Fiona has kindly offered to share her experiences launching and expanding her business Wallstory Murals
Q1. Give a brief description of your business and how you came up with the name.
I design, illustrate and produce Paint By Number Children’s Mural Designs for parents to paint themselves. I don’t know how I thought of the name, I think it just came to me. Murals are on the wall, and they tell a story as simple as that. It had a nice ring to it too
Q2. How did you come up with the idea behind Wallstory Murals?
I am a graphic designer by trade, and I worked in the design and advertising industry for many years. After 11 years of trying for a baby, my son Callan came along thanks to IVF. Two years later Briony came into the picture- thankfully quite naturally (saving us a fortune)
After waiting such a long time for a baby, I wanted to spend every minute that I could with him so I decided to give up work. I have an intense need to be creative, and as they kids got a little less demanding, I began painting murals for friends as an outlet for my creativity. This progressed to a small mural painting business that kept me creatively satisfied for a few years.
During this time I realized that most people are not lucky enough to be able to afford the luxury of a professional mural artist to a paint mural for their children room, so I started looking at what DIY mural products there were available to help keen DIY parents. This led me to create my first website ‘Murals For Kids Rooms’ where I found ideas and resources for creating children’s murals and children’s wall art.
I cut my website teeth on this site, and when we moved to France, I needed something I could work on at home to earn some money. It was a natural step from an information site to a webstore. I created a DIY mural shop ‘The Magic Mural Factory’ which sells all manner of DIY mural products from Sticker Murals to Cloud Painting Kits and Paint By Number Murals.
My suppliers are all USA based as are the majority of my buyers. This shop also gave me an idea of what was popular and what sold the best. I found that my biggest sellers were the paint by number murals, and as I couldn’t find anything similar in the UK I decided to produce my own range of paint by number murals designs for the UK market.
Wallstory Murals was born.
Q3. Did you have any start-up costs, if so how did you raise the finance?
Start up costs were minimal as I do all the designing, illustrating, website design and management. It was just my time rather than any money that was required. As the orders come in I put the money back into the business by printing up extra murals for stock.
Q4. Do you employ staff or do you do all the work yourself?
At the moment I do just about everything myself but I do employ a lovely lady in the USA where the murals are printed. She does all my packing and shipping. I will shortly be using UK based printers to produce the designs and will then have to find another reliable packer and shipper person to help me there.
Q5. How many hours a week do you spend on your business?
Every minute I can find is spent on Wallstory Murals. I juggle the kids, housework and everything else that goes with being a mother. This means that I sometimes work late at night when the kids are in bed and the house is quiet and peaceful. I’m not a good morning person otherwise I’d be up at the crack of dawn working before everyone got up.
Q6. How do you manage your childcare?
As I work from my little office at home, I am always here for the kids, so it’s not a problem. They are now 11 years old and 9 years old, so they are getting a lot more independent and can even make me a cup of tea. My husband is very supportive and will take the kids out or off shopping when I need extra time.
Q7. What strengths do you think it takes to run a successful business?
You have to be like a little terrier dog. Never let go, keep at it pulling, pushing, shaking, growling determined to get that bone even when the other dog is much bigger than you you just have to keep trying. If you don’t have much money then you have to be even more determined. Learn to do everything yourself, and when a bit of money comes in, you can start to delegate and get some help in. I’m still at the push, pull, shake, growl stage and I’m not letting go until I can pay someone to help me.
Q8. What have been your most successful marketing strategies?
It’s still early days for my own paint by number mural designs, so my website has been my sole marketing platform. This has taken up all of my time and has been an enormous and frustrating learning curve, but I am getting there. I didn’t have any spare cash to pay for expensive ‘pay per click’ advertising on Google, but I have still managed to get my sites on page one on the listings for DIY children’s murals and other specific search phrases. There are other harder search terms that I’m working on, and that’s an ongoing battle and a much bigger bone.
I am in the process of marketing my designs to various child product related catalogue distributers in the UK and that will be the first non website marketing I do. A small local marketing company have taken on this challenge to market and distribute the designs for me, so I’m crossing all my finger for some results from that.
I plan to save some of my profits to exhibit at baby and décor related shows in the future, but I will definitely need more money and help there. I’ll be looking for other people who have done this form of marketing and see what information I can glean from them
Q9. And finally, do you have any advice for parents considering starting their own business.
I’d say do it, but be passionate about your idea. You need to live, sleep and breathe your work. Don’t underestimate the work you will need to do. Start small. If you have very young children, start it as a hobby, test the waters and see if there is a niche for you to fill.
Work on it an hour here and there as that is probably all you’re going to get until they are a bit older. Learn all you can about accounting, tax , marketing and the internet. Find out and what help is available to you through local business links to get you started. As you children get older, you will then have a good grounding to start really pushing your idea.
Start writing a blog. Blogging is a great way to ‘meet’ other like minded people. It’s also an excellent way to get onto the internet as blogs are easy to learn to use and have great visibility in google searches. Comment on other peoples blogs, make friends with others who have been doing it for a while, and you’ll be surprised at how willing people are to share their knowledge for free.
Enjoy what you do. Make you hobby your business, and when the kids are at school you are free to really get your teeth into your business.
I would be the first to admit that I am guilty of not sticking to my own rule, but try and stop working when the kids get home. Be strict about your ‘knock off’ time and make time for them. It’s very tempting to keep working when your office is at home and you love what you do. Pretend you work in an office and have to catch a train home. Be there for your children. That is after all why we want to work from home.
Please go and visit my site Wallstory Murals and please feel free to comment and find children’s mural ideas on my blog.
If you need some more ideas for children’s murals please visit my site or other website
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I'm a 27 year old mum to 4 year old Erin. We live just outside Edinburgh in a small village. I've been blogging for four years and write about anything and everything that takes my fancy.
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