Designing for the Long Game: Scaling Without Starting Over with Imparfait Design Studio

Anastasia Casey: We are so excited to invite you to dive deeper into the Interior Collective podcast episodes now on Patreon. Unlock access to in-depth analysis, helpful downloads and worksheets created with each podcast episode. Subscribers gain behind the scenes access to additional resources like examples and screenshots of guest spreadsheets, construction documents and so much more. Your subscription also gets you immediate access to our private community of interior designers and our team of industry experts ready to answer your questions. Subscribe now at patreon.com/theinteriorcollective or linked in the show notes. Join the Interior Collective, Patreon community, and let's continue this conversation. AC: If you've been listening to The Interior Collective for a while, you probably have heard all kinds of software recommendations and maybe even tried a few, but if your system still feels kind of all over the place, I totally get it. That's exactly why I wanted to share Materio. That's M-A-T-E-R-I-O. It's an all-in-one platform built just for interior designers from concepts to install and everything in between. You can try it for free at getmaterio.com and Interior Collective listeners get 50% off their first month. AC: Hello, Nick and Rebecca. Welcome to the show. It's such an honor to have you. And even after talking to you for like five seconds before we got on, I know this is going to be a really fun show. Okay, so let's get like, let's paint the picture because you guys have a lot going on and have a lot had a lot going on for many, many years. You created Kitchen Lab Interiors over 20 years ago. Walk us through its origin story of the firm and what things looked like in those early. Rebekah Zaveloff: Absolutely. So, Nick, I can jump in first and we'll try not to talk over each other as husbands and wives tend to do. But that said, so 20 years ago, we were working out of our house or our apartment actually in Chicago. So we own a building in Chicago in Chicago's Wicker Park that Nick bought before he even met me, a little bit before. And it was small. It was me for a long time, for a few years, and then it was me and an assistant that was part-time. And then once we had our daughter in 2012, our assistant became full-time. And then for a while there, and I'm not great with dates, but it was me and an assistant, and Nick kind of came on as we got busier. He was doing other things. We had met in the restaurant business. He owned some properties. So there was a bunch of other things going on, as there always are with us. There's about a million things going on. But then as we started to grow and become busier, we started adding people and we actually moved out of our apartment into, like Christy left, our first assistant left, and then we had a new one, Kate, and then we moved into one of our units in the building we turned into our office on the third floor. And those were fun days. I mean, they were scrappy and hilarious. We would have Christmas parties that would span between our house on the, so basically we had converted a coach house into a single family and the coach house is attached to a three flat. So it's like a five flat building, old brick brownstone. And so our house was the coach house and our office was upstairs on the third floor, like right up the stairs. So it was kind of old school and kind of fun. And we would have these fun Christmas parties where everybody would wander around from, you know, from our apartment to our office and things like that. So. John “Nick” Nichols: Actually, of the fun facts about the beginning of the business was that we had, Rebekah and I had met and we were renovating. I was renovating a three-flat next door to the one that we lived in, and Rebekah had been in art school at UCLA and the Art Institute of Chicago in collage, in film, and all sorts of other, and in actually painting. And she walked into this gutted three-flat to the studs, and really we…a light went off. She's like, my God, this is something that, you know, this is space. This is manipulation. This is, what can we do in here? And suddenly that was sort of the liftoff to her understanding that there was a crossover between the world of art and the world of space and the world of interiors. And the interiors part came later. The kitchens came first and we started a company called, there was Kitchen Lab was started, but also Kitchen Lab Design Build. When I was in college, my dad wanted to know what I wanted to do with my life and I said I wanted to be a writer and he said I think he should be a carpenter too and you know for some reason I thought that that was good advice and it was because I needed summer jobs and so I learned how to do I worked in the trades during during college and when we first started the company I was doing kitchen installations record learned to be a kitchen designer at a now defunct studio in Chicago and I had already been in the restaurant business and been in the entrepreneurial world and I really encouraged her, I'm like, you should take this and become a kitchen designer and start a kitchen design firm. And that's how Kitchen Lab was born, Kitchen Lab Design Build. So that's the origin story. And then it kind of grew from there. RZ: Yeah, so actually it was 2006 that we did our first whole home project. So that's what's kind of ironic and why the rebrand versus spinning off a new company thing started to happen. We just kind of kept putting it off and not wanting to deal with it. But ultimately we had been doing, mean, so wait, so Kitchen Lab, I think we started in 2003 officially is like our, you know, our business license date. And then in 2006 was our first whole house project. I mean, so it wasn't, no, it wasn't even that long. I mean, exactly. And what's crazy is like, you know, Nick and I, because I'm sort of almost self-taught in the design area, even though I went, you know, I became CKD and, you know, took the test and all that kind of stuff after becoming a kitchen designer. I, we just say yes. You know, people are like, so we had this project, this beautiful house up on the North shore in Highland Park. We were doing the kitchen and the architect, started that, and it started to have scope creep. And the architect wasn't like, you know, some architects want to do everything. This guy wasn't really like, he wasn't pushing for that. And the clients said, do you, you know, do you know any interior designers? I want to do the rest of the house. And I, and I actually referred her to a friend of mine who I actually, ironically, our studio is next door to her sister, her sister's store 25 years later. So talk about different state in Michigan. So this was in Chicago. Now we're in Michigan and we're next door to her sister and she's still an interior designer, this is Arden. And anyway, for some reason, I think she either couldn't take the project or something and our client was like, Rebecca, you can do