Design Camp: How it Started with Lindsey Borchard & Anastasia Casey

DESIGN CAMP TICKETS ON SALE NOW!

Lindsey Brooke Design

Episode Mentioned: Lindsey Borchard - Pricing as an Interior Designer

Together, Lindsey and Anastasia have hosted hundreds of interior designers from every corner of the globe at Design Camp. Design Camp came to fruition based on our personal experiences growing seven-figure businesses in the industry. We felt the lack of a comprehensive, actionable and relatable resource to get started. Everything felt top secret, competitive and subjective.

After working together for more than five years, we made it our mission to create an interior design retreat where designers can form honest, supportive relationships, create an accountable mastermind group, and be given the blue print they need to level up their business.

Every session of Design Camp is different. The keynotes, the sessions, the people. We work diligently year round to keep Design Camp’s content of the moment and comprehensive. We’re grateful to welcome return campers alongside first time guests at every session.

Design Camp is an immersive four-day retreat created specifically for the diverse interior design community. Founders Anastasia Casey and Lindsey Borchard, along with their respective teams, offer inspiration, insight, and empowerment through strategic business development discussions and guided implementation. Every detail of our luxury event is intentional, from the intimate grouping of campers to the inspired setting. Working sessions are punctuated by shared meals, cocktail hours, and keynotes from some of the industry’s most influential voices. Our mission is for you to leave Camp with an actionable plan for creating a design business that is more profitable, enjoyable, and authentic to you—with a network of likeminded friends to support you along the way, forever after.

Transcript

00;00;00;00 - 00;00;35;13

Anastasia

Hi, and welcome to this bonus episode of The Interior Collective, a podcast for the business of Beautiful Living. I'm your host, Anastasia Casey. And today we are talking about a very big passion project of mine, Design Camp. Together with my co-host, Lindsey Borchard of Lindsey Brooke Design, we are walking you through the infancy of Design Camp, how it started out, how  it's transformed, and what the four day inclusive business retreat looks like today.

00;00;35;16 - 00;01;04;24

Anastasia

Tickets are now on sale at Design Camp IDCO. Hey, Lindsey, and welcome back to the show. I am so excited to have you here. And there's nothing I love more than, like a secret bonus episode. I know. I'm so excited to be here. Obviously, I love your podcast and just love everything about the Interior collective. So I'm happy that we can have this kind of, like, conversation about Design Camp.

00;01;04;24 - 00;01;22;28

Lindsey

And yeah, bonus episodes are always the best. I love how we can take a little bit of Design Camp and we'll get all into Design Camp a little bit later. But I do love that we can have even just this many one hour conversation to give people a taste of what Design Camp is really about. But if you haven't listened to it already, go back to season one.

00;01;22;28 - 00;01;57;00

Anastasia

I'll link it in the show notes. Lindsey did an incredible episode about pricing as an interior designer, which proves to be one of our top downloaded episodes ever, and it's one worth listening to and relistening to because the way she breaks down, how she builds clients leaves no money on the table. She's getting every possible dollar from her clients in a very fair way, but B, it's also just mind blowing how specific and generous you are with your exact process.

00;01;57;01 - 00;02;17;26

Anastasia

So we'll get into that a little bit more. But I do just have to start the show off by saying Lindsey is the most gracious and open business owner I've ever known. And additionally, she's just brilliant when it comes to running her firm. Oh, you're so sweet. You're going to make me cry today. Yeah, you'll probably cry by the time we get done.

00;02;17;28 - 00;02;45;03

Anastasia

So. Okay, let's go ahead and start talking about Lindsey Brooke design and your design firm from the beginning. When did you start? How long have you been in business? And then we'll get down to, like, how many people are on your team now? Because I've just really seen it from its infancy. Yeah, I mean, I started this in 2016 and in a spare bedroom of my home, kind of a cliche story of I didn't go to school for this.

00;02;45;03 - 00;03;07;20

Lindsey

I went to design school for fashion, did that a little bit, and then I, I randomly went into the wholesale side of an interior interior design company. Rachel Ashwell, Shabby Chic. So they, like, made their own products and they have their own stores. And so I did the wholesale department of that. And really that was my first taste of interior design.

00;03;07;22 - 00;03;31;10

Lindsey

And even though it wasn't like my personal style, I really got the behind the scenes of how to make a product, how to put it together, how to put it together in a retail space with designers. So I don't have any formal training on interior design. And it's this business that was basically just built on a passion. And I was at that point a stay at home mom to my oldest son, James.

00;03;31;10 - 00;03;54;29

Lindsey

I was pregnant with my second and looking back now, I probably had some postpartum with James that I didn't really realize, but I felt like I just didn't have the creativity in my life that I really did need. And I don't think I realized it at that time. And so my girlfriend was like, You should start a blog because blogs are like the thing back then.

00;03;55;02 - 00;04;22;28

Lindsey

This is probably like 2014 and you know me, I don't like blogging. I'm like, That is not me. And I started Instagram and I started just posting things on Instagram, my house, my friends houses. I started getting referral clients from my friends. And then I started getting these E design clients from Instagram and I'm like, Googling what is E design?

00;04;23;01 - 00;04;56;22

Lindsey

And that's kind of how the business started. It slowly snowballed from there. One referral led to another referral and one E design led to another E design, and then it kind of shifted to doing more like local clients and I remember at a point where it was like, okay, we need to possibly get a nanny. If I wanted to continue this because I was doing it like between nap time at night and I talked to my husband and he was super on board and super supportive and saw kind of like a spark lit within me.

00;04;56;24 - 00;05;17;26

Lindsey

And so that's kind of how it started. Like, you know, we added a nanny one or two days a week and then slowly built on that and then had another conversation to say, like, Hey, I think I could do this full time. I think I can make a real business out of this. And that's when it really like that's when I say like, okay, 2016 was like really the start of the business, even though I had been doing it for a little bit.

00;05;17;26 - 00;05;47;00

Lindsey

But I started in my house, you know, with an employee in my house, with young kids running in and out, crazy, not being able to focus. My garage turned into, you know, pillows and accessories and furniture and it just overtook the space. And, you know, now it's almost we're going into our eighth year this summer, and now we have a studio space and a retail store.

00;05;47;00 - 00;06;11;26

Lindsey

And we have eight employees, nine employees, ten employees, if you include the shop, too. So it's just it's I am really proud of it when I really sit back and like, take a second. You know, there's still so much more that I want to do. And you know this I talk to you about it all the time, but I am really proud of where we started and kind of where we are right now.

00;06;11;29 - 00;06;36;18

Anastasia

But yeah, it's been a journey, though, So to give a little background on how Lindsey and I know each other, if you had officially started in 2016, I think you would have reached out to me on Instagram probably 2017 or 2018. Yeah, I think it's just 2018. Yes. I've been following you for a while and I really just loved the content that you were pushing at that time.

