Growing a Hobby Into a Business

0:00I've really got to give this a go now and if I don't it will be one of those things that I'm always thinking about like what could London London terrarians have been if I hadn't have pushed it be a good for a good. Hey everyone, welcome to Shopify Masters, your companion for starting and building a business. I'm your host, Shuang Esther Shan. For anyone who's hesitant about starting a business, but you've got an idea you just can't shake, this episode is for you. Our guest, Emma Sibley, has firsthand experience with that feeling. She started making terrariums as a hobby 10 years ago, and then people kept on asking her to make them one too.

0:43And she kept on saying yes. The business grew from market pop-ups to a shop called London Terrariums in East London, where Emma sells plants and hosts workshops. She's going to share how she fell into entrepreneurship and how she found many ways to monetize her hobby. Thank you for being here, Emma. Thank you so much for having me. So happy to have you here. I love browsing your shop and I know that making terrariums started all as a hobby. Can you tell us some moments where you probably felt like, hmm, this could be a good business? Because it started a hobby, I, throughout university, I loved houseplants.

1:26Me and my friends were always swapping houseplants. And then I started just making terrariums. I'd read about them and was like, this is a really fun thing to do, like after work and just a way of like disconnecting from like being a laptop all day that kind of thing and I feel like when I started 10 years ago there was no one really making terrariums in London um it was just the I feel like the dawn of like Instagram and so I just kind of was making terrariums photographing them and then um putting them on Instagram I was like this is a fun thing and then yeah just like friends and family would say, oh, it's my mom's birthday.

2:07Can you make her a terrarian for me to give her? And I was like, oh yeah, sure. And I was like, oh, this is fun. I'm just like making a bit of like extra cash on the side doing this. And then it was basically when my housemates, I was living in a shared house in South London and they were constantly getting annoyed with compost all over the table and things like that, which is when I decided like, oh, maybe I should use that money that people were paying me to invest it in like a studio space something like that so from the studio space I started selling at markets um did a big kind of Christmas market which was super fun and I guess that's when it really started to kind of escalate the markets they're kind of going out and we were asked to do a corporate workshop doing that I think it was when we first started running workshops because for that, that was a really exciting moment because it was like, oh, this is so much more than just maybe like selling a product.

3:06We're kind of selling an experience. So that was a moment where I was like, oh, that could work. And then also when I realized that there was a potential to cut down the days of my full-time nine to five that I was doing alongside this because it started as like a side hustle. So when I was like, oh, maybe I can cut that job down and then do this a bit more, focus more on London terrariums. That was kind of some exciting moments where I was like, oh, this could really be something. Did you feel like, were there any reservations or things that maybe made you question about going into entrepreneurship during that period as well?

3:49I definitely think so, because it was never a huge ambition of mine. I was never like, I definitely want to start a business. This is exactly what I want to do. I was very happy in my nine to five job and going to pursue that as a career path. So there was always that scary thing of, oh, I'm really leaving a safety net that I have got here. But when I started this, I was only 24, 25. So I was still very young and everyone was kind of had just left art school and loads of my peers were doing really exciting things and not working in standard nine to five jobs. So it felt kind of the right moment to give it a go.

4:32I guess what were some moments that eventually gave you the confidence to consider starting a business? When it was still just purely a hobby and I was making terrariums on my kitchen table, I was offered a studio space and I was like, okay, this will give me the opportunity to kind of scale it even a small amount and kind of have a space that I can experiment in and, and kind of work from. So that was definitely an opportunity that made me kind of push it in the right direction. It was one of those things where I was just like, I've really got to give this a go now. And if I don't, it will be one of those things that I'm always thinking about, like what could London terrariums have been if I hadn't have pushed it further?

5:17So you mentioned that workshops was a big milestone, getting a studio space. Where were some other moments that gave you the confidence or some other milestones that kind of solidified your decision to start a business? I think the property spaces that we've moved to have definitely done that so from the studio we moved to a another small shop space before this one and so I feel like each move has given me a a new kind of found confidence in what I'm doing um each step has been a little bit more of a commitment financially and kind of like personally, I guess. And I think just working with having kind of brands and partnerships come to me and recognizing the business as someone that they want to work with, that's also a point where I was just like, oh, okay, yeah, this is really great.