this. Like, let's just do this. And so that was our first whole house project. And here's the kicker, it's still on our website. So it's still one of my favorite projects and that's how old it is. NN: Actually, that project, the kitchen in that project has been added to millions of idea books and hows because we were on house so early that a couple years ago it had been added to over a million and I don't know what... RZ: What is now. I joke, I've sold a million hamburgers. AC: Wow, that's amazing. Okay, so you kind of alluded to what we're really talking about today, the concept of, are we rebranding, launching a completely separate business? Talk to me about what that thought process was, because I think right now it is very pertinent to how people are feeling after so many people entered this industry during COVID and now things are maybe shifting and they've learned a lot or they've gone back to school. It just, think that this is so relevant. So talk to us about your mindset and why you thought that you even needed to in the first place. RZ: This is like a master's degree in marketing. I got to tell you, I learned so much. So first, am I allowed to swear? Awesome. So the joke is, is that the unofficial name of the rebrand was we don't just do fucking kitchens because that was something and it drove Nick crazier than it drove me, you know, for some reason, it just was like, yeah, go Nick. NN: Could I interrupt for one second? There's an interesting backstory. There's a story before the story, which is that we started as Kitchen Lab. Then because of this conversation, where people would literally call up on the phone and say, I know you're called Kitchen Lab, but do you do more than kitchens? And it was clear that they hadn't looked at the website, seen the work, or it doesn't really matter why they were asking the question. The question was driving me crazy, and I was driving Rebecca crazy probably with that. We sort of, you know, not to be too crude, kind of decided to call it Kitchen Lab, we decided to add interiors to it. We're like, we'll solve this problem. Kitchen Lab's a great name. It's really what it is. So we really kind of, we really just kind of messed up. I won't be too crude about it. It's like we just screwed up because ultimately people were still asking the same questions. And so that's what led to the decide, the decision to start a rebranding process. And in the beginning of the rebranding process, we really thought we might change the name entirely. And during that, yeah, so we started with that idea that we would rebrand and just take the assets of Kitchen Lab Interiors and put a new name on them that was more representative of what we did as interior designers and really as people that take projects from the drawing board or from people's minds through to completion. So we do a lot of projects that start with hiring architects where we vet the architects and really act as the client's advocate from start to finish. So that was the issue with Kitchen Lab Interiors is that we thought, okay, we'll get rid of this. And during the conversation, thank God, our branding, you know, our amazing branding team said, you understand how much equity you have with this, right? I'm sorry. RZ: This is the SEO that per the consultant that came on that normally that term SEO just scares the hell out of me. And it's like snake oil salesman, but she was amazing. And she had been recommended by our rebranding team. And she's like, you guys have a lot of equity in keywords that are specific Google keywords because you've been around for so long, you know, and kitchens and kitchen lab and kitchen lab interiors, all those things are like, you know, they're unique keywords. And so when she started showing us the data, we were like, this is insane. Like we can't give this up. Even if we end up figuring out something to do with it, to sell it, we don't even know. We don't know. We just don't know enough to even think about getting rid of it right now. Like we need to learn more. So. NN: And to be honest, it could have been an almost an extinction event on some level because when you start to introduce a new name and a new brand, even though you have that equity tying it together, we're learning this a year and a half in, it takes a long time to get traction. And if Kitchen Lab was just in the bin, well, I'm not sure. RZ: I don't know where we'd be today because you can't, it's not like you hang out a shingle and people are like, great, we're going to come in and buy your goods. You know, I mean you have to market. so after, so then, so this is where it gets interesting. So we, we did the half as approach into kitchen lab and kitchen lab interiors, which actually still really does relate to the company because basically kitchen lab, the way we look at it now, and this was a moment too, was that there are two different types of projects. There are two different types of clients. Sometimes they're most of our kitchen lab clients are remodels. They're shorter term, they're six months max, maybe eight. They're oftentimes living in their house or moving out to a rental while the project is being done. And budget has a limit to it, but it's still a healthy amount. So like, we say to people, it's a million dollars, over a million is in parfait projects oftentimes and under is kitchen lab. Now, that's not always the case. That's not always cut and dry, but it kind of is a defining factor. And we also, since we had already been doing work all over the country at that point, like not, not, I mean, that sounds a little like, I don't know, excessive, but we were already doing projects out of state. So we were doing a project in Florida. We had done one in, I think it was, guess, Southern California. And, and we realized that that was part of it too. It was like Kitchen Lab was more our local projects and Imparfait or interior design projects were more, were going to be more every, like all over the place. NN: Short form, long form, really. I mean, really, there's shorter engagements. So we always take a lot of, because we came from the restaurant business prior to even getting into this service, hustling, waiting tables, tending bar, we tend to refer to a lot of things that we do with that sort of language. So it's like two tops versus four tops, or versus big tops, if that makes sense. So if you've ever waited tables and you have 10 two tops, you're running around in circles. There's a lot of projects, a lot of clients. RZ: Everybody wants ketchup at a different time or water NN: And when you have a big topic, a 10 top or a 12 top or a party, that's your table for the night. And it's a much longer engagement. And so, Imparfait projects, they take a lot longer to develop on the front end and take a lot longer to complete. You know, many of these projects that we're working on, we're looking at timelines that are into 2027 right now. And that's wonderful from a business standpoint, which is my perspective, which is to say, we know we're going to be building