If you aren’t growing, you are dying, but the hardest part about growing is maintaining quality. As you hire more folks, expand to new locations, industries, etc. it becomes increasingly challenging to maintain the high quality you provided to your clients when you first started. It’s an incredibly difficult problem and so we reached out to some phenomenal entrepreneurs and asked them to share their stories, experiences and insights on the topic with us below.

Lara Kline

Quality control (QC) is not binary for creative agencies. When our team was smaller, there was a fluidity to proofing, with responsibilities bouncing between individuals with a keen eye for copyediting or quality assurance (QA) testing on a website design. We were physically all in the same place and able to pull in colleagues on an ad hoc basis to be “an extra set of eyes” or “take one last look.” Read more>>

Mikey Reisenberg

My restaurant originally started as a food truck in 2013, and over the previous ten years, we have experienced a little bit of everything the food service industry can throw at you. Maintaining quality during the early years was simple, but far from easy. My staff only consisted of myself, my sous chef, and one other individual who has since been promoted to our catering director, and our small staff was able to handle every aspect of sourcing, prepping, and final execution ourselves. Every problem was an opportunity to learn and better ourselves, and the three of us tackled every problem together. The real life experience of dealing with daily problems, and running into the end of year problems that occur due to the lack of discipline to maintain a standard throughout the year is invaluable. Keeping our staff small during the early years ensured that the three original members of the business were able to become experts in logistical planning, menu development, and creating solutions to problems, while also providing a foundation for our confidence as managers once our team grew and expanded. Read more>>

 Ana Arriaga

Maintaining quality as a small business attempts to expand can be tricky. As a one-person operation, it can be extremely difficult to meet demand as this venture grows. In fact, a large part of why this bakeshop has remained a small business is due to this limitation. Other cookie operations can mass produce large quantities of cookies with automated machinery to meet demand, but this would not work for our bakeshop as a level of artistry would be lost. The cookies we produce require a great attention to detail as they are not only tasty but maintain a visual aesthetic that needs to be met as well. I have been afforded the opportunity to participate in larger events such as Dessert Wars and Atlanta Food and Wine Festival, which required additional help to meet the amount required to serve an audience of that size. A small business such as mine would need to employ additional workers to grow. Now, it’s no secret that I can be a bit of a control freak. I like to see each product before it leaves our bakeshop to ensure that it meets the level of quality I wish to maintain. I have been extremely fortunate to have family who is willing to step up when I need a hand with larger orders. It is essential for business owners to find people they can trust to produce at the same level of care that they would themselves use and hire employees who have pride in their work. Your employees will ultimately be a reflection of your business. When you can employ helpers to handle operations, this will give you more time to concentrate on creativity and expansion. Read more>>

Joanna Diimes

while on my journey I’ve learned, quality is everything to maintain a good loyal customer base. With there being many outlets for the public to have a better understanding on what takes place to create a garment, maintaining quality is our best asset. I’ve had experiences in the beginning of starting Constructed for Women where customers would give me feedback on what they may or may not have liked about a product they received and every time I’ve made sure to always listen to it because the overall goal is to grow and get better with time. The last thing I would like is for a customer to think of CFW as a fast fashion brand when really we’re striving to provide good quality garments for the everyday persons closet. With that being said, I take extra time in researching and developing well thought out pieces instead of pushing items that won’t benefit the customer in the long run. Advice I would give for someone who is concerned with quality is too take your time, test what you can and then decide. Read more>>