We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Israel Deutsch. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Israel below.
Israel, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. How did you come up with the idea for your business?
My full-time career is in law enforcement. A widow of an officer who died in the line of duty asked if I could build her a flag out of a used fire hose that she had. After building that fire hose flag, a local fire department saw the flag and wanted one. This is where Crafty American was born. We evolved our products based on customer needs or requests. Since starting our company in 2018, we have over 10 products and now we even have a whole candle line.
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.
My full-time job is a police officer in Wisconsin. I always dreamed of becoming a police officer since I was in elementary school. How I got into firefighting was that I would get frustrated over volunteer firefighters causing problems on fire scenes. For example, parking their personal vehicles all over the highway in the winter during a crash. I started to attend the local volunteer fire department meetings and explained my role as a police officer on scenes where firefighters are also there. After a few years, I was able to teach those firefighters somethings and they taught me some things. I am now a certified firefighter in Wisconsin.
What makes out company stand out from some of the rest is we are a small business. Only myself and my wife work on the products. We are a 100% MADE IN THE USA product and everything is made by hand or touched by the both of us. This allows us to control the quality of the product knowing when a customer receives it, its made to our standards. \
The materials we use are 100% made in the USA and each has its own story. Its defiantly a American product. Did the fire hose Koozie once save a house?, save someone, put out a car fire. The products are meant to spark conversation.
Can you open up about how you funded your business?
Our initial investment to the company was a $10 quart of paint. We put our profits back into the company to purchase larger or better equipment that can produce the same results but more efficient. Since starting in 2018 we now are a 6 figure company.
Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?
Social Media is vital to any business. understanding # tags and @ symbols are critical. We find most of our customers see our daily social media posts. Facebook, Instagram, Tik Tok, Pinterest, Twitter all allow us to reach people all over the world. Some of our best sales and wholesales are from social media posts.
Social media posts also allow our customers to find us at local art shows or see a glimpse of how the business operates.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.craftyamerican.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/craftyamericandesigns/?scrlybrkr=37eddcff
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CraftyAmericanDesigns/
- Linkedin: www.linkedin.com/in/IsraelDeutsch
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/Crafty_American
- ETSY: https://www.etsy.com/shop/CraftyAmericanDesign
- Pintrest: https://www.pinterest.com/CraftyAmericanDesigns/
- TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@craftyamerican we also sell on Amazon and Ebay
Image Credits
Crafty American LLC assumes all rights to the photos