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

Dani, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Have you been able to earn a full-time living from your creative work? If so, can you walk us through your journey and how you made it happen? Was it like that from day one? If not, what were some of the major steps and milestones and do you think you could have sped up the process somehow knowing what you know now?

Hello everyone! My name is Dani and I’m a full-time stained glass artist. It’s been a long journey to get here and it all started 19 years ago, even though I’ve only been doing stained glass for three years. Rather than finish my college degree, I decided to become an entrepreneur instead and the skills I learned from starting and growing multiple businesses has been instrumental in becoming a full-time artist.

I started stained glass after a long time of searching for an art form I was passionate about. Although I loved my work running a magazine for Artisan entrepreneurs, I still felt like something was missing. I’d spent most of my life learning the ins and outs of marketing and entrepreneurship, but never pin-pointed what kind of business I wanted to run, so I bounced around a lot until I founded the magazine.

I was introduced to the Etsy community in 2015 and spent a lot of time answering marketing questions that sellers had. I LOVED Etsy and the artisans who had created a business around their art. That eventually lead to starting a magazine that shared the stories of their business journeys. It was incredibly fulfilling and exciting to read all those stories and to see how they helped the community as a whole grow. The more I read their stories, I began to realize what I was missing in my life. Looking back now, it’s pretty hilarious that I couldn’t see it, given that I spent all my time with artisans around the world and loved every minute of it.

One day, I was particularly stressed out and confused by the general sense of unrest that was following me. I began thinking about the vision I had for my life when I was a teenager and decided to become an entrepreneur. That’s when it hit me. My vision then was to become a successful business owner doing something I loved so that I could eventually afford to take time off and become an artist (as a hobby). Duh! Why not make the art my business?

From that point on, it was clear what I wanted to do, and I immediately started paying attention to the different arts and crafts that got me excited. Lots of things caught my attention, from sewing, to water color painting, to making soaps and shampoos, but I didn’t fully connect with any of them. I even spent two years (and a lot of money) getting good at making bath and body products, but every time I started to take the steps to turn it into a business, all my passion faded. I just couldn’t get excited about selling it.

Then one day I saw a beautiful stained glass piece on Instagram and I clicked with it instantly. I knew absolutely nothing about stained glass at the time and actually thought it might take months of internship and a rented workspace and tools to get started, but fortunately, I was wrong about that!

Since the pandemic had just started, there were no classes to take at the time, so I learned entirely by watching every YouTube video I could find. Seven months into it, I opened an Instagram account and Etsy shop and things started taking off quickly. I hit 10k Instagram followers in the first year and soon after that I officially started doing it full-time. It’s been life-changing and so rewarding to work on something I’m excited about every single day.

Dani, 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?

For those who don’t know, making stained glass involves cutting sheets of glass into shapes, grinding those shapes down with a diamond bit (so that it all fits together perfectly), wrapping each piece with copper foil, soldering the pieces together, and then adding a lead strip around the border. I sell my completed art as well as the patterns I design so that other artists can use them as well.

I attribute a lot of my growth to previous experience in online marketing. It helped me grow my Instagram account quickly by using targeted hashtags, focusing on niches that interested me, and using Instagram ads. My focus now is on learning to create more short, entertaining videos because those really boost your growth. Since posting more videos, my Instagram growth has sped up significantly. I’m very excited to see what 2023 brings!

Are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

When you’re running an online business, tools are crucial and I’ve found some great ones over the years.

1). Splice: This is a video editing app that makes the process really easy. Although Tik Tok and Instagram both have their own video editors, I’ve found them to be difficult to work with and lacking in features. I’ve used a lot of video editors over the years and Splice is by far the best. I even enjoy it more than my expensive desktop software!

2). Milkshake: This is a free landing page/mini website for social media. They have very attractive, professional templates that you can customize and it allows you to direct social media followers to different links based on their interest. I’ve even connected mine to an email manager where people can sign up for my email list and get a discount. It’s an easy and passive way to grow your email list. Lastly, you can purchase a domain name on a website like godaddy and then forward it to your Milkshake URL, that way the link you put in your social media bio looks clean and professional.

3). Aweber: There are a lot of email software programs out there, but I like Aweber specifically because they connect to Etsy. Whenever someone purchases something on Etsy, their email is automatically added to my list. Thankfully, Aweber also comes with all the advanced bells and whistles that you want, including the ability to build landing pages and set up automated welcome messages.

4). Canva: Oh boy, I cannot live without Canva! It’s a design tool with thousands of templates. There are logo templates, social media templates, you can create PDF downloads, and you can even schedule posts to social media from the platform. 

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

When I became a business owner, I was 19, and so I had a lot to learn. I read everything I could about marketing, personal growth, and entrepreneurship. Over the years, I got too caught up in all the steps and techniques I’d been reading about and observing from others. It resulted in being too focused on doing everything rather than just the things I enjoyed and the things that worked. There’s so much to think about when it comes to marketing such as email marketing, automations, a website, branding, business cards, ads, all the different kinds of social media platforms, and so on. Previously, I did ALL the things which lead to only having mediocre success with each of them. It also resulted in mega burnout and a never-ending sense of pressure and stress.

When I started my stained glass business, I resolved to do it differently. I began with the things I enjoy the most, like Instagram and Etsy. I have other things set up like Pinterest and Facebook pages, but I mostly set them up to ensure that my brand name was reserved for a later time when I wanted to expand in those areas. Excitingly, this approach worked wonders! When you enjoy what you’re doing, you’re more creative and better at it. When you have to force something, like making daily Pinterest pins, it usually comes off as bland and is ineffective. 

I’ve even broken the rule about having a website right off the bat. It blows my mind that I only have a landing page right now, but my system is working and I know that I will begin the website when the timing is right for me. 

It’s great to learn all the marketing avenues available to you, but don’t get caught up in the things people say you “should” do. It’s your business. Do it your way and pay attention to what works and what you enjoy.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.glassyleafstudio.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/glassyleafstudio/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/theglassyleaf
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@glassypatterns4289