal, and should be actually advised to you and tailored to your business. Yeah, it's customized. it's like, you know, you're going, let's say you're going to shop for a sofa and it's just like the one size fits all. It's not how it works. The level of comfort is different. Some people like softer, firmer cushions and some like a real deep curl up and watch movies. So it's similar to what you guys are doing with individuals in their businesses, which is great because one size does not fit all in any business. Ha ha! And people sometimes say to me like, well, like if you're teaching this to everyone and I was like, well, I'm not, we have a hundred people. Do you know how many shops are on Etsy alone? 20 million, 20 million. And it's like, people don't realize like the people who are really, really good, like they're getting a ton of education, they're getting mastermind and they're knowing exactly what they need to do. That's just Etsy. That doesn't include, we have a huge like hundred something directory of shops that we work with and It's like, there is so many ways to go. Like the design market is not oversaturated. It's just that you haven't figured out what your part in it or your piece is. And because you haven't figured that out, you're not gonna be able to make money. Right, right. So that is your design suite. 100 people. And what about the level of experience someone should have before opting to do that program? Like, do you have to already have sold stuff and you're just kind of coming in there to tweak your business and get in the right direction? Or can you be someone who's like, This is kind of, I am kind of switching directions here and this is what I want to do. So now I just want to like know how to do it, but I don't have product sold yet or, you know, like digital patterns or SVG files, that sort of thing. So once again, this is one of the reasons our program is far more complicated for us than for the individual coming in is that we will take people at any place they are in the process. It's actually one of the things that motivated us to open up the university as well, because what we found is we do get a lot of people who have actually zero software skills. Like they haven't started a business. They don't have software skills. So we have 17 courses in the program. that they get immediate access to because what we do is we kind of tailor the coursework. We're like, okay, you want to get in SVG design. Okay, so based on that, I want you to take introduction for Illustrator for beginners, then let's hop into the Silhouette Designer Master Class, which actually covers not just Silhouette, Cricut and Glowforge and all that as well. And sometimes we'll even say which modules we want them to take. Like they don't have to take an entire class. We're like, you want to do only 3D design? Okay, so you're just going to take this section. I think that ability to customize is a really interesting thing because what happens is we really get the ability to bypass things that we have to do if we're getting a bachelor's degree, right? So if you're getting a bachelor's degree, it's like you have to take every single class all the way through. Design Suite was really built to fast track people. That's why it's a year long and it gets people through much quicker. What we found is there are some people who really do just need that university level, like take every class in chronological order to get their business where it needs to be. And, and, and we can tell based on personality. If you're someone who's like, I will bring the effort. I'm going to show up to classes. I'm going to do the work. Like you're really self -motivated design suite is really the place for you. Cause you'll, you'll move forward based on what you want to do. If you need someone to really, really guide you and handhold you. A university platform is a really good place for that, which is why we kind of built that platform. And it's four semesters, so two years to finish, in essence, what we do in a single year in Design Suite. Okay, that sounds great. So, what was the other thing I was gonna ask you? You had mentioned, actually I did purchase your boot camp. So Karina, this is recording in August and I don't know how often you do offer the live boot camps. Maybe we should find that out first. it used to be we'd only do a live one like once every three or four months. And then recently we've kind of moved it almost to a monthly schedule, but we'll have certain months off. So you kind of have to look, it's at designsuitecourses .com slash design bootcamp. And we used to also just have a replay. It wouldn't be live, but I recently moved it back to live because if anybody's been paying attention to the economy, economy has been changing. And so based on that, I have to kind of revise what I'm telling people to do and how we're doing it in bootcamp. So you'll see that like I kind of fit it to whatever group of people is coming, some of the questions they're asking to make sure that we're on point when it comes to, you know, what's happening in the business portion of things. So I know you came to a bootcamp, which is super fun. And like, I actually should ask you like, How did that go? did you learn some things? Well, I'm just part way through it, I mean, just, I think I have three videos in and you have like five, right? Yeah. Bonuses, yeah, yeah, I'm looking forward to those. But I was completely, like I thought going in it, I thought, you know, it's gonna be the standard, what I've seen other places and it completely was not. And I was sort of like awestruck and blown away. it just kind of like messed with my mind a little bit to just rearrange my expectations and thoughts about how I really should go about this. It's a very good introduction to your year -long program because that is an investment