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

Shae, appreciate you joining us today. How did you come up with the idea for your business?

The drive to work in a creative and tactical hands-on capacity is literally in my blood. My dad is a large scale metal sculptor, and when I was young I joined him building huge steel, copper and bronze sculptures inspired by nature, cosmic events, and abstract movement. When I was got into high school and really started thinking about my career, I knew that I wanted to apply my artistic vision to my future life in a practical way. That’s when I began sewing. Meeting everyday needs from an aesthetic and functional perspective was immediately fulfilling and I knew this was a craft I wanted to pursue.

The early work I did with my dad helped me understand the impact of 3D art flow, and that allowed me to see the body in a sculptural way. After taking the huge leap from home sewing to getting as degree in Apparel Design and Product Development with a minor in Sustainability I compounded the knowledge of my craft with the economics of business that I learned from helping my dad sell his art.

Over the years following college, I was able to build a small tailoring business on the move while I jumped from army base to army base with my husband, who is a Major in the military. When we settled in Tulsa, I opened Tallgrass Tailor – the largest tailor shop in the Midwest – and eventually became an “accidental” creator while building a library of training videos for my staff on YouTube.

The logic behind why I believed it would work was simple; I bootstrapped the business from the very beginning and rose each step to meet the next need for my own growth and the growth of the business. I always knew it would work because I was serving a need the people were already asking for, the ready-made demand for this skill made it the perfect opportunity!

Were you solving a problem no one else was solving? Yes, and no. Technically there are available options for the clothing alterations problem already in our society. However, I believe what we offer is a whole new
level of communication, skill translation, and service of a new and compelling magnitude. From our in-shop services to our online presence via entertaining and educational sewing videos, we work every day to propel our craft into the future and sustain it through modern times as it falls out of favor in traditional schooling.
What I find most exciting about sewing is that it falls into the category of what I would call a ‘life sport’. You can engage with it and participate at varying levels throughout your life and never reaching the end of your learning capacity. There is always something new to discover, from purely technical advancement to using the newest machinery.

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

I am female business owner, tailor, and YouTube show host promoting the growth and evolution of the garment industry and skilled trades. I’m the founder of the highest rated most reviewed alterations and tailoring service in Oklahoma, Tallgrass Tailor, employing a talented team of skilled craftsmen and women from across the country and world. I also hosts a YouTube Channel, Sew Show with Shae, with over 2.5 million views and counting that provides fun, educational, and entertaining sewing videos that are translated through closed captions into 50+ languages for audiences across the world.

I’d like to think that what sets me apart from other creators in my space is the way I’m blending a very technical craft with fun and humor to perpetuate the life of this skill. People constantly talk about the way that sewing is dying; but I like to believe that as long as we are all getting dressed every day before we leave the house, it can’t possibly die. I think this craft has as much opportunity to evolve as any other art form and sharing that with the world through impactful and sometimes hilarious videos is certainly how I differentiate myself.

The thing that I am most proud of is building this comprehensive, and yet flexible woman-focused service business that allows me and my team to serve customers in a very meaningful way, while also meeting all the extreme demands of our personal lives. As women, who are both proud of our skill and find purpose in our work, but also value our commitments to our spouses, families, and communities. Working all these years to setup and run the business to work in a way that accommodates each of our unique lifestyles brings me tons of joy. Between the services that we provide in our physical tailor shop, and the much broader presence that we continue to build online, bringing anyone from any walk of life into our sewing world, it seems like the potential for growth is limitless.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

I could just say COVID and leave it at that! The business was only a few years old when the pandemic hit and I had no idea how we would continue to provide a literally hands-on and somewhat intimate service, as
fittings require the tailor to physically touch the customer. When we closed our doors in early 2020 the opportunity for filming became possible and even appealing as this would be the safest way to communicate with my team and customers plus we were still paying rent on our store front and had daylight hours now to try something new. The pandemic pushed me to make get innovative and commit the time and energy required to launch our YouTube Channel and it has only grown in inspiring and unexpected ways since then. If it weren’t for closing the shop for that period of time, I would have never carved out the space to try something new so I’m extremely grateful for the push it gave me!

What else should we know about how you took your side hustle and scaled it up into what it is today?

For the record, I think it’s worth stating that scaling up in any business is always terrifying because there’s so much unknown. Specifically in the space of a skilled trade, where you’re handing off not just the technical component of the service but the creative aspects that will go into the solution you provide. This can be both physically and emotionally difficult.

Building trust in others and clearly teaching and communicating how to achieve the outcome I’d like for every piece of clothing we received were the biggest steps to conquer and these are items that we still work on every single day. I really had to take the scaling process one person at a time, working one on one with each new tailor (regardless of incoming skill level) so that we both understood each other, and worked well together to reach the same goal. Beginning with establishing consistent open store hours and a full payroll system and then moving on to the hiring of each new person were all huge milestones.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/sewshowwithshae/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@thesewshowwithshae