In October of 2008 at the ripe old age of 22 I started Sew Fitting, LLC. “Never want to get so big that I have to move out of the house,” I said. “Never want to get so big that I need employees,” I said. Yes well, hat sufficiently eaten on both those fronts. After spending two years growing like a fabric-based slime monster, slowly engulfing the entire apartment, my husband kicked me out. Rather, he took the initiative to look downtown in New Albany and found Sew Fitting a happy new home outside of our very cramped and thread-covered living space.

In early 2011 and pushing 25, I packed up and, with the help of my very first minion (also called Amanda), we trudged down the three flights of stairs in my apartment building carrying my industrial sewing machine, a VERY heavy work table, and “all that fabric” to open our doors in the Metro building. This little hole-in-the wall housed us for a whopping 11 months during which time Amanda moved on. I gained Gabrielle and blasted through a learning curve on the hiring process through several hard-learned lessons. I no longer make the, “It’s hard to find good help these days” joke. I know the difficult truth.

December 2011 saw Gabrielle and me moving a few blocks down the street into the historic White House Centre, which was the place to be in downtown New Albany. Our wonderful new neighbors included unquestionably the best consignment store in town with whom I immediately struck up a great partnership.

Three years and several expansions later, Sew Fitting moved to its newest home as the anchor tenant in the newly renovated Underground Station, a historic building complex constructed in 1832. I now have a staff of five who fill a mixture of full-time and part-time positions and who work in several different capacities, both sewing and non-sewing. The additional employee costs such as payroll, employment taxes and worker’s comp insurance can really add up. However, when weighed against the amount of work they are able to produce and the time they free up for me, it makes it all worthwhile.

The last six years have been a whirlwind and included quite a bit of “fly by the seat of my pants.” I’ve learned some good lessons and I’ve learned some hard lessons. One of the biggest challenges I’ve faced is that my business model is a little out of the norm for our industry. When I have workflow issues, I can reach out to our fantastic ASDP membership for advice. Unfortunately, what works for many sole proprietors doesn’t work when you’re juggling 6 people. What happens when you have a very full day scheduled and someone comes down with the flu, or has a family emergency? When I have employee issues, typical HR sources can only help so much. What do you do when you have problems with an employee, but they would be nearly impossible to replace because of the lack of available skilled labor?

With payroll, a storefront, taxes, utilities, and all the other liabilities that come along, overhead can become daunting. I live in an area with demographics and pricing very similar to many other ASDP members. However, I have far more overhead than many other businesses in our industry, yet I can’t set my rates far and above everyone else, lest I price myself out of the market. I’ve found alternative revenue streams to help mediate the rising overhead because my employees and I can only sew so much. Last year we added tuxedo rental to our repertoire, and with our recent expansion we’ve added sewing machine repair, which we farm out to our trusty machine mechanic. Each of these ventures generates income while adding only minimal time requirements on the part of my employees and myself. The additional demands are typically in the form of garment measurements or repair requests, filling out order forms and passing them along to the appropriate vendor while we collect a handling fee.

In my relatively short time in business, one of the most important things I’ve learned has been the distribution of roles and responsibilities. As I’m sure many other entrepreneurs know, delegation can be hard when you’re a control freak. My business has grown to the point that I could work 24 hours a day, seven days a week and still not be able to keep up with all the sewing, marketing, and administration that has to get done. I’ve had to take a good hard look at the things that I do and don’t enjoy or am not good at; those are the things that should be passed to others. The idea of doing my own taxes, especially since I started having employees, is absolutely terrifying to me. I retain a CPA to do taxes for me because it is a better use of my time and talents to sew and grow my business than it is to learn the ever-changing small business tax codes. For every garment that passes through Sew Fitting paperwork is generated, money changes hands, and bookkeeping must be done. Back in the day, at home or in the Metro building, I could sit down for an hour or two every Friday and enter in all the alteration tickets for the week, prepare the deposit and trot off to the bank. Within a year or so in the White House Centre, those same tasks took at least half a day. This was half a day that wasn’t billable. Enter the role of a part-time bookkeeper. Within a year, this position had morphed into a full-time position consisting of bookkeeping, receptionist, part-time seamstress, and office manager. So much work passes through the shop now that I redefined Marcey's role to be my full-time business manager. She no longer sews, but spends her entire 40 hours a week working on payroll, bookkeeping, inventory, supply ordering, and human resources.

Just before our move to the Underground station, I hired another Amanda, this time a part-time receptionist when I realized that I was often spending the entire day answering phones, logging orders, bagging garments, calling customers for completed orders, and checking people out. All of these other activities often meant that it was 4:00 or 5:00 in the afternoon before I sat down to a sewing machine with 12 hours of sewing work waiting for me. This was *not* sustainable. My biggest argument against hiring a receptionist or having an office manager was that these were people I had to pay who did not generate additional income. With my overhead, how could I spend money on someone who didn’t generate enough income to cover their salaries and overhead? My handy-dandy business advisers (sometimes called my husband and father) were quick to point out that I was currently spending days at a time on things that did not directly bring money into the shop. If I was to pass these tasks off to someone else then yes, I would be paying them, but I would also be freeing myself to generate income at my hourly rate. The un-billable things that have to get done still get done, but now I am able to use those same hours to get billable work completed that I would otherwise be staying up all night every night to try to do.

As Sew Fitting has grown, often times faster than I can imagine or keep up with, I’ve had to learn to rely on other people and different skill sets. The local Small Business Development Center has been an invaluable resource. Every year I sit down with my business manager and my SBDC advisor for a strategic planning session that typically lasts all afternoon. This helps me sort out the jumble of everything I want to do, need to do, or need to consider. These sessions have given me the data, advice, and the courage I needed to add employees when necessary, or plan for expansions, such as the move into the Underground Station. As Marcey once described my organizational skills to someone, “Bless her heart, she’s an artist.” Numbers and management are not my thing. My thinking is much more abstract and scattered than is preferable in terms of business and practical planning. Having mentors and coworkers I can rely on to fill in the gaps in my knowledge or focus has made all the difference in the world for me and for Sew Fitting.

Written by Cisa Kubley, ASDP Member