00;06;36;18 - 00;06;53;10

Lindsey

I had started. So when I started this business, obviously, like someone came and said like, what's E design? And, I had followed a girl that was doing E design. I don't know if, you know, she actually has a pillow company now. Daniel Oki Pillow Companies and E Design. I reached out to her to say, Hey, what is E design?

00;06;53;12 - 00;07;26;09

Lindsey

And she just let me kind of know what she was doing. And then when I really started the business, I reached out to a couple other designers who I met through Instagram and they kind of opened up to me. So I started opening up on Instagram. Well as you know, like, I mean, social media just took up so much of my time and my business really started kind of obviously I had two young kids and so I reached out to you and didn't at that point, like, did it need a website or branding?

00;07;26;09 - 00;07;49;24

Lindsey

But I needed help so much with marketing. And I remember it was like I was definitely one of your first hires, if you will, even though I was sort of a contract. But I remember like it was, I don't want to say it was a hard sell for me, but you were definitely like, This is a big investment. Like, this is a big thing for me to be hiring out.

00;07;49;26 - 00;08;11;11

Anastasia

And you just were at that phase in your business where it was really like that first giant leap to be like, Hey, I'm going to invest this much in marketing dollars. And I just remember totally freaking out and being like, Oh my gosh, Lindsey's work is so beautiful. Like, look at what a cool California style she has. But I think we just really hit it off.

00;08;11;11 - 00;08;31;07

Anastasia

So we had I think we had definitely exchanged DMS and we're like Instagram friends, but we certainly weren't close friends when you had initially reached out? No, not at all. I mean, I remember having that conversation. I think we spoke. I mean, I literally remember the day I was you. 

 do too! I remember I was in the old kitchen before we renovated it.

00;08;31;07 - 00;09;01;14

Anastasia

And I remember I was standing there, my living room facing, and I felt this like kismet energy, you know, And I just remember feeling like this is my girl, like, I just I felt like you were listening to me with like, I really was like, Hey, I really want to continue for my voice to be kind of like helping other people, you know, was still really young in my business and learning and making mistakes, but I wanted to carry that through.

00;09;01;14 - 00;09;19;08

Lindsey

I was kind of just coming on and I don't even think stories were a thing. I don't even know. I kind of just came on and started writing captions about business stuff. And I think you were the first one that was like, you should start this thing called Monday mentors and kind of talk to.

00;09;19;10 - 00;09;42;26

Lindsey

It was a fine line because I remember you saying clearly, designers are not your customer, so we can't just focus so much on designers. But it was so important to me that you found a way to incorporate that into my business model, which I just thought was like one genius, and to just the fact that you took something that was super important to me, even though you probably were like, This girl has no idea like that.

00;09;42;27 - 00;10;10;05

Lindsey

This is not going to be bringing in the clients that she wants for her design business. But yeah, it felt just such an instant connection. And, I remember I had 16,000 followers. I remember talking to Quinn (husband) and being like, I think this is going to change the path of my business. Like I think I am so sold on just what you were telling me and the way you believed in my business, even though you really didn't know it.

00;10;10;06 - 00;10;26;20

Anastasia

Like in the ins and outs, like you know, now, you know, it was just amazing. And it's probably one of the best decisions I made so far in my career. And like five years later, still, you know, and then just expand it. Anyways, I don't get into that. Okay. So I know, I know. Well, thank you for those sweet words, Lindsey.

00;10;26;20 - 00;10;54;26

Anastasia

I just love you so much. But if you're listening and if you happened to notice one of the continuously weird parallels between Lindsey and I, she keeps referencing her husband, Quinn Yes, my husband is also Quinn. And that is just one of the funny little things that I've just always felt so connected to Lindsey. But she touched on how one of the pillars of her business has always been mentorship and education, and I think that's really like the infancy of Design Camp and this concept around it really started.

00;10;54;26 - 00;11;19;14

Anastasia

I just loved that she was so open with her knowledge. I love that she was open with her struggles and I felt like there was just such a gap in the industry for it. So that's kind of a little preface, but I want to talk more about where your business is now, because I feel like your credentials are just so outstanding and you don't necessarily sing your own praises very often.

00;11;19;14 - 00;11;38;26

Anastasia

So I do want to go over that. I mean, I think it's really important to mention that in these five years you are well into seven figures in your design firm and have been for years now. How many you said that you have ten employees, including the shop now at this point, how many clients a year are you taking on?

00;11;38;29 - 00;12;05;28

Lindsey

We typically have anywhere between 10 to 15 projects at a time. I would say within a year we probably do anywhere between maybe 20 and 30, just depending on where we fall with some of our projects in a span of years. So it really just kind of depends on where those projects fall as far as when they end and things like that.

00;12;06;01 - 00;12;24;14

Anastasia

So I feel like that's still small when I talk to a lot of people, even at Design Camp, like we have 30 projects right now, so we're really selective about and I feel, you know, it's been a privilege that we've been able to be really selective now on who we take on as a client because we're a small firm.

00;12;24;17 - 00;12;50;19

Lindsey

I only have four designers plus myself on the design team. And so with these big projects, we want to make sure that we're not getting burned out, that each of our projects are getting the best of us. They're getting the best of things. But I think that it's really important to make sure when you get to a point, you know, we don't, we don't just take on large projects.

00;12;50;19 - 00;13;12;02

Lindsey

We still like to take on smaller ones as well. What do you consider that like? What is the difference between a small and a large project? So the difference between like a quote unquote small and large part large projects are typically full remodels or full custom homes before the house down or starting from the ground up, or we're taking it down to the studs and redoing everything.

00;13;12;04 - 00;13;38;09

Lindsey

Plus we're doing all the furnishings as well. So that's kind of what we usually tend to do between, I would say, three and five of those a year. Then more I would say maybe medium projects are we're doing full home furnishings, so we're doing 5 to 6000 square feet or more of a full home coming in and furnishing from top to bottom, maybe doing some like cosmetic, maybe painting or adding wallpaper, changing out hardware, things like that.

00;13;38;12 - 00;14;01;09

Lindsey

And then smaller projects tend to be kind of what our medium projects are. But maybe it's not the full house, maybe it's just all the main living spaces. Maybe it's just the first floor, maybe it's just a kitchen remodel. So it's still, I guess, a decent amount of work. But compared to the larger ones, to us, that feels more manageable and they're done quicker.

00;14;01;16 - 00;14;23;02

Anastasia

They're not taking 2 to 3 years to complete. So it's kind of nice to sprinkle those and because like right now we're in a space where like we haven't done a photoshoot in forever, I don't know when we're going to do another photoshoot like we have nothing completed right now. So yeah, there's like that big lull in between when you're in your procurement era or a construction area that overlaps.

