We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Maria Kim. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Maria below.

Maria, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. So, naming is such a challenge. How did you come up with the name of your brand?

When it comes to naming, it’s really just my initials and then I added favorite things. I intended to post all my favorite things on my platform but I realized it’s mostly food! I did not want to be pigeonholed to just foods though, so I kept the name. Sometimes I do think it’s a bit long and not creative enough but at this point, I feel like rebranding would be too much a hassle.

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers

Today I run Mksfavoritethings on Instagram, Tiktok, and Etsy. For IG and TT, I post about foods I’ve tried and have even dabbled in food reviews. My main goal is to just tell everyone about the local restaurants I’ve visited and hope that they would go and visit them. This all started in the pandemic so I really wanted to help promote local businesses who were struggling. Even now, the food industry is still struggling and my hope is just to spread the word!

For my Etsy business, I really wanted to incorporate food into sewing. At the height of the pandemic, people were really resistant to wearing masks. I thought if the masks could have designs with fun themes, people will be more inclined to wear them. The business took off during the pandemic. I was selling food themed masks and people seemed to love it. Now that mask wearing is no longer required, I’m sewing other food themed things like wristlets, scrunchies, and my latest are scrub caps!

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

I initially didn’t want to “play the game” as they say. But after meeting a couple of people online, it’s all about networking. Finding people you click with and really getting to know your audience. I got lucky and found a small group of influencers who were truly warm and welcoming. Yes, people care about numbers – that’s what social media is! But the small group I found didn’t put that first and truly just wanted to create amazing art and that’s what drew me to them. Yes, posting at certain times and using tending sounds helped but I think people like to see the real you in your posts. So truly just enjoying what I do and taking a step back when the numbers get in my head too much helped a lot. Be yourself! You will find a group of people you click with and if they are giving you positive vibes and you are also able to give them positive energy, stick with them! You need a good group of people around you for the ups and downs of social media!

Okay – so how did you figure out the manufacturing part? Did you have prior experience?

For my Etsy, I do make my own products. I initially picked up sewing during the pandemic because we didn’t want to keep buying masks. I started with one design but then kept searching for the best design that would help fit our face and have it not fall off our faces when talking. I looked up various designs and tried to incorporate them together to help.

I learned that I can keep improving my craft and that it’s not about perfection. It’s about continuing to improve as the time changes.

Contact Info:

• Website: Www.Etsy.com/shop/Mksfavoritethings
• Instagram: Www.instagram.com/Mksfavoritethings
• Facebook: Mksfavoritethings
• Other: Tiktok: Mksfavoritethings