We were lucky to catch up with Mandy Hopp recently and have shared our conversation below.

Mandy, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. If you could go back in time do you wish you had started your business sooner or later?

I quit my full-time, very cushy marketing job in the tech industry in February 2020 to launch my design studio, Hopp Creative. I loved the team I was working with, but was struggling hard with burnout and overwhelm. I’ve known since I was in high school that *someday* I wanted to work for myself eventually – which is a large part of why I had pursued design and marketing.

For years I had freelanced on the side, had followed designers who ran their own studios, researched how to start a business, dreamed of being on my own, and essentially just waiting for “the right time”.

Spoiler Alert – there is no such thing as the right time.

And honestly, that’s a good thing because as I’ve learned, owning your own business is basically just a series of cliffs to jump off, trusting and hoping and praying that it all works out. And that first leap – when it doesn’t make total financial or situational sense – is the most terrifying of them all.

I decided that it was time while I was having a full-on panic attack underneath our Christmas tree in December 2019. Well, actually, my husband was the one that encouraged me to do it and believed in me enough that I could believe in myself. He kept telling me (as he tried to help calm me down underneath the tree) there was never going to be a good time – but in the scheme of life, it wasn’t a bad time to do it. We didn’t have kids yet (outside of our two beloved dogs), and financially, could live off of just his pay for a short period of time. Worst case? We have to move in with my parents for a month or two.

So – I did it. I told my boss I was putting in my three weeks, which quickly turned into six so I could help transition the team. And during those six weeks, I spent evenings filing for an LLC, ordering business cards (that I still have several boxes of, 2.5 years later) just to prove I was really doing this thing, designing my website, putting together service packages, and praying that I would be able to find clients.

Also during this time, COVID-19 became the newest term in our collective vocabulary, and while it didn’t seem possible until about… February… that this would really start affecting our lives – that was the background of me trying to put together my business.

My last day at my job was one week before my state started shutting down. Thankfully, I had secured two clients before I made the real leap so I was in somewhat of a happy-scared-but-hopeful mode (thank goodness!) but I recognized that the business front was looking a little scary with the world shutting down. That last day was truly surreal – but it was the next day – my first day as an official self-employed designer, that was even more surreal. A whole day devoted to my business! I walked my dogs, made a celebratory breakfast, worked on some client work – all while wearing sweatpants and a hoodie. Truly living la vida self employed.

Looking back – I was truly crazy. As a risk-averse person who’s biggest risk up to that point had been taking a trip abroad with strangers, this was next-level insane. I have no idea how I had the mental strength to do it, but I did. I had absolutely no clients lined up before I quit my job as a pandemic brewed, but I wouldn’t change things for the world.

That first year was not an amazing, record-breaking income year – but I made money on my own! I learned a million lessons that simply couldn’t be researched – you have to do the thing to learn the thing, no shortcuts. I set the foundation for a more successful second year, and the most-successful-to-date third year. Yes, every week (and sometimes every day) I thought “just getting another job would be way easier. I miss normal paychecks”. But the time freedom, the ability to work with clients that I truly enjoy, the ability to do things the way I want, and the people that I’ve met along the way are worth every tough day.

Having said all that – I truly wouldn’t change a thing. At this point in my life with a new house, our first baby on the way, and much more aware of how important retirement savings are (!) – I would never have had the courage to make the leap from comfortable into the unknown of freelancing.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I’ve always been artistic, organized, and a little quirky. In middle school, I designed and wrote “magazines” in powerpoint. My dad introduced me to HTML, so I started to code my own little websites for my magazines and random interests. In high school I discovered photoshop and quickly started overlaying my amateur photography from my little Nikon point-and-shoot with my favorite quotes. I also joined our school newspaper and became the photo & design editor – learning the in’s and out’s of InDesign and volunteering to take photos at our school events. It was also in high school that I discovered that graphic and web design was an actual career – and I was sold. 

I went to college and double-majored in graphic design and web design/development with a minor in photography, knowing that one day I’d own my own business. In the decade since graduation, I’ve earned a Graduate Certificate in Marketing Communications, worked as the designer/webmaster for a large school district, worked to start and build the marketing department for a tech startup, and now, I own my own studio.

Hopp Creative is the design studio for Everyday Difference Makers, helping changemakers share their stories and maximize their impact through the power of strategic design. We work with a range of clients on a number of design and marketing-related projects, but our main projects are website design and branding.

Our biggest differentiator is that my team and I bring a really cohesive approach to all of our projects, making sure that the story behind the people and brands we work for shines through their websites, brands, and marketing collateral in a way that is easily understood by potential clients. Simplicity is the name of our game – I like to call our style happily minimalistic – we like whitespace and clarity, but aren’t driven by trends or adherence to one specific style. We are wholly focused on our clients long-term goals and needs, and differentiating them in crowded marketplaces through design and messaging that *feels* like their brand is our goal.

What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?

I’ve always wanted my work and my life to make a difference. I never understood why my parents worked such “boring” corporate jobs – or how they could be happy doing so (I love thinking back to when I had no bills or responsibilities and thought I knew it all, don’t you?). 

I dreamed of working at a nonprofit with a mission I believed in that was actively engaged in doing good – not a company simply worried about its own bottom line. These days, I fully understand why people like to work “boring” somewhat-steady corporate jobs (rent payments will do that to you!). However, my deep desire to serve others and make a difference has never wavered. While ultimately the only non-profits I’ve worked at were school districts – I always wanted to make my everyday work meaningful.

As I began dreaming seriously about what Hopp Creative would be all about and who we would be aiming to serve, all of this was at the forefront of my mind. I wanted to use my skills and knowledge to help amplify the impact of people, companies, and organizations who are making a difference in their corner of the world. There are so many smart, brilliant, and amazing humans on this planet that are doing huge things in their communities and for their clients and customers – and they need websites, brands, and marketing that helps them do even more of that and make bigger impacts.

That’s my goal – serve as many of those types of people and companies as I can, and support their efforts to make the world a better place.

How did you put together the initial capital you needed to start your business?

Thankfully starting a design business as a one-woman show is a fairly low cost of entry. Setting up an LLC, a laptop, some software subscriptions, a website, and a place to work are pretty much the extent of it.

However, I love this question because long before I decided to quit my marketing job, I got a small one-off bonus, and I specifically set aside part of it as my “quitting fund”. I laughed at myself, thinking I’d never actually have the courage to quit without another job lined up, but lo and behold – that “quitting fund” was my initial capital for the few things I needed to get Hopp Creative off the ground, and helped bridge the gap between my initial invoices being sent out, and actually having money deposited into my business account.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.hoppcreative.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hoppcreative/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/HoppCreativeStudio
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/mandykhopp/

Image Credits
Haley Fischer