00;14;23;02 - 00;14;56;21

Lindsey

And so the smaller projects that can be a really great killer project, even if it's just a kitchen that's getting redone or just a smaller furnishing area in a primary suite or something, something of this question when. So we talk a lot at Design Camp about how to graciously kind of steer the wrong type of clients away. And one of those ways is on your intake form, on your website, to have that dropdown of like what is your project Total project budget, including furnishings, design fees, construction fees, like what is the total number?

00;14;56;28 - 00;15;20;12

Anastasia

And we always like to make sure that in that dropdown the smallest number listed is your smallest price point. You're willing to take on a project. So when you're saying that you still take on the smaller projects, are those people that are coming to you from Instagram and your website or those people that maybe are past clients that you're doing like a one off or I am interested in how you decide to take on those small projects.

00;15;20;15 - 00;15;45;13

Lindsey

It can be all of the above. It can be referrals from past clients. So it's a friend of a past client and I always, even though most of them have been really good, I always want to give those people the opportunity because the referrals from some of our our best people that we worked with that we've become friends with, or it will be from Instagram or it will just be, you know, maybe they got in touch just us through through our website, through Google.

00;15;45;13 - 00;16;05;04

Lindsey

But I really like to make sure that the budget aligns with whatever it is that we're doing. So our minimum is about 100,000. We probably are going to raise that because it's just really hard to do like a kitchen design right now with $100,000. Our fees included materials construction. So we're going to be taking a look at that this year.

00;16;05;04 - 00;16;28;05

Lindsey

But right now it's $100,000 thinking of, okay, if we're doing three room minimum kind of furnishing, that's about how much we need for furnishings. And is that 100,000? Is that just for the furnishings? That doesn't include your fees. Right. Right. Can you put your fees in there, too? We can possibly fit our fees in there, just depending on which rooms we're doing.

00;16;28;08 - 00;16;49;22

Lindsey

And if we want to take on a small project like that sometimes, I mean, we have definitely done like one of my favorite projects that we did was one primary bedroom in the primary bathroom, and they had such a healthy budget for that and they really just let us be creative and challenge our our own kind of design esthetic and wanted to do really beautiful things.

00;16;49;22 - 00;17;07;00

Lindsey

And so that was a no brainer, even though it was such a small thing. But it was a nice turn around. It was like a 4 to 6 month project and we were able to do it within their budget. But you know, I would say most people wouldn't want to spend what they spent on just their primary. You Yeah.

00;17;07;08 - 00;17;37;25

Lindsey

Yeah. But yeah, so that 100,000 minimum is probably going to have to go up to probably 200,000. That's a jump, but it's a realistic jump. Like I just want to be really realistic. I've had so much experience now with understanding how much things cost, and that was probably the hardest thing that I had to learn and has and is just always changing with COVID now that inflation, all this stuff.

00;17;37;25 - 00;18;00;17

Lindsey

So I think that it's really needed for what type of projects we want to do. Well, I think that's a perfect example of what I think makes Design Camp and the way you host Design Camp is that you are making these small or sometimes substantial pivots or alterations to both your processes and just how you run your business.

00;18;00;25 - 00;18;21;21

Lindsey

And what I love about it is, I mean, we'll spend three months before Design Camp going over our outlines and our talking points and revising and saying, wait, did we change that this year? Have we updated this in the last six months? And I think this is a perfect example of how next time we're at camp, you've probably made that decision and you figure it out what that minimum is.

00;18;21;28 - 00;18;54;23

Anastasia

And do you share that with everyone who attends? And I think that I love Design Camp. It is like this living, breathing organism of all of us growing and gaining experience together and sharing that experience. So I love to talk about back in 2018, you and I started working together and then that was, I believe it was like June, June or July that we actually like to officially onboarded you as a client.

00;18;54;23 - 00;19;18;20

Anastasia

And we were running your Instagram and your newsletters and writing blog posts for you. So then fast forward to the January Market in Las Vegas of 2019, and we had both our clients come with us, our teams were with us, we were at market. We walked all the showrooms with you. We were on a panel together. I believe for-

00;19;18;22 - 00;19;52;25

Lindsey

We were on a panel with Ivy, which is now Houzz Pro and I can't remember what we were talking about. Probably just business stuff. It was you and- Mikel Welch. Yeah, it was just the three of us. Yeah, it was just us. And so, you know, that was the first time we had met. Our husbands met and yeah, I remember, you know, just again, like having that, you know, sometimes you talk to people and you have these like Instagram connections or you have these online connections and you meet in person, you're in, you're kind of like, okay, maybe it's a little different or whatever, but it's still the same.

00;19;52;25 - 00;20;14;15

Anastasia

Like, it just felt more like a sister, you know? And we went to after that, that night after the market, I don't know what hotel we went to. We were in the bar. We just started kind of talking about her. Mind you, the bar was closed. We literally went and sat down at this bar. The bar was closed and we were just like, We need to keep talking about business.

00;20;14;17 - 00;20;33;00

Anastasia

And so we sat down and it was so late and so we were like, Oh my gosh, that panel was so great. I remember going really well and I was like, We need to talk more. Like there's more we can share. And I loved the questions we received and we were like, We need to talk more about this.

00;20;33;07 - 00;20;59;03

Lindsey

And I honestly and I hope you do remember Lindsey. I don't recall who said the word retreat first, but we were just like feeding off of each other, thinking about it. I don't remember either. I just actually think you were talking about your experience with the retreat you took. And then I probably said something like, Oh, yeah, we should do that.

00;20;59;03 - 00;21;28;17

Anastasia

And then, yeah, okay, that was weird. It happened quickly. So the retreat experience that I was talking about, which actually aligns beautifully with our story together and our timeline because I had gone on a luxury retreat with Fiona Humberston. She is a brand stylist in the UK, and she was hosting this beautiful workshop in Majorca and I was just obsessed with Fiona.

00;21;28;17 - 00;21;47;21

Anastasia

I still am. She's an incredible mentor to me, but I went on this retreat. I remember she had a monthly payment plan option. I had been in business for maybe 18 months. I was very new into business. And she had a payment plan option. I paid for it for a whole year. Like leading up to this retreat.

00;21;47;23 - 00;22;12;14

Anastasia

And I went with one of my good friends, Ciara Wilson, and we got to Majorca. It's like an incredible, you know, 500 year old estate. And it was just so beautiful. And the retreat was very, for lack of a better word, it was super woo woo. It was very much like feelings and like general vibes. And I being new in business was like, I need to do a list, tell me what to do.

00;22;12;14 - 00;22;32;18

Anastasia

I will check it off and I just need to go through these action items. And I wasn't fully invested. I wasn't totally in it at that point. We're on a day like three or so and we had a psychologist there who was teaching us about the psychology of design and all these different things and really about the psychology of our own business.

00;22;32;20 - 00;22;55;27

Anastasia

And I was like, Oh, this isn't what I thought I signed up for. I thought we were going to be drawing logos and making marketing pitches, and it definitely was not that. And on day three I had, you know, exercised 100 million with a psychologist who was there. One of the exercises she had us do, she was like, write down your five favorite clients you've ever had.