this for the next two to three years at a minimum. And that means that you can feel comfortable. You're short of the world coming to an end. You can feel like we can plan around this. Kitchen lab, smaller projects, you always need the pipeline to be getting filled. AC: Can you guys tell me, I'm so curious, I understand what Imparfait's doing, that's more commonly what I hear about on the show, you know, like full scope, full service projects. Can you break down a little bit more those under a million as a, you know, loose threshold, those six month projects that you're doing with Kitchen Lab? Like, what is the scope of a project like? RZ: So a project like that, oftentimes, kid you not, someone calls us and calls Nick, he takes all the prospective client calls. I just closed on a house and I want to start construction immediately, or I'm about to close on a house in two weeks. So there's a lot of that, okay? So it's very much, it's not planned. think about like, and the other thing I have to point out is our first new construction ever from the ground up project was not until 2020, finished in 2020. Which is crazy. if you think we've been, we've only been doing remodels and additions, not new construction, because remodeling and additions were my remodeling old houses are my, is my passion. I love it. And so that's what we've been doing for years. So Kitchen Lab is almost exclusively remodels, additions. Like I said, six to eight months ish is usually what they run. It's oftentimes a kitchen, a mud room, a powder room, a butler's pantry, a walk-in pantry, family room or foyer and living room. It's the whole first floor only like it just or it's the kitchen and master bath and then it's scope creep into furnishings and stuff for the first floor. NN: Ironically, ironically, this was another joke name that we had, which was Scope Creep for the company. And, you know, I mean, we were just talking to our team this morning. We're doing check-ins with everybody on the team. And one of the things that we talk about all the time with Kitchen Lab projects in particular, smaller projects, I'll just go back and say many of the projects are four to five months, not quite six to eight months. Those are bigger scopes. But almost every single job that we do, we start with somebody, whether they start off saying they'd like to do a kitchen or kitchen in a powder room, kitchen in a mud room, in a powder room, they almost always, like probably 90 plus percent have scope creep. And the beauty of that is that that means that clients are trusting us and saying, I need to do this as well. And they're growing into it. The difficulty from a planning standpoint and from our team standpoint is how do we manage beginnings and ends? And so it's challenging, but at the same time, it's very flattering. And from our perspective, and from my perspective, from a revenue standpoint, it's wonderful that people are willing to extend the scope of their project because they trust our team, they trust the vision, they trust the execution, and they want to do more. And let's face it, we all want to do more when it comes to our homes. AC: Can we talk a little bit about your team structure and how that works between publicly two different brands? And actually, maybe you can answer this as well from like a back end, like legal standpoint. Do you have two separate staffs? Is it two separate entities, like legally, or is it two separate entities legally and your staffs kind of span both? RZ: So I'll speak to it a little bit. So we started, so yes, they're two separate entities legally, two LLCs, two bank accounts, the whole idea are actually S-Corps now, two separate, you know, all the things, tax ID numbers, all the things. Our staff floated, so some of our staff was being paid on payroll through Kitchen Lab. Some of them we shifted over to Imparfait when we launched that. And then we log hours and so we have two different studio designer accounts. So we use Studio Designer for both companies and we log our hours depending on what those projects are. Since Imparfait has grown in the last year and has its healthy client base now, a couple of our team is only on the Imparfait payroll. And then now we've separated it a little bit more and we're still working on that. Nick, you can speak to that and then I'll talk about the exact positions and who does what. NN: I mean, the goal is ultimately to have two separate companies. I think it's another fair thing to say is that when we decided to create Imparfait through the branding process, we didn't really take into consideration how complicated that we were starting a second company. We really didn't fully comprehend that until we started saying, we can't have the same logins for Studio Designer. We can't have the same email. Obviously, some of the things we knew, but it's it added either that or.. RZ: It was I think it was more wealth of whiteness. NN: No, it's two separate entities and we're getting there more and more on a day-to-day basis. So that's really the goal. But ultimately, the way to think about it for our clients, and we were just talking about this again this morning with our PR team, is that Kitchen Lab does kitchens for Imparfait projects. So if we're building a house for you and the house project is going to take three years or a year, it doesn't really matter. Ultimately, our Kitchen Lab team with the 20 plus years of experiences building kitchens and designing kitchens will do the kitchen for that project. And so that's how we sort of interchange. And conversely, because kitchen lab has always been, became Kitchen Lab Interiors, many of our clients, as Rebecca was saying, scope creep or otherwise want us to do a whole first floor is a very common thing for us to do. Can we do our living room? Can we do additional rooms, dining room. And so in that case, the Imparfait interiors team, including our, we'll consult on that. that we're, in other words, we don't have a staff interior designer at Kitchen Lab currently. AC: Okay, Rebecca, before you dive into actually like who's the team and how that works, one other question you were just talking about, Nick, that Kitchen Lab will handle the kitchens of projects for Imparfait. Does that, do you just bill that time back or does your client contract directly with Kitchen Labs for the kitchen? Like are you running it kind of as a contractor, if you will, through like a contract employee and running through Kitchen Lab or are they contracted with both companies? RZ: It's not, so we don't do it like a contract. They don't contract with two companies. So, and the Kitchen Lab team, the time they're spending, they just log under Imperfait. But the sales of the kitchen cabinetry, right Nick, isn't it how we're doing it? But the sales of the cabinetry is logged under Kitchen Lab's accounts. So that's where we're also different, which is that a lot of interior design firms out there do not do millwork, do not sell cabinetry. And that is something that is our DNA and is a huge, obviously, part