of not only time, but of course, financial. And I think that's one of the best ways that you could do it is just going on there with those introductory overview videos of how it's done. really, it's kind of like eliminating those preconceived notions as to what you are stepping into. That's what I thought, just only with the first three. And in fact, one of the videos you said that like, for your first, what, 10 months, you made $300, and then when you switched platforms, not, it made total sense. Like people think they need to do a website and draw the traffic in, do all of this brand, you know, creating your brand and stuff, nobody, it's like you could build it, they will come, but they don't, because they don't know who you are or where you're at, and it makes total sense. And then when you went on these other shop platforms that have the traffic, have all of that, what did you make? You made like some crazy number in. Yeah, I think I, the first month I was there, I made $300. So I made the same amount in the first month as I had done the first 10 months. The second month, I don't remember what I made, but I remember by month, yeah, by month three, I was doing $1 ,000 a month. And at the height of that particular store, I was doing about $4 ,000 a month. And I will tell you, that is a low end number for me in terms of design shops. Like that is a low number. So I have design shops who make substantially more. And so, Once I started realizing nobody else was making this kind of money, like I knew of a few other designers who were making this kind of money, but it's like no one got it because they were busy making their own websites and thinking if I build it, should come. I mean, you're exactly right. The field of dreams is like, if I build it, guys, no one's coming. No one is coming. And believe me, I've been experiencing that with this podcast for the last six years. So I love doing it, but it would be nice if it could be monetized. you know, it's like my website, but who, you know, I have listeners like you do around the world, but still, are they going to seek out just the website? Probably not. I mean, they're going to their podcast platforms. That's, you know, Apple and Spotify and all of them. Those are the sort of shops that carry the product, right? Yeah. got it, right? Like most people don't think of it in that way. It's because you have a podcast. You understand how this all works. But it's like trying to twist everyone's brains to think about things right, because we've all been fed so many wrong things, because the problem is that we've been listening to general business people. Right? Or we're listening to people who are teachers who don't own businesses. I find that actually to be one of the strongest worst things I've seen out there. Or people who say, well, I did it back then and they don't do it now. It's so crazy because my design businesses are still up and going and they contribute to my overall income and people don't realize it. They're like, well, Karina must make all her money just from her education. Now I have nine platforms, I'm a fabric designer, we still do deals with people. I just recently did a deal last year with Sawgrass being one of their featured designers. Like I'm a designer. And so because I do run several things within my own design business and I have a team that specifically helps me with that, I can tell you right now that everything that's being said out there, it's all true. It's totally right. There's nothing wrong with it. It's just usually not the way anybody starts out. Nobody starts out by building a brand. Nobody starts out with their own website. Nobody starts, it's like they're, it's not, they're not trying to lie to you. They just either don't know or they can't remember what it was like. Right, right. Yeah. And passive income too is kind of like what you're also sort of referencing too, I think, even though you're doing new deals. But, you know, that's another facet of. will tell you, I haven't had a lot of time to design. So I've been relying on passive income for the last two years while I've been running design suite and starting this university because that income just keeps coming in. we actually just, I was just telling Stephanie, we have our team retreats. We have a Filipino team and we have a U .S. team and then we have some people other places as well. So I'll zoom in from our retreats for meetings. And one of the things on the agenda, is how do we give Karina more time in her design businesses and a little bit less time as CEOs of these two companies? What can we take off Karina so that she can design more so that we can build up those companies? And people don't realize that because they just think this must all come so easy. Guys, it's business. Business is not easy. And most of the time we have fallacy in thinking because we're looking at free stuff. The more we look at free stuff, the more we're looking at what everybody else is saying. So we actually have very little knowledge of what's really happening. Right, right. And another thing that I had kind of resigned myself to is that it's just one person. Business can't really aspire to the things that your students have done and you have done. So that is also empowering, I think, and really just needed because everybody feels that imposter syndrome, including myself. then you just feel like, it's all crap. All the stuff I do is crap. What am I trying to do here? never the case. It is never the case with creatives. Actually, all the stuff creatives make, most of it is actually really, really good. It's just, there are a couple of things going on. The first is you've probably not made enough of it to find your market. The second is you might be on a platform that doesn't have that market. So we have to put you in places where you actually