00;22;55;29 - 00;23;17;04

Anastasia

And when I wrote down that list, four out of the five of them were interior designers and the whole message they'd been teaching us was like, You need to find your ideal client, find your perfect audience. And I remember resenting that a little bit because I was like, Hey, I'm trying to make rent. Like I can't turn clients away.

00;23;17;04 - 00;23;36;24

Anastasia

I cannot buy into this concept of saying no to a bunch of work that's coming in just because there's going to be someone potentially better down the road. But when they had me do that exercise and I listed them out and I remember it was Clara from Banner day, Lindsey was on that list, Decor rotation. And I was like, Those were absolutely my favorite clients.

00;23;36;24 - 00;24;01;13

Anastasia

I can produce the most beautiful work, the most meaningful work. To me, it finally clicked and I was drinking the Kool-Aid and we left. The next morning. I rewrote every bit of copy on my website to focus entirely on interior designers. And from that point on, I never worked with anyone outside of the shelter industry again, and that's when IDCO really

00;24;01;13 - 00;24;22;10

Anastasia

transformed from me being basically a freelancer to having a proper company where I have, you know, now we employ 22 people and so I, I will never forget how that retreat changed my life, even though it took me two of the four days to really get into it.

00;24;22;13 - 00;24;43;17

Anastasia

But I understood the power of having a small set of time, a chunk of time set aside to focus on your business and what your intentions are within your business and to learn from other people in the same business and to be open and candid about that. When you're trying to run a business, it's just really difficult to carve out that time.

00;24;43;17 - 00;25;07;14

Anastasia

And so I was telling Lindsey the story in that bar. I'm sure it was after 2:00 in the morning, it was so late that we were talking about this and the boys had already gone to bed. And between her Monday mentor sessions, which we had already started, everyone goes spam her so she brings them back. Go spam her on Instagram, but then she's going to be like, Stass, I need you to do the Monday sessions for me.

00;25;07;14 - 00;25;31;07

Anastasia

I don't have time. And that's where I really was. Like, Wouldn't it be amazing if we could take this panel discussion? We just did her Monday mentor sessions, my knowledge of marketing in the industry and created our own version of a retreat. Yeah, I think we felt like we were the perfect two hats.  I had at that point some experience in the business.

00;25;31;09 - 00;25;56;09

Lindsey

You had the marketing and we just kind of felt like, Wow, we can really both be touching on really important things that we both, you know, quote unquote felt like. I don't mean, I hate saying expert, but like at that time, like, you know, we were learning and we had already grown a lot in that first six months of us working together, which is crazy to say.

00;25;56;09 - 00;26;18;11

Anastasia

But yeah, I mean, I remember I remember like telling her about it and then like, I think like very quick, I don't know how quick it could be days, it could have been weeks, but we then started planning like, yeah, it was like, here's the idea. I have this perfect place in Austin and I remember feeling really overwhelmed like, Oh my God, how do we just even start this?

00;26;18;11 - 00;26;42;14

Anastasia

Like, how? But it just effortlessly kind of came together, which also made me realize that, you know, I grew my business very organically and I feel like Design Camp has just like came about very organically and has grown very organically. And that's how I feel, like I lead a lot of my intuition on business and I just felt right to feel like, okay, we were like, this is how it's supposed to be.

00;26;42;14 - 00;27;08;24

Lindsey

And yeah, I mean, I don't think that it would have worked if we didn't come in there and like right from the start, be very vulnerable and like to really talk about what is in my business. I, we, I have, I have done other things and have seen other things where a lot of people hold things back. And I just remember being like, if we're going to do this, we really have to pull back the curtain, you know?

00;27;08;27 - 00;27;40;08

Lindsey

And like you said, like, I don't think I've ever talked and I've taught several different sessions, but I don't think I've ever said the same thing at each Design Camp. Like, we are always changing our business. We are always improving. We're always going through these. Sometimes fails and rough, rough patches and we talk about that. And I think that's what really sets Design Camp apart and why it works.

00;27;40;10 - 00;28;06;22

Anastasia

One of the first impressions prospective clients have of your brand is your website. If you don't have a strong online presence to show off your work, though, you're losing out on potential clients. IDCO Studio offers a selection of limited edition website templates designed specifically for interior designers. Just like you. If you're looking for a more hands off experience, you can add on implementation and professional copywriting and we'll have your new website up and running within a few short weeks.

00;28;06;24 - 00;28;46;07

Anastasia

Visit IDCO.studio to choose your favorite before it sells out! You mentioned earlier when we were starting to position ourselves as experts and even though we were still like newer in business and figuring it out, I feel in hindsight, which is always 2020, that it wasn't that we felt that we were experts. I feel like where our expertise is even now after our 10th Design Camp, our expertise lies in our ability to, a, be super honest and open, and our expertise lies in our willingness to show our mistakes.

00;28;46;09 - 00;29;17;24

Anastasia

And our expertise lies in getting other people to that level of vulnerability and willingness to share as well. I feel like your magical gift. Obviously, you're such an incredibly smart business person, but I think what makes your unicorn feature is really your ability and willingness to share the highs and the lows and exactly how you got there so that people can learn from that experience, and can contribute their own experience.

00;29;17;24 - 00;29;58;11

Lindsey

And I feel like that's really where our special, our special moment of Design Camp is. It's not even necessarily our resume, it's the environment we're able to cultivate at Design Camp now. Totally. I mean, I remember it could have been one of the last ones we had at the Wayback, and we can maybe talk about the evolution of that, but I remember getting this like 911 text during one of when we were speaking and we had a break and I called my office and we one of my designers at the time was just having such a horrible experience with a client, really, really difficult client.

00;29;58;12 - 00;30;20;23

Lindsey

We ended up having to fire them and it was a mess. And I remember like going, you know, after I talked to them and we kind of went back into sessions and talking Design Camp, like opening up and telling people like what had just happened, you know, and like, I just think it's so important because I learned so many so many things from people at camp.

00;30;20;23 - 00;30;40;02

Anastasia

So much, so much. It's like, you know, people are like, Oh, it's so nice. You just like, kind of selfishly do it for myself. Did I have learned some of my key things that we have either changed or pivoted on or just knowing that like, oh my God, they feel the same way, too.

00;30;40;04 - 00;31;07;02

Anastasia

That is so true. I feel strongly that even because we have designers come and we'll talk about things we haven't even said, what Design Camp is it? We will talk about that. But we have campers who have not yet started their business all the way through, people who have been in business for 15 or 20 years and everybody obviously takes away different, different information and finds different levels of values throughout their sessions on the four day experience.

