0302: Rising from the Ashes with Borrow Curated Furniture + Design
48m | Aug 7, 2024Ann started Borrow out of her garage in 2012 with the belief that people need local art and design in their lives. Borrow provides modern, made + antique furniture for the events and homes of the community she lives in. She has a BA in Creative Writing and a childhood history in theatre. When she's not at Borrow, you'll find her at home with the people she loves.
What’s in this episode:
- How Ann started borrow with only $7,000
- A tragic event that destroyed nearly everything
- An efficient and effective system for furniture repair
- Her method for keeping herself and her team accountable
- Learning how to “chill” as a boss and fostering culture
- Being a role model, reaching milestones, and more!
Quotations:
“You're not starting over. You're gonna go in and rebuild as an absolute expert. When you first started this business, you were not an expert. You didn't know what the hell you were doing. ” – Ann King
“We always have kept good records. So I was literally able to just press that button on RW Elephant and spit out exactly how much stuff we had.” – Ann King
“I'm way less attached to the collection. It's stuff. And probably the biggest takeaway is, you think it's about the furniture. It is not about the furniture. Not at all. It is about the people. It is about the people that you work for, that you work with. It's about your community.” – Ann King
“When you call OSHA in and you say, I want to do this the right way, can you show me how to do it? They love you for that. They understand that you're just trying to do things the right way. So it's not scary at all. It's very, very informative and helpful.” – Ann King
“One thing we did invest in, and actually it was a company that we found at Lend & Gather. We hired Upright Labs to come in and give us a 150 page deck of how to reset the warehouse for primal efficiency. So that was massive and a big investment, but totally worth it.” – Ann King
“I didn't realize that like management was about empowering and supporting. It's not about telling and teaching.” – Ann King
Resources:
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Thank you to our sponsor:
RW Elephant: Mighty inventory management software designed to help you conquer chaos and reclaim your creativity!
And our guest:
Ann King of Borrow Curated Furniture + Design