are gonna be seen, right? You haven't been to day four and day five. And day four, talk about the four ways you make money. And day five, I talk about distribution. So I show you all the distribution channels and how it works. And it's like, people just don't have that education because they haven't been in business long enough, or you've never worked for a corporation and seen those channels. And so I'm trying to lay out like a foundation for understanding why certain things are easier than others and why some things are really hard. The number one thing I have people tell me, and this is how I know they haven't had a real good education on distribution channels. is they say, I wanna be in Target. And I'm like, that is like, there are so many fallacies around that. Because to get into Target as a designer, you have to be Joanne Gaines or Shay McGee. And what are they? They're not designers. They're influencers. They are people with huge, big brands. Shay McGee is not building the furniture and having it created and put in Target. She's got to deal with Threshold or someone else, right? That is... that is not a designer. So you wanna be an influencer, you're in the wrong business, you need to go get a TV show and do something. And so people get really confused about what they really wanna do. They say, I wanna be a designer and I'm like, okay, because it's not exactly what you're thinking it is. Being a designer is the person who actually does the work on the computer or the physical work if you're an artist. They're the ones who are actually doing the work and then either putting it in and sometimes it doesn't have your name on it. There was a time period where if you walked down the Michael's aisle, it was like a lot of it was my stuff, but it was under the recollections brand. It wasn't under my name. We were white labeling it because that's what a designer does. Now, are there things with my brand on it? Yes, when I did a deal with Deseret Book, you could find dishware with the Karina Gardner brand on it. But like that wasn't always the case. It would be a mix because that's what a designer does. Yeah. So yeah, was it like that with your Nordstrom, what's Mini -Loo? deal with Mini Lu. So Mini Lu did have its brand on everything. We didn't white label it. It was its own brand. So that deal came from sales reps. Once again, like people think like I was doing a deal specifically with Nordstrom. No, no, no, no, I was not. I had sales reps that I had hired. They were close to the buyer at Nordstrom. And so I made deals through the sales reps. And that's the thing about most distribution channels. There's usually several mediums in the way. whether it's a retailer or another buyer, and you have to go through those channels in order to get the deal made. So all of this is part of your design suite. And like you said, if you need more of it from beginning to end, your university, which is great. And then I also encourage my listeners to listen to Karina's podcast as well, because they're nice short little episodes. And you have a specific topic. You have a bunch of guests. And it's nice to hear. It's always, at least for me, And I think my listeners are the same, is that we like to actual other people that have experienced stuff or that they have, you know what I mean? Like, not just like, here, do these three steps, but someone who's done it, who's excited about it, has a passion for it, that really gets us excited and motivated and going. So. we do a little bit of a mix. Sometimes we have Design Suite members come on. We're actually gonna be heading into maybe doing a few more with the coaches as well, which I think is really fascinating. So we actually have a second podcast. It's a paid exclusive podcast called the Design Your Life podcast. That podcast, the coaches come on. This is so crazy. So two of our coaches, Shara and Julie get on. every single month and they do a recap episode. And these are, think, more delightful than my episodes because the two of them get on and they basically rehash what they think works and doesn't work and what I've been talking about and how it's been affecting their lives. It's more of like a liken it to us. Like this is what's happening in our design lives to make these things happen. And they do a rehash like on top of our regular episodes that we do. That's really fun. We're gonna kind of probably bring that to the Make and Design podcast because it has been so popular in our paid podcast. I don't know when this episode is coming out, but actually it's kind of a little bit of a secret, but the Design Your Life episode traditionally has always been a paid podcast. Okay, so by this time we've already added it to... Design Suite. So Design Suite is going to be always getting the Design Your Life podcast while they're active members. And the same with the university. Since this is our first semester with the university, we've been trying to decide how do we keep them up to date with what's really happening in the industry. So we decided to give them the Design Your Life podcast because that is a podcast that I tend to spill a little bit more, you know, and when I say a little bit more, I mean a lot more. Like I'll be like, okay guys, this is like seriously what's going on on Etsy or this is like seriously the softening economy, this is how it's going to affect everybody. or I see this is trending right now and like you guys got to be careful about this. So, if you're interested in that, that podcast is like the secret, amazing leak that most people don't know about. And, in the past, it's, it doesn't even have an opener. It doesn't have a closer. It is literally me getting on and just being like, guys, this is what's happening. This is, this is how I'm feeling about things. And, you know, here you go. So. Okay, so the paid podcast, is