We recently connected with Brittany Keegan and have shared our conversation below.

Brittany, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

Zaley Designs started as a bit of an accident! I was in business college at the time with the dream of building my own photography studio and already owned a photography business.

I was home from college for the summer and my sister and I were searching for a dog collar for my mom’s beagle as a gift for her.

We happened upon Etsy and quickly found a minimal selection of mostly cartoon themed dog collars with plastic buckles. We eventually found a polka dot one similar to what my mom was hoping for but upon its arrival it was the wrong size and cheaply made to which I (with little to no sewing skills) thought “I can do better than that!”

So I set to task one summer day hijacking my mom’s embroidery machine, tearing apart an old pillow case & camera strap… I made my first collar.

It wasn’t better, but I was onto something.

A trip to the fabric store & an order of metal hardware later I was hooked, and also determined to make back the $20 I just spent on hardware (if only I knew what my hardware orders would be totaling now!). But I digress, I sketched logos and doodled names and landed on ‘Zaley’

Said: ZAY – LEE

Named after our two family dogs at the time: Zeus and Bailey, Zaley Designs was born.

I set out to make dog collars in classic designs: stripes, polka dots, plaids, florals etc with metal hardware. Etsy was so saturated with cartoon dog collars and plastic hardware dog collars at the time which were just not my style, so I wanted to offer designs that I personally would put on my dog.

In the very beginning I wasn’t dead set on if it would work or not. I made collars while I was home, listed them on Etsy & when they sold I’d make more to list. I was still going to business college with the intent of owning a photography business (and running a photography business at the time.) Dog collars were fun, but I wasn’t quite sold on dog collars being my career.

I tried to sell paintings, my photography, even scarves, but nothing worked… so one day I literally rolled my eyes at God and said “fine” to dog collars. They were the only thing that had worked! So I buckled down, created my first intentional collection of collars in the Spring of 2013 & we’ve grown from there!

It’s been a wild but incredibly fun ride, and I’m so thankful for parents who believed in me every step of the way encouraging me, God who set me on this unforseen path, and all of the amazing people and moments it’s brought into my life.

Since we’ve evolved to add more designs and patterns of course & have even added some whimsical designs in like s’mores, Halloween trucks, nutcrackers, etc.

Dog people are fun, I absolutely LOVE owning Zaley Designs & I’m looking forward to all we have to come!

Brittany, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

My name is Brittany and I own Zaley Designs!

I started Zaley Designs with a passion for someday being able to be a stay at home mom, but still be able to provide some income to help out with only having one main income. At the time I hadn’t met my now husband, or become a mom, but I wanted to start building a future that allowed me the ability to stay home.

I like to joke that Zaley Designs quickly outgrew a “naptime hobby”, I truly didn’t know it would “work” or go the way it has, but I’m so thankful!

Today I am married to my sweet husband, he is always up to help with whatever I need, encourage me when business running gets hard, and pushes me to think so much bigger than my original “naptime hobby” intentions. I am so thankful for him!

We have a son, who is the biggest blessing on the planet. We adore him so much! I am so grateful that this business I built does allow me to stay home with him, and teach him that building businesses, and chasing dreams are possible. Sure, it’s a lot of work, but it’s an absolute honor to get to do!

Zaley Designs mainly makes dog collars, we also sell dog leashes, matching keychains, and some other dog products like toys + treats.

We have 3 types of dog collars.

Our original fabric dog collars which come in an insane array of design choices… think 100s of options.

For dogs that need a little tougher of a collar comes our Endurance line of Dog Collars. Those collars are made from webbing strap in either solid colors or printed designs and come with engraving on the buckles.

Our toughest dog collar is our TITAN Collar. Those collars feature our designs encased inside of a waterproof coating so they’re tough & super easy to clean.

We have a dog collar for every kind of dog & every kind of lifestyle.

Zaley Designs is more than just a dog collar maker, we are a lifestyle brand for dog moms.
There are so many dog collars out there to choose from, what sets us apart is our attention to style and detail.
Women spend so much time curating perfect wardrobes that fit their style, designing and decorating their homes to have their desired aesthetic & then somehow their dog is wearing a $10 dog collar from a random store that’s dirty, falling apart or just a forgotten item in their home that they interact with countless times a day.

We’re out to change that.