6:20That definitely boosts your confidence in what you're doing. Opening a retail space is so important for are so many businesses nowadays. But when you're, I guess, like committing to a property, there's leases to think about and also understanding at what point can you actually recoup the cost and make it financially reasonable for your investment. What are some checklist items someone who's a maker or someone who's starting out should think about before they commit to a physical space? I think it's um how what size does the space actually need to be what what do you need it to be um for us there was so many there's like the workshop avenue of our business the retail avenue and then we also have to have a space to make the terrariums our first studio space was really just the studio where we made them our second well then our first shop after the studio space was more of a retail space that we made the terrariums in, but still wasn't really functioning as a workshop space.

7:29Whereas this third space that we're in, it has retail upstairs, workshop and workshop space downstairs. So it's kind of making sure you know what you need for the business to kind of function in all the levels that it needs to. And then just remember that actually, if you're having a bigger space, then maybe you need to hire more staff to cover that space. So that's another cost that you need to kind of think about. And actually filling the space with stock and having the kind of finance to be able to do that as well. So it's not just kind of the space, it's how you use it, I guess. Yeah, those are some important things to think about.

8:15Also, I think for those who have a hobby or a craft that they love and it slowly organically turned into a business, at a certain point, you have to let go of some of those responsibilities being the main maker. Like I think about bakeries, pottery shops, of course, plant shops. So I guess talk to us through some of those challenges where you have all these new responsibilities as a business owner. And now you also have to let go of some of those responsibilities as the craft maker as well. Yeah, I think that's one of the hardest kind of transitions, I guess, from starting a business that is a hobby because it's so personal to you.

9:01It's like it starts as a hobby, something that you really enjoy doing and something that you're putting your kind of soul into. And for us, the terrariums over the past 10 years, I've employed so many different people. And it's what I love is actually seeing people kind of approach terrariums in a different way and having to, as kind of the owner step away and be like, oh, okay, that isn't how I originally envisaged the terrariums to be made, but that works really well. So you have to, if you're going to expand the business you I think you do have to be able to be okay with other people coming in and putting their input in I think but also remembering to kind of keep your roots and where you came from and that's something that um I think comes across quite well in London Terrariums we have been going 10 years but I'm not an empire I'm still a very small business with a very small team.

10:00And even though I'm not running every terrarium workshop now or making every terrarium on the shelf, I kind of still very much oversee it whilst I'm doing the accounts and all of the horrible stuff over there. Yeah, because I think there's like a balance, right? You probably employ creative people, they have their own ways of expressing themselves, but you also have certain designs or a little bit of uniformity you want in terrariums or in the way that a workshop should be delivered. So it's like, how do you balance, like motivating a team to be creative, but also like follow processes a little bit as well?

10:40I think when people come into the business, you need to kind of lay out the main objectives of like what you want the business to be and and how you want people to feel when they come into the store or come into a workshop and I think the feeling for me is obviously you want to make sales but the feeling that people leave with is so important to me if someone is kind of not really used to planting or doesn't even really know what a terrarium is but they might have been dragged to a workshop by a friend. It's our job and it's my staff's job who are teaching the workshop to give these people a new love and enthusiasm for the terrariums.

11:29So someone who works for me doesn't have to be the best botanist and horticulturist. Every single person who's worked for me has come from a creative background rather than a horticultural background. I feel like that you can learn actually to have a warmth and a presence that people can really come in and connect to and I would much rather get amazing reviews online about the staff in the store being helpful and warm and welcoming rather than being like necessarily the most knowledgeable if that makes sense they need the knowledge but I think they just people come in and they just kind of want to talk to us as well.

12:11We have so many regular customers and same with the workshops. And I think that ethos is carried through London Terrariums and it's something I kind of really install in everyone who works here. Yeah, I think that makes a lot of sense because you want your customers to feel good about whether it's a workshop or a shopping experience. Very excited to chat more about your expansion and also moving things online and in person as well. Before we do that, I wanted to take a moment to thank our listeners for tuning into the show. Thank you so much for supporting Shopify Masters. We also have recently launched a YouTube channel where you can watch some of our favorite in-person interviews.

