The 34 -year -old founder of the injection point store in this side history spotlight question and answer features. Peanut. She lives in the Westport, connective with her husband and two children. Answers of length and explanation. Amendments have been made.
Image Credit: Penny Lin’s Courtesy. Crista Larry.
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What was your day job or basic profession when you started your side histl?
Before starting PeanutA new age -old Sui Point Store, offering hand -painted canvas, accessories and more, was a full -time influence running my blog, covering the bases. I started the blog in 2013, but I just took it full time before starting Penny Lin. By managing the blog, I got a corporate career in Major League baseball, where I worked for more than five years on the social media team.
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When did you start stirring your side, and where did you get inspired for it?
I initially learned to sew from my grandmother, which affected the business name, and then I really entered it at College at Kentucky University. I picked it up again in 2018 when I started sewing a custom belt for my father and husband, and in 2019, sewing colorful pillows for my wedding. I knew very little that it would be a great fondness to come back in love as the epidemic approaching.
When I returned to sewing, I quickly slipped from my canvas stash and was disappointed with both personally and online needle point shopping experiences. He realized the antiquities. There were not many sites with good user experience, a handful of shops called you to order, and the designs felt very strong. I felt myself that there were more entertainment and better accessories and canvas, so I started making them after my search was short.
Image Credit: Penny Lin’s Courtesy
Did you take some first steps to get your team off the ground? How much money/investment did it get at its inception?
When I started painting my canvas, I was not even in the mindset of starting a business. It was still only a hobby for me. I probably spent $ 100 in buying empty canvas on Etsy and Paint in Michas, and painted a coffee cup of notorious Ralph for myself. When I shared it on my Instagram, I have a lot of followers asking to buy one, so I knew my followers were also interested in needle point.
When I started searching for my own accessories, I found out that many customs items were minimal in 100 items. At that time, I had a business bank account for my blog, so I used this money to order inventory and I knew I could sell at least 90 of my followers who didn’t even do it. After making some canvas and seeing the demand, I realized that I had enough ideas to launch a large collection online. So I purchased the smallest shopkeeper package, began to source Songle Minders and Project Bags, and recruited my friends and family members to help paint canvas.
All of them, I spent about $ 5,000 on the initial inventory of my accessories and an additional $ 2,000 on shipping material, canvas tape, etc., but none of them calculated the canvas painting time one by one, which was the largest investment.
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If you can go back to your business journey and change a process or approach, what will happen, and do you wish you to perform it differently?
Consider how I made my business, it’s a catch 22. If I know what I know today, I will do it in a different way. However, keeping my hands from every aspect of the business has given me a lot of knowledge and appreciation that keeps the business.
Initially, I painted almost every canvas, which took many hours, but it kept the cost less because my wages were primarily free and it took me over my inventory. If I knew that people had outsourced the painting, it would save me so much time and energy, but myself would teach me the price of paint canvas.
Similarly, I wish I got hired to remove people from my plate in the beginning, but by doing all this, I learned a valuable lesson and I knew how I wanted to run every aspect of business. I do not think that if I had not had my fingers at every aspect of the business in the beginning, Penny Lin would be a thoughtful and effective brand today.
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When it comes to this particular business, what is the thing you are particularly challenging and/or surprising that those who come to this kind of work should be ready for, but are unlikely?
Penny Lin is so successful as a business, and in restoring cultural love for Sui Point, is that we have done the most important innovation in the industry. I have never expected the amount of pushback from shopkeepers and industry weights. Across the board, how did people run our views and our business.
Today, we have found partners who believe in our development and are building with us. When we launched our acrylic line in 2022, the online chatter was not modern or unique, but today we have a patent for design, and it is one of our sales lines. We also take a little wholesale margins from industry standards because I believe in making the needle point accessible. Our wholesale partners were initially based on that it would not succeed, but it was proven otherwise. I prepared a thick skin during blogging and learned to stop the noise, which has entered me into Penny Lin when we continue to shake the industry.
Image Credit: Penny Lin’s Courtesy
Can you miss a particular example when you go wrong? How did you do it right?
I clearly remember one of our first bag launches, which did not go according to the plan. It was a beautiful project bag with leather and PVC that we sold so quickly! When I was packing them, I experienced some zippers and was very disappointed to know that they were trapped and it was difficult to open despite the work of the samples. I reached every customer who ordered them and told them that the bags were not on our standards. I offered them a full refund if they want to return the bag or discount if they want to keep it.
It became one of my biggest principles in the business: When anything goes wrong, I need to take ownership and work to improve it. Our community was beyond appreciating how dynamic we were, and mostly bags were kept. We put the rest of the bag on clearance and now work with our team and shopkeepers to ensure that we have quality control measures.
How long did you take you to see permanent monthly income? How much did the Side Histal earn?
In the first six months after our launch, the only permanent income was what we created during the launch. Everything will be sold so quickly that we will not have any inventory left until the next launch. We often have a day or two without sale between launches, which was not a lasting way to run a business. To prevent this, we started producing more inventory and introducing our Penny Lin Clacto, which allows us to bring designers who have increased our offer. Our designers have been fruitful for us in the last five years, and today we continue to increase it.
We started to see more permanent revenue in the year two, with only more than 30,000 monthly. The level of popularity of our launches has begun to end, and we can make better predictions to keep our income stable. It was such a big deal for us to reach these numbers at this time, but now we do this in one day. Every year has been very different in terms of demand, and every six months, we arrive at an infection point where we need to increase the quantity even more.
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How does the growth and tax now look?
It has been really interesting that Penny Lin has doubled or three times every year. In 2024, we earned $ 4.4 million, and we have already exceeded it and are on the way to double it in 2025. We currently have an average of 70 570,000 every month. Whatever I think we can have a roof, we come and double it every year. Our growth has been so explosive that I expect it to end in the next year or more, but there is still a chance for its business.
My brain is always running with new ideas for the brand as we increase our product offer, new designers launch under Penny Lin Lin Clecto and bring new accessories to the market. Earlier this year, the opening of our store in Noorwak, Connecticut was a huge milestone for us, and now we are looking for more stores. I do not see our growth diminishing at any time.
Image Credit: Penny Lin’s Courtesy
What do you enjoy running this business?
I love honestly what I do a lot and get a great deal. I feel very proud, enthusiastic and happy to think about what I have created in Penny Lin and what I have made in five years. This is nothing that I never thought of as my career or which I expected to increase Penny Lin. We have not yet seen a lot of collisions on the road, and continue to succeed after success, which mobilizes me to continue.
I am proud of myself the fact that Penny Lin is “a staunch for a staunch”, and it has nothing more satisfying as a needle pointer that he wants and is able to make it in my collection. I have the privilege of working with my shopkeepers to produce my dream products, and it is so interesting to see how much our community loves them.
I feel even more happy in the change I have brought to the industry about how we have succeeded in bringing the needle point to the new generation. It is crazy to sit back and think that my brand has revived a centuries -old tradition and made it in something that lives and will continue to be ready for generations to come.
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What is your best business advice?
First, “if you don’t ask, the answer is not always.” People are often afraid to arrive because they are afraid to be rejected, but my purpose is to always ask, and if they do not answer, it is still not. If they do not answer, this is not the end of the world, but the answer to answer is yes.
My second is to learn the difference between constructive opinions and criticism. If someone doesn’t like you or your business, they will never have to say good, and it’s not worth hearing. However, if they are loyal fans and frequent buyers, and they comment on how product or process can be improved, it is worth hearing. It is easy to get lost in negative opinions, but as fast as you learn it is worth hearing, the better decisions that your business you want. Will