We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Pierce Bembenek a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Pierce, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today One of our favorite things to brainstorm about with friends who’ve built something entrepreneurial is what they would do differently if they were to start over today. Surely, there are things you’ve learned that would allow you to do it over faster, more efficiently. We’d love to hear how you would go about setting things up if you were starting over today, knowing everything that you already know.

Knowing what I know now, once I built up a strong enough portfolio of work and merchandise, I would have reached out to likeminded independent stores local and around the country sooner. Currently, we are trying to take a step back from vending at local markets and art shows and are starting to get wholesale going with a few stores. Another quick thing is know your demographic! I have more alternative art than anything and I quickly realized in the beginning I should not buy a spot for the local street fair because there are not a lot of alternative people at those. Figuring that out early on definitely helped steer me in the righty direction.

Pierce, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

While I was in high school, I took as many art and photography classes as possible and then continued my education at The University of the Arts in Philadelphia. While enrolled, I took courses in sculpture, graphic design, printmaking and illustration, graduating with a BFA in Illustration in 2017.

Corvid originally started as “Cloud’s Artwork” in 2017, in reference to an old nickname of mine. Later renamed to “Corvid Clothing” in 2019, and finally “Corvid: Alternative Art Store” in 2020. The business was run solely by me from 2017 to late 2020 until my partner, Alexya Rauso joined the team in October of 2020. During this time we frequently vended at artist, punk and Halloween markets in NEPA, Philadelphia and New Jersey. In addition to vending and our online storefront, we do art commissions as well (personal pieces, business logos, album artwork, etc.)

I feel my art style sets us apart from others due to my really unorthodox way of creating. In the beginning I’d sketch something out traditionally, put tracing paper on it, and ink the piece. If something was off I would re-ink that portion, scan everything, and add it to photoshop to Frankenstein everything together. Now, I have a digital tablet but the rules are still the same haha

What I want our clientele to know is that we appreciate you and we are for you just as much as you are for us!

Have you ever had to pivot?

Recently, we realized that we couldn’t keep going the route of selling at just regional art markets, so I did some searching for alternative stores around the country that might be interested in having our stock of spooky goods. We are now selling to a couple of stores wholesale to help get our name out there!

Can you tell us the story behind how you met your business partner?

So, my business partner is also my life partner haha We went to the same college but never interacted with each other aside from seeing each other around campus. Sometime in college we became Facebook friends because we had mutuals. Then, at the start of the pandemic we were commenting on each other’s photos and started talking in our DMs. After that, we started seeing each other in person and now years later we share a life, a business, and a dog together. I handle the heavy duty art and inking, she handles the colors and most of the back end for Corvid. We also collaborate and bounce ideas off one another and draw up concepts for upcoming projects together. I would not be here today in the same capacity without Alexya.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://corvidstore.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/corvidstore/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/corvidstore

Image Credits
Pierce Bembenek, Alexya Rauso, Liz Sompel and Liz Waldie