12:56So subscribe for more videos. I know that this has been a decade long journey. At what point did you also realize that you wanted to build an online store and sell some products? I think that was probably about year four, year five, maybe, gosh, maybe even a bit later. Before the website that we had now, which we had built last year, we had a website before that was kind of selling stuff, but it just was a bit kind of clunky. It was basically only two years ago that I was like, okay, our website has to really, really function to sell tickets, sell terrariums, and sell horticultural products, watering cans and things like that.

13:43It's one of those things, even with a standalone store, you need to kind of capture a wider audience. And that's where kind of the online store really helped. I feel like we weren't really pushing online before. And then we had like a main focus a couple of years ago to really like invest in the website and push that forward as somewhere that people can go for, as well as purchasing. Again, it's that information and the helpfulness, like with all the blogs and things as well. It's a great resource. And also, you're not just using Shopify for the platform. It also was pretty handy when you wanted to scale the business even more.

14:21Talk to us about your experience with Shopify Capital. Absolutely. We've used Shopify Capital quite a few times over the past couple of years. But the main time was to scale up into the premises that we're in now. I think Shopify Capital is incredibly helpful at giving you financial aid without getting you in a pickle because basically you only pay back when you have a great day, you pay back a bit more. When you don't have a very good day online and in-store, then you pay back less. So it's a real kind of great way of just helping you scale the business. And I actually don't think I'd have been able to open this store without Shopify Capital.

15:04So it, yeah, has been really, really beneficial for us. Amazing. Well, that's so great to hear. And it's always like really cool to see how different founders use Shopify Capital. And I also understand workshops is what started it all. It's still one of the main revenue streams. so I guess like the question here is how do you facilitate and make sure that an event is great for each of the participants again it's all about I think the feeling that people get you want it to be nice and buzzy so you want like a nice amount of people that everyone can feel comfortable kind of a coming on their own if they want to come on their own but then also coming groups and actually be able to chat to their friends using it as a social kind of situation we have groups of friends that maybe only see each other once every couple of months they'll come and do a terrarian workshop and have a nice catch-up um we can give them tea and coffee um or in the evening if they want to bring a bottle then I won't say no they can do that um but it's basically just crafting an environment that people feel comfortable in that they can ask questions and have a wander around the store I think that's what's so lovely about being able to do workshops here as well before we had this big space we used to go externally and use other locations for workshops but actually having them in our store allows people to have a look at loads of the terrariums on the shelf and get inspiration of kind of how they want their terrariums to kind of look like um but at the same time you don't want to overfill a class that people kind of feel like they're just a number you want everyone to feel like they're having quite a personable kind of experience.

16:52And I think like selling out the number of tickets is just one measurement of understanding what constitutes a successful event. And it's not like counting a number to really know how good an event is. Are there things you check off when you're like, okay, this is something that went right yeah it's it's people leaving so happy and it's as I mentioned earlier it's the ability to introduce people to something that they didn't know about or teach them something without it being like we teach them about the history of the terrarium started in the Victorian times and people are like oh my god that's amazing I I actually thought it was just a really modern thing.

17:35So it's being able to cater to kind of every demographic, every age range. Sometimes we have 80 year olds in a workshop. Sometimes we have six year olds in a workshop, in the same workshop. And it's kind of being able to make sure that everyone is kind of understanding and engaged in the right way. And then I think also it's when you see repeat customers coming back, someone coming with their boyfriend and then being like, oh my gosh, I'm going to bring my mom. She would love it. Like we had a father and a son last night and the dad, he was in his late seventies and he was just like, Oh, we should do a family one.

18:09And they were like, do you do a private workshops? And yeah, we've done like birthday parties where someone's come to one and then been like, actually for my 30th, I want all of my friends to come. So they're the big ticks. I think when you're like, okay, I'm really doing a good job because people want to come back. and yeah that's very exciting yeah it's a truly butterfly effect where the participants are acting as advocates for your brand and your events very cool and i know that you are also diversifying and having different revenue streams where you're writing books and you're also working with brands to do installations and different partnerships um yeah talk to us about just widening your services and offerings?