of how we make a living. And so being able to do that through, to be able to have a sister company that provides that sort of seamless experience and also knows everything that we're doing. And I'm involved in obviously both sides of things. So that's how that works for the most part. AC: Well, I think I feel like this model is applicable in like a lot of different ways that a lot of designers could really be considering right now. For instance, if you are traditionally a full service interior designer who's doing custom new builds, but your inquiries are maybe slowing right now because of the state of the economy and you don't want to water down that brand that you've built, but virtual design could be something that you could be doing. You could have a second LLC or S Corp depending on kind of how you transact. Like I think that there's other ways you could implement this concept of having two separate brands instead of completely rebranding or diluting your existing. RZ: So true. this goes back to when we were debating on whether or not to rename or to rebrand or whatever we were going to do. You know we looked at places like Thomas O'Brien for Target. We looked at, you know, things like that. And, you know, how do certain designers do it? How do they manage to to do these easier to the public, where it's good design for all, which is something that we're big believers in and want to be able to provide. But we're such a small boutique firm that we just can't we can't scale on that level or offer price points on that level. And so you know, it allows you to wear two hats. It allows you to run. It does not water the brand down. And there's something about that that I think has been really helpful for both the team, for our clients understanding of where they fall into each project and or which company they fall into. And it's funny because we do have one big project right now that's considered a Kitchen Lab project, but it's practically it's almost the whole house. You know what I mean? Like it's almost turned into the whole house at this point. But it's not quite as robust of a project, right? It's more it's like you're not doing does I mean, even though we're going to maybe do some art for them. It's like art accessories, all the things every single room instead of maybe just the master master bath upstairs, you know, that kind of thing. NN: To jump onto your point, Anastasia, it's like we literally, we come from a background where we had to hustle to do everything and we still do. And so when things slow down, you start saying yes to things that you wouldn't say yes to before, or you weren't able to say yes to. You just gotta survive. And as you know, from talking to so many people, our business is susceptible to recessions. There's a lot of uncertainty in the business world right now to say that we're gonna leave. RZ: The housing market's been a nightmare for years. I mean, they're just, you know, it's just been a mess. NN: Well, we have contractors calling us all the time and somebody I spoke to yesterday said, you know, all you have to do is walk through Home Depot to see that things are not going well right now. So this is a contractor that we've worked with many, many years in Chicago. And, you know, he's like, people are calling me from all over the place that I haven't heard from in years saying, do you have anything that, you know, I can look at? So, you know, this may change anytime. And certainly we haven't had a recession for some time, but that's kind of where we are today. AC: Yeah, absolutely. And actually, as I'm sitting here talking to you, I'm surprised it took me this long of the conversation to be like, wait, I did the exact same thing. We have our website templates and templated tools for interior designers at IDCO Studio. And it was a few years ago that a friend of mine had rebranded and launched a beautiful website that I loved, but they didn't even come to us for a proposal. And I was like, I love what you did. I was just curious, like, why didn't you even ask us for a proposal? And they're like, well, I didn't know you did custom web design and these things. And I'm like, oh, shoot, that's a problem. And from there, that's when we launched Kwin Made, which is our completely bespoke studio, same team, different entities, exactly what you guys were describing. Yeah, and it was a matter of we needed to be able to have cash flow from different perspectives and serve people that we really wanted to serve that we couldn't scale on one way or the other. So it is really interesting that I think that this episode is so fascinating because I think people can apply this thought process, at least get them thinking about how else could they manipulate or shift their business to be able to serve more people. As you said, Nick, like keep things afloat when things are possibly slower. NN: Well, the other thing we haven't shared with you is that's part of the origin story is that during the Great Recession, that's how old we are, we started an online design company called Design in a Bag. And really we thought we were going to change the world. And we really had had a product that we thought people really needed and wanted, and we just couldn't get the traction that we needed. So in other words, it was it was what people are doing today where there are virtual design websites. Of course, it was with 2008, 2009 technology and where we would basically create a kitchen design and send it to somebody in a branded bag. And really what it was, was wireframes of how this particular setup would look, custom wall swatches of paint to go with it. And basically everything that you needed to kind of create a kitchen space, a kitchen space conceptually delivered to you for, I think it was between $99 and $599. But what we discovered was that people still said, but wait, where does my fridge go? And they wanted custom design. And so Rebecca's mom at that time said to Rebecca and myself, Rebecca was soon to be pregnant. Maybe you should concentrate on the business that makes money. So that all happened in the past as well. another guy that we worked with forever said you need to have three legs on a stool. And so three revenue legs. in other words, to your point, having the bespoke branding studio or the bespoke design studio, having the more ready to wear sort of is very helpful from a revenue standpoint. But then what's the, from our perspective, it's the same long projects, short projects. And the third leg is missing. Well, kind of, real estate. RZ: We're still into that. But no, and it's interesting too, because the idea of having sort of a high-low, one of the things that we found that was really challenging, and I'm sure you found this in your business, that contracts, scope, you're rewriting these things for people every day, because you're, and you're trying to be too many things to too many people, and that's one of the big no-nos with design, is that you need, if you want to, if you want to attract your ideal client, then you need to