00;31;07;02 - 00;31;30;09

Anastasia

But even our most senior designers that come, I hear over and over again that sometimes it's just really great to be validated. And if there are certain things that you're doing in business that you have been doing and we're saying, yes, we have tried a lot of different options and we agree that this is the best way. Sometimes you just need to know that, hey, you don't have to start over on something else.

00;31;30;09 - 00;31;47;27

Anastasia

Like it's just a great gut check to be like I am on the right path now. There's also tons of things that are like, Oh gosh, we've been doing this system for 15 years, but it's not the most efficient anymore. And now we have three other options presented to us that we can really investigate and find out what's the best fit for our firm.

00;31;48;02 - 00;32;13;14

Lindsey

Yeah, I mean, I think and I think that when, you know, when we were talking about this, about what we wanted, it was first and foremost, I think it was like building a community because I know how important that was for me. I had made really great designer friends on Instagram who kind of were my community. Instagram was my community, and I was able to reach out to them with any questions I had and they were very candid with me.

00;32;13;14 - 00;32;43;07

Lindsey

But I know that that's not the case with a lot of people. Even though I had a couple of people who were open, there were still so many that were closed off and I think that above all the education and kind of what you learned, the community that's built around Design Camp is really the most magical thing because like you said, it's kind of like with anybody who is either just starting or been in the business for 20 years, they kind of find their people at design gear, you know, hundred percent.

00;32;43;09 - 00;33;09;03

Lindsey

And we find our people at Design Camp. And it's just so nice that like we let everyone know, like, listen, we're going to be super vulnerable and we're going to let you know kind of the ins and outs. But this really only works with you guys. Also, let your guard down and are vulnerable too. And I think that's probably the biggest thing I think when I look back on like all the Design Camps, that's the biggest thing that people take away is that they have like friends for life, people that they can call after Design Camp.

00;33;09;03 - 00;33;44;04

Lindsey

They can like it. I mean, we have campers that go on vacations together. Yeah. Like they have their oh, we have some in Europe right now. There's a group of I think five or six of them who are in Europe right now on a trip when we were at Camp. So we just wrapped our spring 2023 session because that was two weeks ago now and we had campers from our first Design Camps, as in three years ago, that were currently on a reunion trip to Florida and there were 16 of them there and they all go together and everyone always goes to market together and round top together.

00;33;44;04 - 00;34;18;15

Lindsey

And there's just something so amazing about showing up to an industry event forever after and having not just familiar faces but close intimate friendships that you can just kind of pick up where you left off. Although I have heard that some of these groups are on a group text all day, every day, nonstop texting, and people have literally had to silence the notifications because they are that close and it's just being paying them nonstop like, yeah, listen, businesses can be really lonely, really lonely, especially if you don't have a team, you know?

00;34;18;15 - 00;34;45;24

Lindsey

And so I think that one of my favorite parts about Design Camp is just having the community and having to be able to walk away feeling like, Wow, I have people in my corner, you know? So we obviously go through based off of my unique retreat experience, I really try to make sure that Design Camp is very action plan hard facts like really jam packed with actual key information.

00;34;45;27 - 00;35;17;11

Anastasia

But even with that said, I still look at camp that 30% of the value is what Lindsey, myself and our teams put into it. And 70% of the value is what you learn from other campers and those friendships that you take. And so to those listening, I launched the podcast I guess last year to kind of get a little bit of that Design Camp feel and inside look into the industry on a more accessible, larger scale.

00;35;17;13 - 00;35;44;15

Anastasia

But I think what makes camp just really the next level is the fact that you can reply with questions, you can interrupt us at any point. It's a very casual and we like to have things interjected so that we can learn from everyone and to have those carved out moments where we do just allow for conversation with people that are in business the same amount of time as you, and then also with people who have been in business for way longer than you.

00;35;44;15 - 00;36;04;07

Lindsey

So you have a lot of opportunities to learn from different people. So Linds, at this point, I feel like we should actually explain what Design Camp is. And let's start by what it was when we launched with the Wayback. So you had come to me and said, Hey, I have this perfect place. I think you were. I can't remember how many you were working with.

00;36;04;09 - 00;36;21;18

Lindsey

And I remember coming out and I was like, Okay, I'm going to go on this trip to Austin. We're going to like, go to this place. We're going to kind of sit down and plan out everything. And the Wayback was just so perfect because it's this really beautiful little kind of bed and breakfast run by a mother and daughter.

00;36;21;20 - 00;36;42;24

Lindsey

And it's like little cabins. And I think it was between like 17 and 20 people that we had. I can't even remember. No, it sleeps 14 people like with some of our stuff, I guess. Yeah. So with us, yeah, we didn't even get to stay on property. We would slip back to my house every night and be back for breakfast at seven the next morning.

00;36;42;26 - 00;37;06;14

Lindsey

So, yeah, it was the little cabins and people would bunk up and now it was like very nice cabins, really beautiful. But it definitely was like summer camp vibes, grown up version. Yeah. And we pretty much had the whole place to ourselves. First, Lindsey and I were like, Well, we're going to teach all of us.

00;37;06;18 - 00;37;23;16

Lindsey

We're going to teach everything. I'm so frigging glad we don't do that. We're we're going to people and we and I can't even remember how we, like, really picked the topics, but I think we were just like, we need to talk about the client experience and at that time, kind of like what we were going through in our own business.

00;37;23;16 - 00;37;44;19

Lindsey

So for me building, I was building up this kind of client experience that we have now. And so you had obviously really helped me with that by building as an investment guide and all of these tools to help us create that client experience for our clients that really propelled us in getting the type of clients that we really wanted.

00;37;44;22 - 00;38;08;14

Anastasia

And so I know that we talked about that, we talked about trade accounts, we talked about marketing, we talked about systems and processes. Like, I mean, we tried to pack so much within the three or four days or and we would have dinners together. And I mean, we really just kind of spent we didn't leave the place like we did not leave and we still don't leave,

00;38;08;19 - 00;38;44;29

Anastasia

But it was so small and intimate. And I remember, oh my gosh, do you remember our first camp? And we just cried pretty much the whole time. The whole time. The whole time. And I think it was just like all of this, like work and like this dream that we both kind of realized we wanted to do. And it and the people that are at our first camp, I mean, they just hold such a special place because they believed in us, like they were the ones that said, yes, like I believe in you and I want to learn from you and I still get choked up because it's like, you know, sometimes, you know, you hope

00;38;44;29 - 00;38;58;00

Lindsey

you're doing it right and you go like, I don't know if this is going to work. And you just like putting it all out there and like, we were just like really putting it out there. I really felt that at the time and we just had the most amazing campers and the fact that we cried and they didn't.

00;38;58;00 - 00;39;16;22

Lindsey

I mean, maybe they did, but like, they did not let us know that that was crazy. But it was just so much fun. And it really made me realize, okay, we do like what we were feeling about the community and the sense of bringing people together and learning and just talking about business for 3 to 4 days.

