We were lucky to catch up with Julia Gustafson recently and have shared our conversation below.
Julia, appreciate you joining us today. One of the things we most admire about small businesses is their ability to diverge from the corporate/industry standard. Is there something that you or your brand do that differs from the industry standard? We’d love to hear about it as well as any stories you might have that illustrate how or why this difference matters.
From the moment I discovered the monument industry in 2001, I have longed to open the doors to a business that understands that this is a business of grief but that we can do something to help out in the healing process and that we can actually CELEBRATE LIFE!! That’s what Two Rivers Monuments is all about.
I have been an artist in the monument industry for many years but I was hired to come into a company and etch what the salesperson had penciled into the layout. I traveled to 26 different monument companies in 11 states to hand etch nature scenes or portraits. Albeit, I loved the work, I felt that I was missing out on the connection with the families. In 2018 I decided to put down roots and open my own shop. I was bound and determined to handle this business very differently than what I had seen. I would be the one to sit with the families and hear the stories and I would be the one who would design and produce the memorial. No longer would there be a middle man who had never worked on granite and didnt have the experience of creating a memorial except for on paper. Story telling is my passion. I want to hear that Mom has a racous laugh or that Dad always made treasure chests for all of the grandchildren. THIS is the history that I get to help tell! My sister, Tami Gustafson James is my partner in crime. She does the sandblasting and I do the artwork. Together we take care of everything regarding the purchase of a grave marker from ordering the granite to setting it in the cemetery.
The biggest reason I do things differently is that I INCLUDE the families when I am diamond etching their stone. Diamond etching is like using a tattoo gun but with a diamond that scratches the polished granite. When I am etching here in my shop, I open the doors and invite the families to come in, I teach them to use the tool and then work next to them as they put tool to stone in their own hands. Whether a daughter wants to etch her dad’s favorite constellation or a mother just wants to put a few drops around a fish… I want them to participate in creating this legacy. Not everyone chooses to do so and that is OK! I want them to decide what is right for them.
All I know is that if I can focus on the celebration of life and a bit less on the loss.. then I have done my job!! If I get a hug when a family leaves… then I have done my job!
Do I have to worry about the bottom line?? Sure I do but I also lead with the heart and believe that if it is right… that the rest will follow. I dont spend even 10cents on advertising. I build relationships with the cemeteries and the families and just ask that they share their experience. So far it has worked well!
I was just asked to speak to a convention of my peers and explain what makes my shop different… and why it is important to be able to offer up this kind of opportunity for families.
Grief is a really tough road to navigate… I just want to make one of the stops on it a little bit better!
Julia, 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?
at 8 years old, I was determined to be “The Bestest Artist”. All I knew was that the 120 count of Crayola crayons was a dream and that my Holly Hobby drawing table was the best gift I had ever received. My grandmother loved to watch me draw and wanted me to use my art someday but who was going to pay me to draw portraits?? That was just silly, I told myself.
Who knew that by the age of 30 that I would walk into a monument company and fall in love with an entire industry. I dont believe my feet hit the ground for the first six months that I was there. I was hired to draw up duplications of old stones that were already in cemeteries or maybe a carving of someone’s car to be sandblasted. It didnt matter, I loved all of it. One day, I saw a gentleman come into our shop with a dremel type tool and he traced something onto a polished black stone and started diamond etching…. and I was hooked. I bought the same tool, scavenged in countertop shop dumpsters for scrap granite and began practicing. Six months later, I asked the owner if I could etch and he finally gave in. I havent looked back. I have since etched over 600 portraits, nature scenes, cars and tractors….heck, even a full sized granite motorcycle that you can sit on in the cemetery. My favorite project was being able to etch my daughter who is in the Navy, onto a full size etching of a Navy Nurse on a huge Veteran’s project in Iowa. The hardest was having to etch a young lady’s stone who was like a daughter to me…
I truly believe what sets me apart is the that I am the owner, designer and etcher….
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
I knew from the year 2007 that I wanted a place of my own. I wanted a HOME. So every town that I would drive through.. I would be looking for the perfect building. Something to make my own.
I had just moved to Elk River MN and I was driving over to Chippewa Falls WI to etch for a company over there. I drove right past this rickety building that the grass was as tall as me and when I whipped around in the road to peek in the windows… it was filled with garbage. HERE IT WAS… MY DREAM! It wasnt for sale, lease or rent. I had to track the owner down and I asked him to rent it. He said NO immediately. But I wasnt willing to accept no. So I called him 30 days later and asked him to meet me for lunch and I brought my portfolio to share. After 2.5 hoursof talking, he ripped a half sheet of notebook paper and wrote up a two line rental agreement. That was 6 years ago. When I showed the building to my then 11 year old, she declared it to be just like the restaurant from Princess and the Frog… she was so right!
We cleaned up the place, built new 400lbs doors out of the scrap lumber that had been inside, used hinges and even sewing machine wheels for the new doors and made this building into a place that many have called their “therapy shop”. Heck, there is nothing fancy here because we dont even have running water in the winter and we use a portapotty even on -30 weather here in Minnesota.
It’s surely not pretty but you wont find anyone who loves what they do and WHERE they do it more than me!
Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?
I was etching a portrait on a stone for another company at my shop and the young lady’s mother drove here from many states away so that she could watch me etch. After a few hours of almost complete silence and I was over half way done with the portrait, the mother said “This is not what I wanted.”
I froze! Did she mean the loss of her daughter? Did she not like the portrait??
She pulled out a piece of crumpled paper from her purse. She told me, “I asked the salesman if we could say something about domestic violence and he told me no. He said that I dont want people to be sad when they look at her headstone… My daughter was killed by her boyfriend in front of their 4 month old baby and I dont want my daughter’s death to be in vain.”
I asked her what she wanted to say and she said “I’m not religious but this says it perfectly.
Love is patient
Love is kind
It does not envy
It does not boast
It does not dishonor others
It is not easily angered
It keeps no records of wrongs.
It protects, trusts, hopes and perseveres!
LOVE DOES NOT KILL”
Since I wasnt the person that sold this monument… I didnt feel that I had much say and normally I would never intervene. However, I finished the etching on the monument and then I had those words sandblasted on the back of the stone…
It was TOO IMPORTANT not to!!!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.tworiversmonuments.com
- Instagram: @theheadstonelady
- Facebook: Two Rivers Monuments
