We
just had to feature Austin Craft Mafia first up,
and Jenny Hart was kind enough to spill a few familia secrets
to Susan.
Mille grazie!
Austin
Craft Mafia got started almost three years
ago when Jenny Hart of Sublime Stitching got in touch with fellow entrepreneur
Tina Lockwood of Sparkle Craft. As Jenny says, "I wanted to meet someone
who had a small business, so I could pick her
brain and test my ideas on her. She brought along
her friend Jennifer Perkins of Naughty Secretary
Club and a crafty triumvirate was immediately
born. Shortly after that, we started sharing
ad space together. We realized that we could
make more headway by banding together and supporting
each other, rather than advertising separately
in smaller, more dispersed ads, in competition
with each other."
As the three businesses
grew, the owners kept getting together to talk
shop and share resources over dinner and drinks.
Jenny says another benefit of sticking together
is sharing publicity: "In
any press that came our way, if I was interviewed, I'd be sure
to mention their businesses as well." The Austin creative business
community hosts Babes in Business Bonanzas the last Thursday of
each month, and Jenny, Tina, and Jennifer met more and more like-minded
women. Little by little, their meetings swelled to include nine
Austin businesswomen, and their strategy of sharing ad space and
business advice expanded too. The Mafia was born.
Tina serves as consigliore
of the family during business meetings: "When
there's an agenda, Tina is the person in charge of outlining it
and directing the discussion. She's really the guiding figure,
the person who makes sure we all follow up on meeting notes, etc.
But we're all so busy, very often our meetings simply take place
online in the ACM discussion forum."
The Mafiosa also get together
just for fun: "At Christmas time
we had a gift swap at my house. We all got gussied up, lit a bunch
of candles, put on 'A Charlie Brown Christmas,' drank cheap wine,
ate mini quiches and too many cookies and did a blind gift swap
of things each person had made. It was really nice."
Next up for the Mafiosa are some Austin events and a new feature
on the site, How to Start Your
Own Mafia. Jenny says, "It was a difficult decision, but we
decided not to open the Craft Mafia to outside membership, at least
not yet. Mainly because we are so busy with our own businesses,
we got a lot of early press and are still just organizing the structure
(and website!) of ACM. Plus, we really want to encourage people
to start groups where they are."
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