Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Jennifer Ramsdell. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Jennifer, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you take us back in time to the first dollar you earned as a creative – how did it happen? What’s the story?

When we started ShipShapeStyles in 2018, we primarily were doing church fairs, local craft fairs, and small vendor events. When we decided to go full in as a wholesale business, we received our very first order from a marina in Rhode Island. That order was for $600 of our bangle bracelets. We were ecstatic about this order, which probably took us two weeks to put together because we clearly were not prepared at that time for any orders. Looking back at that, I remember how excited we were that we had actually received an order.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I started ShipShapeStyles in 2018 primarily to spend more time with my mother, Theresa , who is my business partner. It gave us the opportunity to work together 2 to 3 days a week designing new styles and filling orders. We started out with two reps, carrying our jewelry line, one located in Pennsylvania and the other located in Hawaii.
We are a nautical, tumbled Seaglass jewelry line, and when we started our business, we were using silver plate products And very soon after switch to only sterling silver. We have always strive to produce a quality jewelry line, and we remain and all made in the USA business.
It is important to us to have a line that is of superior quality, and the end result is consistent re-orders from our customers. We always listen to our reps and our customers feedback in regard to any changes or new styles that they would like to see.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Our story of resilience comes from the very early start of our business. At that time I was working for a wholesale jewelry company that acquired all of their products from China. When I started ShipShapeStyles, we wanted it to be a nautical jewelry line and I was very careful not to source any of our products from vendors or use any of the reps that were involved in the company I was working for. I created a website on my own which at that time we may have only had five or six different jewelry styles, but I was quite proud of what we were starting.

So proud in fact that I approached my employer to show them my website. Immediately , I was given the option of either working for their company or continuing on with my own jewelry line. They told me at that time that my jewelry would be good for nothing more than local craft shows or Etsy. When I told them that I did not start my small business to fail , I was walked out and subsequently lost my job.

It was that interaction that drove me to prove them wrong, and that we could indeed build a viable business.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

The best thing that anyone can do to support artists and creatives is to buy local. Try to support your local artisans and small businesses versus buying from the big box stores.

I heard a recent story from one of our current customers who spoke about shoppers coming into her store, and comparing her prices to Amazon. The customers were actually going online to Amazon while in her store to see if they could find the same product at a lesser price.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.shipshapestyles.com
• Instagram: https://Instagram.com/shipshapestyles
• Facebook: https://facebook.com/shipshapestyles

Image Credits

Self