We were lucky to catch up with Kira Stewart recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Kira, thanks for joining us today. So let’s jump to your mission – what’s the backstory behind how you developed the mission that drives your brand?
Art Consulting Services began with one client, and me working with fabrics, art and floorplans at my kitchen table.
The client was an interior designer who was new to town and needed artwork for a medical clinic. My background as an artist, gallery salesperson and the fact that I was raised by a mother who was a nursing professor meant healthcare lingo was familiar to me, as were anecdotes of what life inside healthcare and hospitals was like. My dad had been an engineer, so I’d also seen floorplans and engineering plans growing up. All of that really helped.
The first projects with the interior designer went great and more and more work came in. Within a year I hired my first employee.
Suddenly there became the need to clearly define “how we do it here”, so that a client who wasn’t working directly with me still experienced that same “magic” I was passionately hoping to provide. That began a journey that remains to this day, which is to continually create, refine and update our values, processes and business practices behind the scenes so that now, with 10 employees and over 100 active projects on the board, each and every client still experiences amazing client care, creativity, passion, professionalism and service that keeps them returning again and again.
So what is our mission?
At about year 8, a lot of competition began emerging in the little niche of art consulting. It became clear that I wasn’t really sure how we were any different from our competition, or exactly how I wanted us to be different.
What made us, “us”? It’s easier for people outside of us to often see what makes someone unique. I knew I was driven to “do amazing work and blow their minds and make them love you and never want to go anywhere else and keep pushing the envelope of what you can do for them”, but how do you quantify and operationalize that and train other people to do it?
The market became extremely competitive and so a consultant was hired to work closely with us for a year, helping my team and me define what our “secret sauce” really was.
Our mission, “when art is more than art” became our north star, and the compass we use to be sure that we don’t just deliver an exceptional art consulting experience as the project unfolds, but that we come up with ideas and concepts for the art collection that enhance the purpose of the space, help tell a story, and add meaning and inspiration. That’s our mission!
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
I fell into art consulting after a lifetime of being an artist and writer, with a degree in Studio Art from UC Davis, and a 12-year corporate career I’d started immediately after graduating with my art degree. I was a typical artist needing a job to pay my bills after college, so I got a “real job” and didn’t look back.
My longing for the creative expression that I’d left behind to “make it” in the business world increased over the years after graduation. It seemed like being a cog in the big Fortune 500 world, although I was successful and am still tremendously grateful for what I learned, was not what I was supposed to be doing. Outwardly I checked all the boxes, but inside it felt like something was missing.
Making my way back into the art world as an artist, I slowly began painting and exhibiting again, then added a gig as a drawing teacher, and subsequently a cooperative gallery founding member.
The chance to be an “art consultant” started with a phone call to the gallery that represented my work. The owner asked me to respond since I had a business and client relations background. It felt like what I’d been searching for my entire life. After 2 years doing it on behalf of the gallery, we shook hands, and I left to hang out my own shingle in 2006.
I’m still amazed today that it’s been over 18 years since I began with the first healthcare project at my kitchen table.
Art Consulting Services is a boutique commercial art consulting firm based in Northern CA, with a staff of 10 amazing people, serving healthcare and corporate projects in 4 states.
Serving 6 of the West Coast’s largest healthcare organizations and boasting a 98% combined repeat and referral rate, the mission of Art Consulting Services is captured in the tagline “When art is more than art”.
What that means is that we not only strive to develop unique artwork collections that aesthetically enhance the spaces they serve, but more importantly, to dive deeply into learning about each client and project so that the art collection can help tell stories, create meaning, and enhance the purpose of the space.
I think the way we go about serving that tagline is one of the key things that sets us apart.
Any good art consultant can develop a lovely collection that is aesthetically matched for the brand and vibe of the space. To deliver an exceptional client experience at every single touchpoint along the project cycle is our goal, as well as producing an outcome that exceeds their expectations, and adds unique, project-specific meaning!
And we strive passionately to do that every.single.time!!!!
That’s where you have to inspire passion in the amazing people you bring aboard. You can’t keep your eye on all of it; you must hire and develop special people who will pour their hearts into serving the mission and values of the team and the firm.
I am most proud of three things:
The consistent excellent delivery of the experience we provide our clients that results in a 98% combined repeat and referral rate.
The incredible team at ACS that I have the pleasure and honor of mentoring and developing into their amazing careers here. We are actively doing “succession planning for the team to be the “next gen” and take ACS well into the future and long past my tenure. I’m so excited about this!
The “When art is more than art” outcomes –One of my favorites is a behavioral health clinic we did. It was serving a high percentage of LGBTQ+ teens so outside the group therapy rooms we did a huge mural with people of all skin tones and physical abilities and cultural clothing. And the key commissioned piece of broken, hand-painted eggshells in a rainbow gradient from the Japanese art of “Kintsugi” – where it is believed that mending something broken makes it more beautiful than it was before, really brought home how art can help serve a much bigger purpose.
Can you share one of your favorite marketing or sales stories?
For the first 10-12 years in business, I lived with a high level of daily fear and anxiety. Everything we were doing required me to learn, hone my professional skills, do things I’d never done before, speak with professionals like hospital presidents, real estate developers, architects, builders, and engineers, and continue to improve everything we did to deliver on what I’d assured them we could do!
One of my favorite memories was being in an 8 story Women’s & Children’s hospital we’d done all the art for right before it was set to open. I was doing a punch list; checking various things to be sure they were all done perfectly. I walked down a corridor and there was the head of PR being interviewed by our local TV station’s reporter and the cameraman was filming! They were in a corridor where the story of how the artwork had come to be selected was inspiring; we’d conducted focus groups and a clinical research project with hospitalized pediatric patients to attempt to select artwork that would elevate their mood.
But I knew that the PR manager didn’t have that information. I stayed out of the way and went back downstairs to the lobby. I sat there and felt like I was going to burst. If I didn’t go back up there and try to “take my shot” I’d never forgive myself!!!!!
So I went back upstairs, introduced myself and mentioned the back story. Suddenly the camera turned towards me and our story was featured on the nightly news that evening and subsequently many times, as the landmark building went live and began seeing patients. I could barely breathe with excitement and the fact that I’d taken the leap, even though I knew it meant I’d need to make it right with the wonderful head of PR whose interview I’d highjacked! (He is a true professional and was very gracious.)
One of the things the corporate world had taught me about making big things happen was that sometimes it was better to “ask forgiveness, not permission.” This was one of those times.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
The hardest and most emotionally painful thing I’ve ever gone through as a small business owner was when my #2 person and right hand, the person I’d shared all our “secret sauce” secrets with, promoted to manager and groomed, left abruptly, took a major client I’d been working to get aboard (with her as the face for our team), and became my direct competitor.
It was devastating professionally, financially, and emotionally.
I think creatives and small business owners must be incredibly courageous and resilient or you don’t survive. Things like that happen regularly in large corporations, but it doesn’t have the same impact when you have 100,000 employees as it does when a key person leaves and they were one of 5.
I can say it was one of those “Life never brings you a problem without a gift inside” experiences. It galvanized me to refine our brand, our delivery, my employee training and development processes, and my employee recognition and compensation plans.
It reignited my daily involvement with the projects and my passion for employee development.
We are absolutely 1000x better and stronger and more amazing as a result of what was, at the time, a devastating experience. It’s amazing how our toughest experiences can build us into something deeper, stronger and better than we ever thought we could become!
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.artconsultingservices.net/
- Instagram: artconsultingservices
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/artconsultingservices/?viewAsMember=true