Imagine the difference if there wasn’t that ick factor of interacting with your dog. Imagine if they had a collar that brought joy into your home, and peace to your relationship vs attempting not to touch their collar lest you’ve gotta wash your hands afterwards. What if it matched your obsession with white marble (we literally have a marble design that’s designed from REAL marble)… etc.

Our tagline is: “Your dog deserves a collar as awesome as they are!” because they totally do & their owners do too!

Our Zaley Designs community is so very special. We want our customers to know that they’ve joined a family. We call our community our Zaley Designs family & truly mean it. It’s been so fun to celebrate with our customers over the years as they add dogs to their families, get married, have babies, chase dreams, hike tons of mountains… you name it. It’s a very special community & I’m so very thankful for it!

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

I started Zaley Designs to be small. A “naptime hobby” as I refer to it, and it’s cost me greatly.

Because I started Zaley Designs to be small, I didn’t build it to sustain growth.
Starting a businesses intending for it to be small makes it very difficult to grow.
Not only in the sense of not putting wheels into motion to grow, but by building processes that aren’t scaleable.

I spent years rewiring Zaley Designs on the inside to have repeatable processes that were trainable, and would make sense on a larger scale rather than just in my head.

For example:

I used to organize materials by season. “Spring 2015” “Summer 2015″ Autumn 2015” etc.
That method worked for awhile, until there was Spring 2015, 2016, 2017…. how the heck do you remember which design went with which spring… or did it go in Summer… it started to get tougher and tougher to find things.
So then it became Spring, Summer, Autumn, Christmas, Halloween etc.
But then there would be 30 floral designs and how exactly does one remember if a floral was launched in the Spring or Summer?

Upon hiring help trying to explain that organization method worked, but it was cumbersome.

One of my ladies and I have an inside joke about how at one point we had like 5 different coral colored floral designs. Sure they were all different but goodness how does one not get them mixed up and keep them straight?

So we instituted a few solutions.

1) We got a color printer and each order is printed with the image of the collar purchased right on the paper. That helped a TON! **If you’re looking for a color printer that doesn’t break the bank get one with the ink tanks, they last forever and aren’t going to drive you to the poor house purchasing cartridge after cartridge!**

2) We changed our organization. Now our materials are organized by type. Stripes, Plaids, Polka Dots, Florals, Christmas, Etc.
Making that organizational change was game changing! It made sense to everyone. A plaid, is a plaid, is a plaid! *not a spring plaid, or a summer plaid, or a fall plaid… just a plaid!*

3) We started giving designs names. Not every design, but the confusing ones. Florals, plaids & stripes. It’s amazing how naming a design the “Ember Plaid” makes it memorable, vs tan and black plaid, which starts to create confusion.

That’s just a small look into a piece of rewiring to support growth and hiring people and making the processes we have trainable.

It’s been a journey to make what I built in my head something that can be repeatable and make sense to more than just me.

If I started Zaley Designs now I’d do it so differently, but I started Zaley Designs 10.5 years ago, and even through I didn’t have the vision then that I have now, I’ve learned SO much and those lessons are invaluable.

I’m unlearning thinking small, and learning to think bigger.
Someone has their products in big box stores.
Someone sells dog collars to Target… why not me?

Do you sell on your site, or do you use a platform like Amazon, Etsy, Cratejoy, etc?

We have a website as well as an Etsy shop.

We started on Etsy and although a lot of businesses “outgrow” Etsy I definitely have a different outlook on that.

I’ve worked so hard over the years to build a thriving Etsy shop, why would I shun that and somehow think I’m now “above” Etsy?

I love being a part of Etsy’s marketplace, it allows me to connect with new customers I wouldn’t have otherwise found it I wasn’t on Etsy in the first place.

All that to say Etsy & our own website are two totally different animals when it comes to running a business, listing and marketing items. I have to keep in mind, the same thing that works for one, doesn’t work for both.

Etsy has it’s limitations like how many variables you can add to a listing, where as my website I can add an infinite amount of options on every single listing. Etsy’s home page is super simple and organized which makes it really easy to see everything we have to offer all in one place, where as my website has more pages, and more organization to highlight collections etc.

Two totally different animals and both very important pieces to our business.

We aren’t currently on Amazon, we were for a short time, but I learned that I didn’t have the capacity to manage another marketplace alone. We’re currently looking for a partner on Amazon and hope to be able to add that marketplace soon!

Contact Info:

• Website: zaleydesigns.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/zaley_designs
• Facebook: facebook.com/zaleydesigns
• Other: zaleydesigns.etsy.com