18:56I think the books was a really exciting thing that came about actually just as I was leaving my full-time job. I got asked to write a house plant book and I'd always been like writing the London Terrariums blog and things like that. So it just kind of felt like another avenue, but actually less so for London Terrariums because the books are just authored by Emma Sibley myself. So that's also quite nice seeing people pick them up in store and not knowing that actually I'm the author and things like that. So that's kind of, I guess, like personal revenue stream that I think as a founder of a business, there's always kind of that thought of like, oh, okay, but who am I in this as well?

19:41Am I just the business or can I do something separate as well. So the books allow me to kind of do that a little bit. And then the various partnerships that we've done over the years have, again, just given us another avenue of revenue that just keeps the business exciting as well, I think. And you can only make so many tiny terrariums look different, especially after 10 years. And I think doing these exciting partnerships like making huge terrariums for Anya Highmarch in one of her big stores kind of makes you question when does a giant terrarium just become a greenhouse that kind of thing and it just really makes you question your practice again if you're doing the accounts and doing all the boring things when you have a partnership or something that asks you as a founder to to question what you're doing and push you in a different direction that's when it makes it really exciting again, because you're like, oh, okay, this is a whole part of the business that I haven't really been thinking about because I haven't really had time to, but doing partnerships with other people and other brands who are coming at it from a completely different direction.

20:52I think that's where real magic really happens. In addition to you writing books and doing brand partnerships, you actually work with different corporations and hosting workshops for their employees, which might be like a surprising revenue stream as well. How did that come about? I think that was a very surprising thing to me, especially as the first workshop that I ever did was a corporate one. A company design agency got in touch and said that they were doing a workshop for their team for team building. Would we like to go and teach a Tuarium workshop? And I was a bit like, oh yeah, I guess we could do that, I think.

21:35So I made like a PowerPoint presentation and went about it completely different to how I do it kind of eight years on. But that has led to be one of our biggest income streams. We do regular workshops with architecture firms. We've been doing one with one specific firm once a month for the past five years because there's so many of them who work there and it's a real nice kind of regular income stream that again is this kind of springboard effect because people go to a terrarium workshop after work maybe just because they want to go because might get them out of work for their afternoon or a lunchtime or something like that they again don't know what a terrarium is and then finish the workshop and they're absolutely like buzzing off of it.

22:25And then they're like, oh my gosh, like my daughter would love this. And my wife would love this. And then it brings those corporate workshops where we go into offices. It then brings a lot more to us in store. Yeah. So great. Not just a revenue stream, but also a marketing channel too. Absolutely. Yeah, absolutely. And we can, we give them like little 15 % off to kind of spend online as well, which takes them to the website and they see all the other stuff that we do. So it's any opportunity to kind of get out there and tell the world about London terrariums, we kind of do it in any way we can.

23:00And then you've already moved locations twice to expand the business, which is so exciting. What's next for you in terms of scaling London terrariums even more? I'm always open to like pop-up shops. I think I kind of know in my heart of hearts, I don't want to open a second store and have this one. I just think in my head, logistics wise, I'm very happy just managing this store. But in the past, we've also done like a six month pop up, which is quite nice, because you don't have the commitment, I guess, with that, you've just got a really exciting, buzzy thing that you can go and do. So I think that's something in the next couple of years or next year, I'd be really excited to do.

23:46And then And also I'm just looking to do a lot more kind of bigger brand partnerships. There's also Chelsea Flower Show, which is on my bucket list. I feel like if I could do that, then that would tick a very big box of mine. So, yeah, I think bigger, like staying in the store, but like going outside of the store is kind of what I would like to do. Sounds very exciting. and I look forward to how you and London Terrariums will grow. Thank you. That's Emma Sibley, the founder of London Terrariums. Shopify Masters is produced by Megan Coyle and Gogo Zoger. Our engineers are Miku Betlam and Matt Shorts.

24:30Our managing producer is Benjamin Gottlieb and I'm your host, Schwang Esther Shan. Check out our YouTube channel for more interviews. The link is in our episode description and we'll see you next week.

24:45Thank you.