00;39;16;25 - 00;39;41;07

Lindsey

That was like super confirmed by that camp. That was something to me. Yes. And meanwhile, at the Wayback, the venue was so great. But we literally Lindsey, I are schlepping concrete tables from one location to another to set up for dates. We were just doing so much work. Lexie there. And Erin, you had two of your employees.

00;39;41;07 - 00;40;16;06

Lindsey

Yes. And we were just, you know, if I had employees, if I knew, I probably had Katie at that point, but she was not there. So there were really only three or four of us. And it was, yeah, it was kind of a madhouse. But and so at the beginning that first one because we could only fit 14 people sleeping there, we slept off off property, We had a couple of people who were local who would drive in, so we had about 20 campers and the way Lindsey and I set it up is the only way we could make it at all sustainable financially is that we had to do two weeks back to back.

00;40;16;06 - 00;40;43;27

Anastasia

So each week was a different session, different campers, and we did that at the Wayback for. So we do three or four rounds at the Wayback. DID Well, you know, our first one was in February of 2020, right before COVID. Yeah. I mean we really, by a miracle got out and then we canceled. I think we canceled our October, we postponed October, and then we had a spring 20, 21 year.

00;40;44;01 - 00;41;03;10

Anastasia

And we did fall 2021 at the Wayback. And then we got to the point where, I mean, our camp was selling out in 5 minutes online. It was selling so fast and people were so eager to get to join. And Lindsey and I were like, This is so much work. It takes so much out of us.

00;41;03;10 - 00;41;22;27

Anastasia

And two weeks at a time is a big chunk plus, you know, six or eight months planning. So we were like, okay, how do we scale this without losing the magic of Design Camp? And that has been the biggest challenge in our trajectory of hosting Design Camp together. It was like, how do we make this something that's profitable?

00;41;23;01 - 00;41;42;13

Anastasia

I still wonder if we averaged out our hours and actually logged our time, it's not a profitable thing because we spend so many hundreds of thousands of hours planning each one. But just from a covering costs perspective, we knew that we needed to scale. And Lindsey had asked me, okay, well, if you could have camp anywhere, where would it be?

00;41;42;16 - 00;42;04;15

Anastasia

And I immediately was like, Well, literally, I could have it anywhere. I would want it at a Kelly Wearstler hotel, I'd want it at the proper place. And so we sent out well, Lindsey's team sent out RFPs, tried to get some numbers on things, and we started to look. After inquiring a few places, we realized, hey, the proper might not be out of reach.

00;42;04;18 - 00;42;28;19

Anastasia

And it was important for us that even though it wasn't going to be cute little cabins that the experience of when you come and invest in Design Camp, you're staying in a place that inspires seeing and beautiful and feels like a luxury and the proper definitely hit all of that but what made the proper in my opinion, the most ideal location for us to scale to was just the level of service.

00;42;28;19 - 00;42;52;13

Anastasia

I mean, the level of service at the proper is second to none. Why everyone there is just amazing. Like they really do a great job at picking their team. So once we figured out that we could make this work financially, we were like, Well, how do we keep the mystique and the intimacy of what Design Camp started as when we were just in those little cabins.

00;42;52;15 - 00;43;19;29

Anastasia

And we realized that by breaking people up into small groups of about 14 people based on years of experience, we could do rotations so that you can sit and listen to design presentations or systems and processes next to someone who's been in business for a similar amount of time. Are you? Not that your questions would always be identical, but they would be likely more relevant than sitting next to someone who just hasn't even launched their business yet.

00;43;20;06 - 00;43;42;21

Anastasia

And that way we could really cater each of those small group sessions to the group that we're speaking to. And in order to be able to do those five rotations, we brought in our teams and this is where I feel really we came to the next level at Design Camp because Lindsey has her team of designers doing the presentation on design presentations.

00;43;42;23 - 00;43;44;21

Anastasia

She has her

00;43;44;21 - 00;44;05;17

Anastasia

Director of Operations is teaching systems and processes of literally how she runs the business because as our businesses have scaled, we are not necessarily the people who are doing all of these specialties. And so we wanted to bring in the people who were doing the specialties. Yeah, I really think that that was probably one of the best shifts that we made.

00;44;05;17 - 00;44;23;13

Lindsey

I mean, obviously it was nice because we were bringing in people to help us right? At the same time. I mean, they're just like I said, like I am not technical . I did not go to school for that. So if someone asked me a question on CAD design, I would not be able to help because I don't do that.

00;44;23;15 - 00;44;49;13

Lindsey

So it's nice to be able to have our senior designers who teach the design presentation, who are doing the legwork of all of that, teach that program or that session. And we still teach sessions on pricing. So Anastasia and I cover pricing, we cover how to grow a team. So there are things that we are now more an expert in and our own business that speak to more than certain people on our team.

00;44;49;16 - 00;45;14;18

Lindsey

But I think that that's what was kind of scary to do at first. I know my designers are like, Wait, you want us to be your clients like they are troopers. They are so great to do that. But I think again, it just was such a great pivot and I'm just so glad it worked out. And I think that it was risky, but it really does pay off because I do think that it's really valuable to learn from the people who are doing that work every day internally.

00;45;14;20 - 00;45;46;09

Anastasia

Yeah, our team, the IDCO team, comes as well. And we have a session, a small group rotation on websites and copywriting and we have our lead copywriter there literally doing audits on your website, telling you the exact formulas to put in to write beautiful, eloquent copy. And you know, there's the saying that those who can't teach, I feel like Design Camp is the antithesis of this and says, no, we're going to learn from the people who are actually doing this and it's really special to be able to do that.

00;45;46;11 - 00;46;11;22

Anastasia

So now we've scaled and I want to talk about what Design Camp is now. So it is a four day experience. You check in about 1:00 in the afternoon at whichever property we're at. It's always going to be at a proper location either in Santa Monica, in Los Angeles or here in Austin this fall 2023. We will be back in Santa monica and then spring 2024 will be back in Austin.

00;46;11;24 - 00;46;33;23

Anastasia

And over the course of four days, we have six or seven different keynote presentations with Lindsey and I and then our celebrity designer guests, as well as the five small group rotations. And we have these beautiful dinners on the rooftop every night, as long as it's not raining, which it did in spring. And then we have dinners and a beautiful restaurant inside.

00;46;33;26 - 00;46;53;10

Anastasia

And the final day on day four, we have a nice guided implementation time where all of our staff that was teaching is now available to ask more specific questions. If you weren't able to get it answered. But I want to talk about what we're covering at camp, because every camp we pivot a little bit and some camps will pivot more than others.

00;46;53;12 - 00;47;26;06

Anastasia

And I feel like this spring we changed a lot up that will be carrying through, moving forward. We listen to people's feedback. Yeah, we ask our employees to ask everyone during dinner what they like, what they don't like, and we really take into account what people want to hear or maybe what didn't work. And so I always think that like the evolutions that we've had at Design Camp always come back from campers and, and our own review of what didn't work and what works just like how we do with the project and I'm sure you guys do too.