it just for the people in your programs or is this also on a platform where you just subscribe and you get those episodes? Yeah, so we actually opened it up to the public a few months ago so that anybody could get on it. So we've been having a lot of people signing up for it's $33 a month. You can subscribe and cancel anytime. and it's available at, I believe you need to go design, sweet courses .com slash design event or design events. can't remember which one of those it is, but in that you'll see all of our upcoming events. So we do always one in -person event a year. This, this year it's going to be in March, three days of design. with us and our coaches live. We do four summits every year. now, you're probably, if it's in October, the next summit is the Design, Craft and Business Summit. Totally free to come. Everyone comes for free. If you want to buy the All Access Pass, you get it for lifetime access, which people like. Yeah. So we do four of those events every year. And then you'll also see on there the Make and Design Podcast, the Design Your Life Podcast. a link to see what we do in Design Suite, which is pretty skeleton because we don't love just letting everybody know about it. I know it's a little bit weird, but it's because once you come in, it's more about the experience of meeting people, being in our community. do video chat with everyone. We just do things different than you'll see just about any program out there does, and it's because we're so hands -on. I like that though, because I just joined a sewing, like what did she call it? Online community, it's only, you know, she only takes enrollment certain times of the year. She keeps it a little smaller. There's monthly lives, classes, and then like the group just kind of, it's on circle. it's. It's a nice little community, and it sounds similar to what you're talking about there. I'm only like a few months in, but it's been really nice, and you really get to know everyone, including the creator. And she brings in other designers and people that help out. So yeah, I like that format. I think it's well worth it. Yeah, I do too, because I think that part of the reason, especially as women that we join programs, is to be with other women who are doing the same thing we are trying to do, right? It just, it makes a huge difference to have a friend. What do they say? Like the reason that people continue to go to church or continue to go to a club or whatever is because you go with your friends. Like it's easier to go to the gym if you're going with a friend, right? So true. That's great. Well, this will definitely, this will go up in October and we'll have links to your website and everything else that we need links to. And yeah, I just thank you so much, Karina, for coming on. I really appreciate it and have already learned so much just from your podcast. and this bootcamp. So I'm glad that you offer it so often too, so that my listeners can hop on. And if it's something that they like to do, then they can do it. And we have now found you. I am, I'm a little secretive because it's so funny. were just talking about, before we started, one of the things I tell people not to do is don't start in social media. It's like one of the worst things you can do. And people like, are like, why? And then I have to explain in bootcamp why I believe that. And it's so funny because for years and years and years, nobody even knew who I was. And I was like, that's the beauty of this. Like no one you can make. six multiple six figures as a designer and no one know who the heck you are. My sister's actually like this. has zero brand zero brand. makes $300 ,000 a year. It's like people don't realize how much money you can make and nobody know who you are. Now I do think once you want to start making a lot more than that, you have to build social media and brand presence and all that other stuff. But I think there's like a misnomer out there that you have to do all these things. And that's really not the case. Not if you're doing it smart and most people it's because you've got misinformation because you're getting it for free. I will tell you every day of the week, every time I listen to something free, I'm like, my gosh, so right. Also not telling you the whole story. Right, right. So yeah, I just about dropped my jaw when you said don't focus on the social media. And that's something that I've struggled with as well, because they're like, you have to post every day, a couple of times a day. And I just don't have that time because of one person, plus I do other jobs. So I always felt bad about it. But then like last year, I'm like, you know what? I'm not. Okay, so I only have like, you know, 750 followers. So what, you know, the ones that I get don't leave. So I was sort of like proud of that. Yeah, well, and to illustrate this point again, so we, I know this is coming out in October, but we're a little bit, we're like two weeks before the university starts its fall semester. The fall semester, we only had basically two months, a little bit less than two months to market it to get students enrolled. And I will tell you, we got up to 50 % fully enrolled in only one week of starting. And it wasn't from social media, because we weren't doing very much posting. So where does it come from, right? It has to come from other places and probably one of the number one places is email marketing or Facebook ads. So it's like, you've got to like choose the ways that are going to make the most sense, but most people aren't telling you that. They're telling you, this organically, do this free. And man, that is really, really, really hard. It really is. Well, thanks again. It was just an honor and a pleasure to speak with you. yeah, so good luck and continued success. Thank you.

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