We were lucky to catch up with Amber Guttilla recently and have shared our conversation below.

Amber, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?

My mission is to help women decorate their dream spaces through curated second hand decor and furniture. In a world full of so much unnecessary waste, I strive to re-excite people about the value of what already exists in the world of vintage.

Not only do vintage items bring flare and personality to a space, but often times they were made out of more reliable materials. What once used to be wooden furniture has been largely replace by MDF and particle board to lower overhead for sellers. The problem with these cheaper materials, aside from aesthetics, is they don’t last as long, leading to more waste and the need to constantly buy more. You could buy a wooden table from 50+ years ago that still has a 100+ years worth of life left in it. Buying quality materials keeps people out of the cycle of buying more for cheap and instead re-focuses them on investing in quality, timeless pieces.

Even if everyone who comes across my content doesn’t purchase directly from me, I hope to inspire others to look towards 2nd hand before buying new. Not only will you play a role in reducing overall waste, but you’ll likely fill your space with pieces that you won’t find anywhere else. Friends and family will come over and ask questions about your unique furniture and decor because they’ve never seen it on a shelf before. It’s a great feeling and I hope that it creates a chain reaction, inspiring others to do the same.

Amber, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I used to go to garage sales as a child with my grandmother growing up. We’d wake up before the sun and my grandma would give me a small amount of cash, usually $5 or so. She’d challenge me to see how long I could make it last that morning. Challenge accepted.

It wasn’t until the pandemic of 2020 that I came across GaryVee’s “Trash Talk” series on YouTube and remembered how much I used to love going to garage sales with my grandma. So, in July 2020, I masked up and hit some garage sales. To no one’s surprise, I absolutely loved it and found some great things to sell online. After a few weeks of buying anything and everything I thought would sell, I noticed that the furniture and home decor pieces I would buy were selling the quickest, so I decided to niche down and focus my efforts in this department. After hearing about what I was doing, a friend encouraged me to start an instagram about this so she could follow along and see all my finds, which is where I discovered this IG vintage community and the rest is history.

Now in 2023, it feels like everybody is time poor. Time is such a luxury now that the pandemic restrictions have been lifted and we’re back to the hustle and bustle of day-to-day life. However, many people still want to shop sustainably, second hand, and vintage. That’s where I come in. My customers regularly shop my instagram stories, also called “story sales,” to find unique pieces to add to their home. I also have a booth at a local shop here in Long Beach, Goods on Orange, where you can shop my finds in person. What sets me apart from others is my taste, which ranges far beyond one style or aesthetic, and my customer service. A decade of retail has made me understand that customers want to be catered to, they want frequent and clear communication, and they want a quick and easy shipping process. I’ve worked hard to make sure I provide all of those things which has afforded me a handful of regular customers.

There are so many things I’m proud of with Sustainably Vintage. I do take a lot of pride in allowing people an outlet to shop sustainably without sacrificing style. I am proud that people choose to shop with me instead of Amazon. I am proud to say I use 75% or more recycled shipping materials. And I’m proud that I’ve built this business from the ground up with no prior business experience. This was my first attempt at entrepreneurship and after 2.5 years, I’m proud that I’ve stuck it out and braved all the storms.

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

Outside of my business, I’ve always worked in Marketing or Sales. Social media was never a foreign concept to me, but I was never actively trying to build a following. I was a user of TikTok for two years before I started posting, which I absolutely regret waiting for so long.

My first tiktok to go viral was a really simple concept; “things I only buy 2nd hand now” where I took my camera into a thrift shop and showed some items that I only buy 2nd hand since there’s so options at thrift stores. The list included planters, picture frames, and mugs. The video was 15 seconds and got 122k views. I was shocked! I continued with this idea and by the 3rd video, it appeared I struck gold. The same concept landed me 1.1 Million views and 13,000 followers. It was then I realized that this was content that people were genuinely interested in seeing. I stuck with this series until I made about 10 videos and then tried to pivot from there.

I started creating “thrift with me” videos showing what I was finding at my local thrift stores and those also did really well. I think people just loved the idea of being able to find really cool and unique home pieces for so inexpensive. It also attracted a big thrift-loving community on TikTok. So finding my niche and then creating content that people wanted to see really helped me get some traction.

However, aside from these “lightning in a bottle” moments, social media growth for me has always been always been about staying consistent and staying authentic. As cool as it feels to get a lot of followers, at the end of the day they’re just a vanity metric. I was so grateful for the followers, but then needed to figure out how to turn these followers into customers. This is where linking my social media accounts together became crucially important and then having CTA’s (call-to-action) in my captions telling people to go to my instagram.

All in all, social media is still a huge learning curve and it changes every day. But I would tell budding entrepreneurs to focus more on attracting the right type of followers, not just any followers.

We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?

That people only cared about the price! I used to think that price was the only factor to consider when shopping. So if I wasn’t the cheapest option, why would anyone choose me over someone else?

Then I learned about the concept of value over price. Sure, price is always going to be a huge factor in making a purchase or decision. But if you can solve somebody’s problem, the price is way more flexible because you’re providing real value to their lives.

This also affected the items I purchased. Not everyone gets value from a vase, but plenty of people find value in a pair of nightstands. One is decorative, one is functional. One is optional, one is arguably a necessity. This shift in mindset has allowed me to be more successful in my selling.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: SustainablyVintage_
• TikTok: SustainablyVintage_