00;47;26;06 - 00;47;53;23

Anastasia

But I think that it's really important and I kind of like that we change things up a bit because it also brings people back because they want to learn about something different that maybe we didn't cover when they were the first time. Yeah, absolutely. We have about 10 to 15% consistently that are repeat campers that have been there a year before and implemented everything we were taught and they're like, I'm ready to hear it again so I can take out the pieces that maybe I glazed over the first time.

00;47;53;23 - 00;48;17;07

Anastasia

So some of the additions we have brought to Design Camp as of recently, the biggest one that I feel like is a total game changer and I feel really blessed that Brittney joined us is understanding your numbers and financial planning for interior designers. We have our CFO who specializes in financial planning and advice for interior designers, Brittany Vier, who came out and taught those small group sessions.

00;48;17;07 - 00;48;39;26

Anastasia

So you're sitting next to someone who's been in business for three years asking the same questions, because a lot of us started, our businesses right before COVID or in the boom of COVID and we're so swamped and so busy that sometimes you weren't able to actually look back and say, Well, wait, I need to assess this. What are my profit margins?

00;48;39;26 - 00;49;02;24

Anastasia

Where am I making the most money? Can I pivot my offerings to grow the most profitable sections of my business? And Brittany really breaks it down for us. Lindsey You want to talk us through design documentation, presentations like I said, our senior designers are teaching design, documentation and presentations. And this session what I really like is we kind of show you and walk through.

00;49;02;24 - 00;49;28;09

Lindsey

I mean, obviously designers like we're not teaching anybody how to design, right? But we're teaching how we are organized within our design and how we do client approvals, how we showcase the material selection, how we're doing client onboarding as far as homework, like what we've done to reduce the amount of revisions we go through and show you our spec book.

00;49;28;11 - 00;49;47;13

Lindsey

And one of the things that I really, really wanted to do with Design Camp is that I really wanted to be able to show like our exact thing. So it's not just like, here's a copy of what our client homework looks like is literally what our client homework looks like and what we send to our clients.

00;49;47;13 - 00;50;12;04

Lindsey

So same thing with the spec book and we really go through like from the time that they become a client to the time that we're installing and they go through that whole process and they're showing everything from how we do our presentation, how we grab feedback, how we do revisions, how we work with our proposals, how we do technical drawings, how we then present all of that to the contractor.

00;50;12;04 - 00;50;36;11

Lindsey

If it's a larger remodel or tear down, like I said, the spec book, and then how we kind of like wrap it up into a pretty bow and then how we are for that client with the design process. So another addition, or I guess you could say that we've just revised and made it really specific. We have tried dozens of different design softwares and obviously IDCO

00;50;36;14 - 00;51;17;00

Anastasia

We've worked with thousands of interior designers and I have kind of this amazing bucket of knowledge from not just what Lindsey has learned specifically in her business, but what all of our other clients have as well. And we've really dug in deep to teaching studio designer as your design software, and we are really excited to welcome studio designer to Design Camp to do very intimate, in-person small group session studio designer training where we can talk about the accounting side of the business, where we can talk about how to be tracking those numbers, how to be doing your proposals, how to turn those into purchase orders, as well as how to be bringing in your other

00;51;17;00 - 00;51;44;26

Lindsey

overhead expenses so that a studio designer can truly be your one and only accounting software. While it's also your project software. That's been really exciting because they obviously know a lot more about it than we do. And I feel like we learn so much from every time we get to talk to Robert and the team. Yeah, and you know, it was really important to bring them on or to talk about them because obviously we had made the switch a couple of years ago from Ivy Houzz Pro to City Designer before we were talking about Ivy and how we use that.

00;51;44;28 - 00;52;15;29

Lindsey

And when we go through our system and process session, we are talking a lot about the software systems that we use. So it only made sense to bring them on, really be able to like deep dive into that because, you know, like you said, there's so many different software systems and as a designer it's not the end all, be all, but it's definitely, for me, the biggest improvement that I've made in my business from when we switched, like, I can't know, I'll talk about Studio Designer all day long again.

00;52;16;02 - 00;52;46;09

Lindsey

So behind the product and what it's done for us. But yeah, I think it was really important to bring it on because it is hard software. It's not hard, it's just a learning curve and learning about it. So it's nice to bring on that professional that Robert is the guy who set up our company within Studio Designer so he's so knowledgeable and so it made so much more sense to have him there rather than me kind of just teaching what I've learned in the last year.

00;52;46;16 - 00;53;06;24

Anastasia

Right. And moving forward, we're switching that from a general keynote with the entire group to the small group sessions where you're going to get an even more hands-on experience. So then we talk about portfolio and website audits. I think that's really important, obviously here at I.T. So we do branding and web design, both template and custom versions for interior designers.

00;53;06;24 - 00;53;36;18

Anastasia

But I think when someone already has one implemented, it can be really hard to find someone who's willing to guide you through what you've already built in versus saying you have to start from scratch. So I really love that session and I'm grateful for our team to be there to teach that. One of the keynotes that I mentioned that Lindsey and I do together is pricing for interior designers, and it's so amazing to sit there with our group of usually about 70 campers and ask to raise your hand if you are charging $100 or less.

00;53;36;23 - 00;53;55;01

Anastasia

Raise your hand if you're charging $150 or less. And we go through and you can see this general pool of who's charging what, how much they're charging so that you can quickly say, hey, there is clearly room for me to raise my rates. I think that's really amazing. And then Lindsey just breaks down her three part process of pricing.

00;53;55;06 - 00;54;15;22

Anastasia

Again, I'll have her episode links in the show notes here for you. But it's just brilliant the way that she does it for the most clean, clean for the client, clean for you internally process possible, but also make sure that there's nothing you're paying for out of pocket. And that's just a mistake we see a lot of designers make where they are paying costs.

00;54;15;22 - 00;54;40;29

Lindsey

That is definitely a client cost, and she's really eloquently outlined that for us. Yeah, and I love that this year we brought in a copy of our actual proposal that we provide to our clients. Think the proposal building is such a stressful task to do. I actually get a lot of DMS from designers who are like, I have this project and here's the scope and am I pricing that out?

00;54;40;29 - 00;55;00;21

Anastasia

Right? And I just love that we really go in depth about what we include on the proposal and how we price it and that the tips and tricks that we do to make it not so overwhelming for the client. And because that is really like the first impression right? So I love that we provided that this time.

00;55;00;21 - 00;55;24;13

Anastasia

And one of my favorites that I actually got to teach this time around because Katie was on maternity leave was our system and process session, which we really just go through our whole kind of from client experience down to client off boarding. We do a real big deep dive into the procurement phase and we show you our process chart.

