We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Rion Swinton. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Rion below.

Rion, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear your thoughts about family businesses.

My name is Rion Swinton, my parents opened up Swinton’s Art Supplies in 1994 and have been running the art store ever since. 4 years ago I left my job as the lead Audio visual technician for the Telus Convention Center in hopes to help out my families business.

I feel especially in this day and age with all the big businesses online and in store that smaller family businesses are more important than ever. Even though some small business do not have the convenience or the price point to compete with a big business, I still believe getting to their level of management is something to strive for. There are some advantages to running a smaller business compared to a big business such as its easier to make quick decisions. If a big business makes a decision then they have to implement that into 100’s of stores, it takes a long time to “turn that ship” so to speak. A small business can make that change very quickly and can “turn their boat” with ease. So there are some advantages to running a small or family run business.

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

Aside from big business and small business, being in a family business is great as I get to spend more time with my family, we have lots in common, we share many of the same goals and are always on the lookout for the next “thing” together.

Taking over the business can be stressful but is mostly interesting. In Swinton’s Art Supplies we have a full retail side as well as run 5 rooms/studios with full time art lessons. When I stepped in everything was done in the “old school” way. Such as scheduling done by writing in books, no sign ups were done online, no purchases were done online, some receipts were hand written. So it has been my job to bring the business into this day and age.

Overall I would not change anything as it has been and honour to step in and help out with the family business. We make a great team and I am constantly excited on where we can take it.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

Covid was a big shift for us as we were unable to run classes or workshops so we relied on our retail side to pick up. When the lock down happened it forced us to start selling online as well as do local deliveries. Because of that change when everything went back to normal we found ourselves with a new revenue stream and a new way to promote and sell products.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

Building a social media presence takes time for sure. Lots of business just post on social media just because they think they think they have to. But to really build a following you need two things, #1 value, you have to provide value to your audience in either education or entertainment. #2 consistency, you have to be consistent with it. There are apps like “MetroCool” were you can schedule your posts to make it easier to stay consistent.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.swintonsart.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/swintonsart/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Swintons
• Twitter: https://twitter.com/Swintons
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC_Hwcf-zdP2nTWqxy9tbUCw
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/swintons-art-calgary-2?osq=swinton%27s+art