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2015 is the year I’m really focusing on growing as a businesswoman and so I’m getting as much advice as I can from other female entrepreneurs. Recently, I had a chat with Julia McNair, owner of the Birmingham-based arts and crafts shop Do-It-Yourself Crafts. While talking with McNair I realized that entrepreneurship is very much like a do-it-yourself project because to be successful one must be both creative and patient.

What inspired you to start Do-It-Yourself Crafts?

I started the store in 1999. I had been working in corporate retail management and had loved my job…until I didn’t. I was considering going to law school, but that didn’t really call to me, either. I found myself doing more and more craft projects, but in my small Southside apartment, I didn’t have the space to store supplies. I decided I wanted a place like a paint-your-own pottery shop, where I could go to create things – not just paint your own pottery. When we opened, we had a varied selection. We sold supplies, as well as having a studio to work in. We did scrapbooking, rubber stamping, glass wine painting, and a whole lot more.

After a few years, we added paint your own pottery, and then mosaics, and then glass fusing. Other items went away. When Hobby Lobby opened, I knew I wasn’t going to out-do a big-box store, so we closed the craft sales section of the store and expanded the studio into the front. What has stayed over the years are the items that customers have told us they want to have – if it didn’t sell, it went away.

Starting a business is obviously risky. What is the scariest thing you’ve faced as an entrepreneur and how did you handle it?

Honestly, the first thing is the scariest: signing the loan, signing the lease. You have to make the money to cover those obligations. After you get started, the momentum will carry you.

What’s the one piece of advice you would offer aspiring entrepreneurs that you wish someone would have shared with you before you started your business?

Starting a business is wonderful and terrible and everyone should think about doing it, but you should know that once you start a business, it’s not a hobby anymore, it’s your business. I joke that I may own a pottery shop, but I’m in the marketing business. It’s nonstop and relentless and never-ending. I read something once that said that if you own a business, you spend about 15% of your time doing the thing you opened your business to do. I think that estimate might be high.

You can think you know exactly what you are going to be doing, and you might. But you might not. Your customers will let you know what they want – and you can change with what they are telling you, or you can stick to your guns and see if you make it. The customer isn’t always right, but they are your only source of income and so you should make every effort to let them be a source of income.

What do you do to make your business stand out from other shops like yours?

Customer service. When I had competition, that was the most important thing to us – that we focus on our customers and make sure that we went above and beyond.

I no longer have any local competitors for pottery shops – the studio that had been my competitor closed and I have opened a second shop where she was located – but that doesn’t mean I don’t have competition for customers. We are competing against the roller skating rink and the bowling alley and the movie theater. We are also competing against all the canvas painting places and other “ladies’ night out” options people have. We are competing with not spending money at all. There is competition everywhere.

Speaking of ladies night out, give us some tips on how to throw a great party at your shop.

If you are having a kid’s birthday party at one of my stores, the best thing is that you can let us handle it and just enjoy yourself. I am a mom and have done parties for my son at other places, and I know that we are easier. (In fact, I am the WORST critic to go to a party – I really pay attention to the details when I’m seeing what other places do and don’t do.) My goal is for the kids to have a great time, but for the moms to say it’s the easiest party they have ever done.

For a girls’ night out – it’s up to you! We can be where you get together with girlfriends and just enjoy a night together, or it could be a class where everyone does something specific. Often we do the Introductory Glass Fusing class for this – I tell a bunch of bad jokes, and then everyone makes a project. We try not to tell you exactly what you have to do – but instead give you some lee-way in how the night shapes up.

To learn more about Do-It-Yourself Crafts and book a party of your own visit DoItYoursefCrafts.com.