00;55;24;14 - 00;55;49;28

Anastasia

We show you again everything that we use in our business to make things organized. And we talk a lot about the things that didn't work and why we changed it to implement new things. And we talked about the things that were super successful. And this is where we showed a lot about studio designers because we're obviously talking a lot about the procurement, but it was a hefty session, I will say.

00;55;50;00 - 00;56;11;21

Lindsey

But I always thought it was nice because it was the first time I really taught it. I obviously did it like put it together with Katie, but she usually teaches it and it was so nice to really see how people just like, soak up that information because yeah, because it's not taught at design school. Even if you did get your degree in this, like this is not the information they're teaching you how to be an interior designer.

00;56;11;21 - 00;56;42;16

Anastasia

They aren't teaching you how to run an interior design business and the business of that. And I know when I was getting feedback from campers who like Lindsey Session was or in the future, Katie session is just mind blowing. I know everyone's always like, I want a Katie, I need a Katie. I’m like, you can't have her! Not available. So then we have a general keynote with Caroline Pinkston who is our director of PR and she handles PR for dozens of interior designers around the country.

00;56;42;23 - 00;57;01;07

Anastasia

And we talk about PR and marketing and the shifts that are constantly happening. We touch on social media there as well, but we have a specific session on social media which is so helpful for people because like, what is the latest and greatest? What is happening on Instagram? Do I use hashtags? Do I not have all of those things that are constantly pivoting?

00;57;01;07 - 00;57;25;08

Anastasia

And then one that we've added most recently also is growth strategies. And what we mean by that is how do you grow your team with bodies and also how do you grow your business from a financial side? Things through getting the deepest discounts from your trade vendors and how to get the biggest profit margin with your markup. Yeah, I really like that one.

00;57;25;08 - 00;57;50;04

Lindsey

And obviously didn't do that in the beginning because I felt like I couldn't really speak to a lot of it because I wasn't really a leader or quote unquote boss at that point. I had one employee and so I felt like, you know, that was one that was nice to wait on a little bit. And really that's the one I think that we opened up a lot really with because we talk about being a leader and how to be a good leader.

00;57;50;04 - 00;58;10;23

Anastasia

And that's a lot in our work. And we've and now we've kind of combined it with trade discount, growing your revenue too, because at the end of the day we're all here to make money and be successful. However you define success for you and so that is a one that I really love because it's also really interactive.

00;58;10;23 - 00;58;30;25

Anastasia

I think that when people talk a lot afterwards about their kind of ideas and gaining inspiration from other people's ideas, I know I have when we talk about it at dinner, so I love that one that we bring in. Yeah, I feel as though six or seven years into my business and going from me plus one part time person to now there's like 20 of us.

00;58;30;27 - 00;58;54;16

Anastasia

We talk a lot candidly about how you need to be very intentional with growing your team because once your team grows, it's really hard to scale it back and I shared a very recent, very personal struggle that we did have to scale back a bit and how incredibly difficult that is. And we just share how to make sure you don't have to go.

00;58;54;18 - 00;59;28;17

Anastasia

So it's just such a joy to be able to feel like I can talk about the things that are hardest in my business and talk about things that are killing it and things that, you know, my team loves me for and things that I'm really proud we were able to implement in our small business and the kind of policies we have for maternity leave and how we're able to give unlimited PTO and all of these different things that we can share how we're able to afford that as a small business, how we're able to make the decisions to bring that in, and how if you don't have the ability to afford certain benefits, what are

00;59;28;17 - 00;59;49;24

Anastasia

some benefits you can provide that don't actually cost you anything but mean a lot to someone's quality of life? Yeah, I think it's important to talk about the highs and lows for sure. So wrapping up, I know when do you have to hop off here, but we are super excited to announce our next Design Camp, which will be happening this fall, October 23rd to 26th at the Santa Monica proper.

00;59;49;24 - 01;00;12;08

Anastasia

And I am dying over our keynote speaker lineup, which we didn't even touch on. That's something we brought in to bring in our celebrity guests, which has just been so exciting personally so exciting, you know? I mean, I know, but we're so excited to be welcoming. Bria Hamill in Lindsey said that the Bria podcast episode was her favorite ever.

01;00;12;15 - 01;00;38;19

Anastasia

It felt super, super personal to her as she just recently moved in, expanded her show room. We have Susanna Simon Pietri of Chango and Co coming, who is just this, just the coolest modern, beautiful style within the expansive team. She has over 20 employees now. Caitlin Flemming will be joining us and we'll be celebrating her latest book launch at Design Camp, which is such a treat for us to be able to do.

01;00;38;19 - 01;00;57;09

Anastasia

And we always, always, always like to weave in quite a few surprises. So you never know who's going to show up at Design Camp to come say, Hi, Lindsey. Thank you so much for going down this memory lane. I'm super proud of us for not crying throughout the whole thing. I know it was nice to look back on like ten years, how we started, where we came from and what we're doing now.

01;00;57;09 - 01;01;23;19

Anastasia

And I mean, it's only been three years really that we've been putting this on. And I, you know, I hope that it continues. And I just I really love that we were able to kind of like sit back and kind of take a look at the success of Design Camp and what we're doing, because I do feel like it's such a special event, and I've said this after every camp, we say this over and over how lucky we are to view, able to do this and to experience it ourselves.

01;01;23;19 - 01;01;48;15

Anastasia

And I, I just feel so lucky and blessed to have you in my life and that we're doing this. And, you know, it's always nice to be able to take a beat and like, look at your own kind of journey, which, you know, we never really do know. So this is such a treat for me. We feel like every camp as we get closer, I'm pulling my hair out and I'm like, This is it.

01;01;48;15 - 01;02;08;24

Anastasia

We're not doing it again. This is so much work. And then as the week wraps up and people are walking up to us with tears streaming down their face, seeing how their life has been changed in four days is the most fulfilling passion project I could ever imagine. And there's just no one in the world that I could ever do this with besides Lindsey.

01;02;08;24 - 01;02;31;19

Anastasia

So thank you for carving out some extra time for me today. I know you're over me. After we just went through camp, I will talk to you soon and tickets are now on sale linked in the show notes here for you. So we will see you in October. Lindsey. See you then. Thank you so much, Lindsey, for joining me today.

01;02;31;19 - 01;02;58;23

Anastasia

As we chatted down memory lane as a reminder, design tickets for Fall 2023 are now on sale. The four day inclusive business retreat will be hosted at the Santa monica proper October 20 through 26, with keynote speakersBria Hammel, Chango and CO and Caitlin Flemming. We are so excited to bring you more jam packed information than ever before and we hope to see so many familiar faces again.

01;02;58;26 - 01;03;22;29

Anastasia

You can purchase your tickets at the link in the show notes and make sure to get on the waitlist because the event sells out quickly. We'll be back in Austin in spring of 2024 and fall 2024 will be back in Los Angeles. Until then, I'm your host, Anastasia Casey, and this is the interior collective.