be really clear about who you are, what you provide, what you look like, what your projects look like, and they will come. I don't do minimalism, right? And it's like, so I need to really communicate what we do. So when you have two different, Kitchen Lab and Imparfait had two different vibes. They just, even when it came to the website design, because we redid the Kitchen Lab website. So. They just, there are certain decisions you make where we would struggle and get paralyzed. And I don't have a hard time making decisions. I mean, that's one of my superpowers. I do not, I'm not indecisive, but I found myself really struggling sometimes when I was trying to reconcile the two companies in the way that we were, when they were together versus when they were separate. So long story short, best decision we ever made, even though it's harder to run two businesses was to separate them and market them separately. So it was really a very, very wise decision at the time. But it was a lot more work. It took up a lot of time because we thought we were just branding one company and then we had to sort of refresh Kitchen Lab at the same time and all of that that goes into that. AC: Okay, so before we really dig into this decision not to rebrand and to duo brand, I do want to hear, let's hear about the team, how many people are supporting you and what your two roles fall within both companies. NN: Well, currently across both companies, we have a total of 10 people. And this changes on a day-to-day basis. And we rely on outside consultants, in particular financial consultant, accounting consultant, bookkeeping consultant. That's under one roof. We have a PR company that we rely on that does our social media strategy. But we do our social media and marketing in-house. And so that is the team across both companies. As Rebecca was saying earlier, you know, really in imparfait right now is four people and Kitchen Lab would be six people, but there's some crossover. And until we're actually big enough or not, people do have to provide, you know, sort of crossover help at times. we, you know, as you know, there's everything, the sands just continue to shift and you just, you know, when we have, for instance, when we have large jobs being procured, we really need all hands on deck on that in the procurement department. And so we were just talking about that this morning with Lindsay who works across both teams. So you know, beyond that, we're back. RZ: Yeah, so in terms of that, and then we have one gal on maternity leave that we're hoping comes back sooner than later. that's where we're at there. so in imparfait is, it's interesting because of the way it's kind of played out is that Nick and I, so Nick's the CFO, we actually joke that he's the Minister of Magical Objects. That goes back to our Harry Potter days because we're science fiction nerds and or whatever wizards and whatever hilarious that's one of our geeky things but but that said so Momo CFO operations all of that kind of stuff is Nick's camp and then and I'm the creative director and oversee pretty much all of you know anything related to design and the stat and the design staff that said we have a lead designer on Imparfaits team Bonnie and she actually her backgrounds in hospitality design as well as some residential after that during COVID and then we have Dina and Lucy who's on maternity leave. And so it's kind of like a, Morgan. So it's a couple of seniors and a couple of juniors is the basic way to think about it. The goal is to get to the point where we have two, three person teams. But right now that third person is sort of a floater. Lindsay is our studio coordinator. She does all our procurement. And then Noelle floats around and helps with Lindsay with that, as well as she has been working with Kitchen Lab clients on interiors that I oversee with Bonnie, but then she presents because we don't have the bandwidth to FaceTime with both sets of clients. So a lot of it has to do with FaceTiming with clients and who has the ability to do that. that's what that looks like. And then Amanda is project manager slash designer, technical, that kind of thing. Lisa runs Kitchen Lab design. Like she is the lead kitchen designer for kitchen lab. And then Gabby is our head of our coordinator for social media and marketing. So that's kind of what it looks like. So we've got, know, the one thing I'll say is that we've done differently is we do have someone that's primarily dedicated to procurement. I think that that's something I've heard that a lot of other teams have their junior designers do all the proposals in studio and that sort of thing. We've really found that we want the people that are technically good at certain things to stick to that or FaceTime with clients, not do the admin of a Studio Designer, but it's good for everybody to know it. then having an in-house person to do our marketing and social media, I think has been really important because of voice. Like we use our PR team for strategy and for PR, but they work really closely with Gabby, but it's really great to have someone in the field on the ground that can track things and take videos and pictures and stuff like that. And I know what we're about in our ethos too, you know, like on a day to day basis. AC: As you have been listening to this podcast, you have heard a wide range of software recommendations, tools for sourcing, invoicing, time tracking and beyond. But if you've tried piecing them all together, you've likely ended up with a system that can feel disjointed and you are not alone. The truth is it is not you. What you needed just didn't exist until now. Meet Materio, M-A-T-E-R-I-O, a powerful operating system built specifically for interior design firms. From the first mood board to the final installation, Materio brings every phase of your project into one streamlined intuitive platform. Procurement, client billing, task management, it's all connected and it actually makes sense. Design smarter, stress less. Try it for free at getmaterio.com. Interior Collective listeners receive 50% off their first month. AC: Rebecca, you mentioned back in the day, starting Kitchen Lab, like it was you with an assistant and then it was a different assistant. Talk to me about when you really scaled beyond having an assistant. Who was that first hire? Do you..not necessarily the actual person, but what was their role? Would you, looking back in hindsight, would you shift what that first higher role was? RZ: Yeah, it's interesting. I know, you know, I think we had a bookkeeper and, and I always heard like, you know, you should do bookkeeper first. Then we had an assistant. The problem is, is that when you start to use Studio Designer, you need somebody that is a Studio Designer expert. So now, I mean, it just is, it's such an intense program and it doesn't, not everybody gets it. So I would say that I wish that we had had the right partner within, we finally found one after going through like four companies to work with us in studio first and