Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Melissa Oesch. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Melissa, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. 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?

I have been an artisan full-time for over 12 years now. I lovingly call it my “all the time” job. I create handbound journals and sketchbooks out of reclaimed leather and added leather bags about 7 years ago.  I first started on Etsy, but it was very much something on the side for the first few months to see if anything would sell. I had been working full-time on an organic vegetable and flower farm and with winter approaching, I had to find another means of income. I decided to pursue journal making more fully to see if it could sustain me. I began being more active with my Etsy site and looking for small local art festivals to sell at. I quickly learned that if this was going to work, it wasn’t going to be something that I could sit down and pick back up (for example, I couldn’t farm part of the year and then just pick up this art business in the off-time). I decided to pursue this wholeheartedly to see if it could work. I took a part-time nanny job where I nannied 4 days a week and worked on the journal business 3 days a week. I did that for 6 months before launching full-time into creating. When I went full-time, I had a little savings, plenty of student loans, and a car that would need to be replaced within a few years. I wasn’t sure if I was being foolish, but wanted to give it my best shot. I knew my other expenses were minimal so I decided to try it. Most of my time was busy creating and looking for opportunities to sell. I decided to pursue every revenue option available so I looked for wholesale, retail, online, and custom opportunities. I didn’t know how any of this worked so it was quite a learning curve. I made a few cold calls to some local stores who educated me on how people actually go about this these days. I researched art shows and began applying and would ask questions and take notes from all my neighbors, especially the ones who had been doing art full-time for decades. Some of these individuals had raised their families and put their kids through college with their art and I wanted to learn everything I could from them. I kept the Etsy shop and taught myself how to create a simple website. It was alot of working 7 days a week and easily 12-14 hours a day. Creating takes alot of time, but figuring out the business, keeping up with emails and applications, and paperwork was a whole other thing to figure out. The first years…probably the first five years was really building the business. I spent a lot of time finding out which art shows were a good fit for my work, building relationships with stores and boutiques who sold my work, and trying to find time to keep up with the online store and custom orders in the midst of the rest of that. After about five years or so, I had built some good momentum and relationships and then it was a matter of keeping up with orders and making enough inventory. As exhausting as it sometimes is, I keep telling myself that I have all the best problems. I’ve watched other businesses grow much faster and be much bigger than what I have (its just me and a friend who has been helping me sew part-time for over 8 years).  I knew when I started this that I wanted it to be sustainable over a long time so I began growing it in a natural steady progression that was a good fit for me. This business has needed to make money to sustain my life, but the creating aspect has been important on other levels and I didn’t want to work myself into simply an administrative role. I wanted to be creating and interacting with people directly. Yes, I need to pay my bills, but I also want to offer a product that is meditative for me to create and adds to the lives of those who are purchasing them. I had to figure out a way to hold all of that.

Melissa, 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?

I have kept a journal since I was six years old. Writing and reading books has always been a part of my life. I went on to become an English major where I read and wrote my way through college. I didn’t take any official art classes, but I did take one informal class on bookbinding at a friend’s house. I was terrible at it and impatient and did not plan on doing it again. Shortly after, a friend brought up the idea of making a non-profit based on bookmaking. We would teach women who couldn’t get work otherwise to make books, sell the books, and, ideally, be able to help until they could go onto to other work. Because I wanted to help and knew I could write, I offered to help and ended up doing alot of the administrative work of the group. I did that for about 3 years and learned alot. Fast forward several years and a couple of jobs later and I was working on the organic farm needing a job for the winter. I still had people ask from time to time for me to make them a journal and decided to try putting some on Etsy. That is really how this began. I have always worked with reclaimed, recycled, and upcycled materials so that is one thing that sets me a part. I make these books as journals, sketchbooks, photo albums, etc. for people to reflect, work out, practice, record, and place their memories and dreams in. I make each one of them by hand with that intention. I’ve found an incredible customer-base that connects with that and appreciates the significance of having a special place for that part of themselves. I am very grateful that this keeps working and it is thanks to all the people who have supported me over the years.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

While I understand this perspective, I want to challenge it. I have encountered many people who tell me that they don’t have a creativity and its just so amazing to see what everyone else does. I use to think that way, too, and now I create full-time for a living. Growing up, my brother was the artist and I was the reader/writer. He was so good at what he did and I could not paint or draw. I just decided that I wasn’t artistic- that was for other people and I could only wish I was. When I was in college, I ended up being friends with many art students and spent time in the art department. They were talented and inspiring and I again could only wish to be that way. Their assignments often took alot of time so I would hang around in their studios while they worked to spend time with them. Often, I’d end up playing around with their scraps, making colleges and adding bits of this and that to my many journals that I mostly wrote in. I didn’t do it consciously, but letting myself have that kind of freedom to play with materials really started opening up my mind to possibilities and what I could do. Most of what I did those years, I either did not keep or kept private. It was really an exploration more than anything. But it helping me see creativity and myself in a new light. When I first started selling journals as a business, I was really scared that I would run out of ideas….largely because I wasn’t really an artist or one of those really inspired people. I didn’t know yet that creativity breeds creativity. Once you start engaging it, the ideas and inspiration comes. You don’t have to try. Its more a matter of giving it space to grow. I think the idea of “non-creative” is a mental limitation that we put on ourselves. There are so many mediums and ways to be creative and I really think it is a part of being human that some of us forgot or haven’t had room for yet. “I know artists whose medium is life itself and who express the inexpressible without brush, pencil, chisel, or guitar. They neither paint nor dance. Their medium is Being. Whatever their hand touches increases life…..they are artists of being alive.” –Frederick Franck

How can we best help foster a strong, supportive environment for artists and creatives?

The best way is to keep showing up. Shop local, small businesses. Buy from individuals. Seek out people near you who are creating what you need. Show monetery support. Share their posts on social media. In this culture, there is alot of room to grow a business with not much, but we need people to support it. Choose to seek out entraprenuers over amazon or other convienent ways of shopping.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.reimaginedonline.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/reimaginedbyluna
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/reimaginedbyluna

Image Credits
Megan Morgan Melissa Oesch