foremost, because I think it would have saved us a lot of headache in the future. For anybody listening, like getting that stuff set up first is more important than anything because going back to fix it is a nightmare. Like having to clean up your books and all of that kind of stuff because you're too busy. You know, the truth is we're too busy doing our work. We're too busy designing, too busy servicing clients. And then that stuff gets on the back burner. And that's what, you know, can hurt a company. That's what can keep you from growing and being successful. So, so there was that. And then... I would say that we, our ethos was to hire younger designers and grow them early on. And I would say that that was probably like in hindsight, if we had had the cashflow in order to hire someone with more experience that would have required a higher salary, that would have been a preferable direction to go. Because I don't think you realize, go ahead, Nick. NN: No, it's just fair to say that we tell clients this all the time, we've made all the mistakes that you can make, every one of them. Our hiring process was the same, where we thought this made sense because number one, Rebecca has always been of the mind that kitchen design needs to be made cool back in the day. But it's also very hard to hire in the space people that actually have real experience, real understanding, because the business itself is very different. In other words, there's the showroom model, is predominant still, where people, many clients will walk in the door and they'll sell you cabinets and do some design. Really, we always approached it from being interior designers that do kitchens and also managing everything of the process. In other words, when we come to clients, we bring contractors, we bring everything that you need, because we know from our own experience that people don't know how to do this and how could they? So that's how we've approached things is thinking that we needed to develop people you know, to Rebecca's point. And the reality is, is that ultimately what you had was a room full of assistance and nobody, know, and then it unduly fell on Rebecca's shoulders to do all the design and all the client facing. then actually when we, yeah, when we actually hired somebody that had big experience in kitchen and bath, that was a big disaster as well. And she can't, had a big, you know, so truly our, the one thing I would say about hiring is that when we finally got to the point where we actually started using consultants to help us with hiring, In other words, specific recruiters to our industry, suddenly we looked at how much time we're spending on the vetting process, on the interviewing process, and realized that the money that we spend, which is pretty significant, was well, money well spent. And they were placing people, the people that we work with exclusively, and we do hire outside of this group, people word of mouth, et cetera, et cetera. I think that we're on the sixth person and the five are still with us. So there's six hires and five are still with us. And this is multiple years to this point. So again, using those outside resources and learning from our own mistakes, and most importantly, not being afraid to say, you know what? We screwed up. This is the wrong way. Let's try. RZ: Clearly we're not good at hiring. It's like, and you know, the truth is I joke that hiring is like dating. I mean, everybody puts on a good face for three months and then you really realize whoever, you know, who someone is. And I think the mistake that people make is like, you don't want to pretend to be somebody you're not in order to get a job. It's like the worst thing in the world. You know what I mean? Like it's just, it's not good for you. It's not good for the company, you know, to be able to say like, I can do that. And it's great to fake it till you make it to a point. But in this business, you're gonna get eaten alive on site within about five minutes. Like everybody's gonna know that you don't know what you're doing or you'll end up walking out in tears. And it's like, so I think that we just got smarter and frankly, you I hate to, it's like, you gotta pay to play. You gotta spend the money to get the right talent sometimes. And, know, quality, you know, it's all about that. It's like, yes, quality stuff, quality people are more expensive. And there is a lesson in that, for sure. AC: Something I'm hearing from you guys over and over again, which I find really refreshing, is that you do use a lot of outside experts. You've talked about, you know, your brand advisors, your SEO experts, your recruiters. I feel like having been in business as long as you have, it's really, like I said, refreshing to hear that, you can, just as you expect your clients to trust you as the experts, you're also comfortable trusting the experts in fields that are not yours. Can you talk to me a little bit about how, why, and who first you became comfortable with like outsourcing things that were not part of really your superhero powers? Like when did you decide we need to spend money with someone else to do this role? RZ: I can speak to that. Can I speak to that real quick? So I had started going to some industry things like, you know, whether, and I don't think I'd gone to High Point yet, but I went to, oh, like an SKS training, you know, a wolf or a Thermador training. And I met a bunch of other designers and it was a great way to network and learn. And they always have great speakers. And I know I think you've done Design Camp and things like that, which I've been wanting to do. And, and I started sort of dipping my toe in that, which was hard because we had a young kid at this point. So I had, you know, a little girl at home. I didn't want to leave her. It was a challenge to sort of, you know, take myself away from the work when I really only had kind of an assistant and I was the face of things. And so that's a challenge. And I would also encourage anyone listening to do those things, to expand your horizons, expand your knowledge base, expand what, just because you think you know how people do things. And yes, the internet's amazing and you can read anything. It's totally different than meeting people in real life, hearing their stories, talking to them, connecting, hearing about their resources. So I learned about a business coach through another designer that I met at a Thermador training out in California. And she had been working with this business coach. And I came back, of course, and said, Nick, we have to hire this person because I'm desperate to, I just, you know, know, when you, you, when you're, if you're really honest with yourself, if you're the kind of person who's honest with yourself, which I try to think I am, I know when things are not going great. Like I know when I could do better. Right? Like I know that I could be doing something better. I know there's got to be somebody out there who knows how to do this better than I do, or at least has a different perspective. And, you know, it's always about like, can we afford to do this? Is it worth it? Because you hear horror stories, you know, even if you hire PR like this PR company that we're with right now, I love, we've gone through a couple of different companies that we did not have as good of experiences with, you know? So, so it's like, you know, sometimes companies just mail it in and then you end up with a junior. It's not paying attention to your account. We've all been there. And our clients complain about that. You know, they don't, but they would if that happened to them. So, so the first person we hired was a, we actually went to one of her workshops in New York and then we hired her on a sort of not in her full service where she comes in for three days and fixes everything. We hired her on a more limited basis where she gives us all the documentation, templates, things like that. And it was really eye-opening. But what's interesting is that it, again, timing is everything. I mean, like, Instagram didn't exist then, there just wasn't enough information out there. And so you realize now, I realize now that like somebody can hand you a template, but you still have to do the work. You have to tailor it to your company. You can't just have a cookie cutter situation where it's like, you know, unless you're really small and really just starting out and you're not really sure what you're doing. But if you've got an established company where you've got to explain this to some of your, your, you know, your staff of like how we're going to now do things. It's a little more complicated. So we hired that person first and that's actually when we ended up with the Kitchen Lab interiors and that was a huge mistake. We should have ripped the bandaid off and just said, forget it, we're rebranding at the time because our business really grew from there. And that was, I don't even know when that was Nick, what year was that? NN: It was 10 years ago. She does. least. Yeah, maybe 2000. yeah, no, think it was I think it was certainly longer than that. Or no, no longer sorry. RZ: Anyway, so that was the first. I would say the one, the first, the second company outsourcing that we did that was really useful was recruiting, for sure. So we use interior talent. They have, you know, to find people to, that are specific to this business because we've been, you know, a bunch of recruiters had reached out to us and we're like, first of all, we don't want to poach people from colleagues. We made it very clear to them. You know, we don't want a bad reputation for things like that. And someone who's in the business in this industry, that understands those nuances in relationships that are not just in a flash in a bucket type of situation. And then thirdly, I would say the one where I felt like the big, where I felt the most like a client for the first time was definitely the branding. Branding exercise is crazy. I was like, wow, this is what it feels like to be a client where you have presentations and you say yes and no, and you're not sure about things. I'm like, this is crazy, you know? And it was really eye-opening. It was really great. AC: Yeah, that's when you're like, can I see five iterations of this? RZ: But like that's the thing. I was super aware that I didn't do that. Like I was like, I am not going to do that to these people. If I want to change it after a year, I'll change the font. We'll go back to the other font. I have to make a damn decision. You know what I mean? So I tried to take my own advice. NN: The more concise answer is that we've been using consultants for well over a decade at this point, but really the problem has always been, we're coming from a place where it's like, how do you pay for this? I know that everybody that we know in our industry is not driving around Rolls Royces. I mean, we work for people in some cases that drive those cars, but the reality is that you have to take a leap of faith at some point. And for us, I know for a fact that for many years, it's like, are we going to survive? Are we gonna be here next year? And part of that is one day waking up and saying, we've been in business for 10 years, we're gonna still be in business next year. And actually understanding that the fact that you've been doing it this long means that you're probably gonna continue to do it unless the world comes to an end. And so with that in mind, you can start to look at revenue and say, okay, this isn't what we did last year, can we afford to do this? And so, you know, the Studio Designer consultants that we hired were key along the way. Some of them didn't work out, but adding those programs, we've always like, I've always been kind of a tech fan boy. So I'm always interested in what's going on in that world. So having, you know, knowing that there are better tools that can help us improve our performance and sort of, you know, profitability has always been something that we've looked at. You know, we adopted Slack very early. You know, just programs like that, that have really become ubiquitous have been really helpful. Obviously Studio Designer is huge in our company as is monday.com in terms of organizing. Having those central programs was super critical to us to be more efficient, better for the clients, better from an accounting standpoint, all of those things. AC: One thing you just mentioned that I think is so true is people are listening. It's like, yeah, it'd be great to have a business coach. Yeah, of course I want a PR firm, but it's like, how do you actually pay for those things? And a good friend of mine, Brooke Stoll, who consults on an operations side for interior designers, she just told me this last week, and I thought it was so smart, that if you can be setting yourself up so that your billable hours are covering your people, that your markup, your product markup is where you can put money towards those in-person experiences, those, you know, the Design Camps, you know, Thermador trainings, those other things, making it to High Point or to, okay, in 2026, we're going to go ahead and hire a business coach. And in 2027, we're going to put that markup dollars towards a PR firm or whatever it might be. But I thought that breaking it down like that to say this revenue funnel is going to go towards this and this revenue funnel needs to cover these expenses was a really good brilliant tip from Brooke as she is brilliant. NN: One of the things that reminds me of is that once upon a time in our business, a million years ago, we didn't time bill at all. So it was really about selling product. And one of the evolutions that made this possible was believing that we were worth actually charging an hour, that we were going to charge our clients hourly for the work that we were doing. As you know, from the kitchen business, once upon a time, was really all about, we'll do design for you and then we'll sell you cabinetry. And so that was where we originally came from you know, a long time ago and then it's been many, many, many years since we time-billed. But that helped us, that maybe it was another leg of the stool where suddenly, you know, you know that each month you can look backwards and say, all right, this is what we did in time-billing last year. This is what we did in, you know, this is what we did in sales. This is what our cogs are. This is what, you know, so when you start to grow, when you start to get more familiar with the actual business, you know, how to run a business, then you can start to say, we can actually afford that. RZ: Which is why having the Studio Designer consultant or the financial consultant part of it is so important. If you're not, I look, we're, you know, I joke all this, like, look, I'm a creative, you know, I went to art school. I'm not an accountant. It's just not my natural state of being. And, and so even though I actually really enjoy data and numbers sometimes, and I was decently good at some of that stuff, it's certainly not my first, you know, my first choice in what I do. And so you know and when there's only limited times, hours in the day, you just tend to push off things that you aren't good at or don't enjoy doing over the things that are like urgent, client facing, that kind of thing. So yeah, ties back into that, but that's good advice from your friend. AC: I would love to go back a little bit to you were saying that it was really talking to your SEO expert or consultant that was like you guys have a lot of clout when it comes to Kitchen Lab and to just let that all disappear for the sake of having a business name that maybe aligns more with your services doesn't really make sense. Can you talk us through how you credit came to terms with that and then also how you ended up coming up with the concept of Imparfait just from a brand name perspective. KZ: I'm gonna tell funny story. If you don't believe in SEO, when you hear this story, you're gonna believe in SEO and brand and equity. This story is insane and so embarrassing, but I'm gonna just show you our underwear. So we did not have a Google business listing, okay? So we've been in business for 20 years. I just thought that when you had a website, Google has little things that crawl the internet and find you, and that's how you end up in things, which is how it usually happens. find out this, like, I mean, I'm just, you know, I'm not the techiest person in the world. And so we were on page, like even though I wrote, I used to write for Houzz, believe it or not, like I used to do idea books for Houzz a million years ago when they first started. It was also a recommendation of my mom to get involved in that. And so the cross pollination between what I did for them and what our business was, you know, there was like things where I was in tons of idea books or I was commenting on things or adding product, whatever it is. So there was a lot of that, a lot of other things as well. And we had been published whatnot. I think we're on page like 15 of Google when we first launched Imparfait and Kitchen Lab separately and we created a Google listing and within two weeks we are number one with non-sponsored. So you Google Chicago Kitchen Design, Chicago Kitchen Designers and we are the first non-sponsored listing. We were, mean, it's crazy like that and that's all historical. That is all historical data or like whatever, earnings, whatever you want to call it, you know, where you earn media. So that kind of stuff is pretty mind boggling. And so I'm sorry, I lost track of, then to the Imparfait thing. So the SEO thing and that, it became really, like we took, we actually took a pause from our branding team exercise, like the work we were doing, and sort of were like paralyzed for a couple of weeks, because we were really trying to make the right decision. Can we afford to do both? Do we have the time to do both? Is this insane? You know, do we even want to? What do we want our lives to look like? Like we really had to do some soul searching. And this branding exercise was like going to therapy for our business, for our business relationship. I mean, it was intense. Like there was some serious soul searching and deep diving that we did to figure out who we were, what we wanted to be, and distinguishing that from...And that was before, all that deep dive was before we decided to keep Kitchen Lab and rebrand as Imparfait, or spin off Imparfait. So that was really fascinating. So we took a couple of weeks, we had some hard to hearts and we're like, look, let's just, we'll keep it, we'll figure this out. It's like, we're just, have to, this is crazy. We don't even know what we're dealing with. We have this like thing in our hands that we're not even sure what we're supposed to do with. And so that's kind of where it came and went. And so even in the beginning, there was an idea at one point of like, is it a resource website? Is it something that we sell for the keywords and the names and the blah, blah, blah? Like again, you who knows? But it ended up that kitchen, we were actually able to finally hire Lisa, who is the lead of our kitchen design now, kitchen design department is finding the right hire is huge because the kitchen and bath industry is really different than interiors. It's just really different. It's a different world and finding the right people for that team was really important. So Amanda was our first hire and she actually brought Lisa on or she recommended Lisa and they're a great team. So, so I think that that was part of what kept talked us into keeping it. And it was, you know, it was, it was challenging. I mean, to run both at the same time and to train and to onboard and to have two different companies with two different ethoses in a way was, challenging. But now we've, I think we've hit a pretty sweet spot and I joke it's like, Kitchen Lab, you know, we're responsible for ordering like five to seven things, right? There's like five to seven tabs in a spreadsheet, right? You've got cabinetry, countertops, tile, appliances, plumbing, bar stools, you know, and then some whatever. Like if there's interiors, there's other stuff, but that's like seven or eight things. The amount of items that you have to order for a 5,000 square foot house is just mind boggling. People just don't realize just how many units there are. And so Kitchen Lab is easier to scale. We've talked about maybe like franchising or opening multiple locations. I have no idea if that's going to happen or it's something we toy around with sometimes because it's also, I think something that's much that's needed. Like there's certain industries, there's certain cities that just don't have access to this, to kitchen design that is not just the walk into a showroom and buy cabinets from somebody. NN: So I wanted to add one thing about the Imparfait branding exercise, which was for those people that are out there listening that are going to brand, it is extremely hard to come up with a name. And this is why, you know, that hasn't been used, that isn't trademarked. And so we had discussed whether or not this was going to be Rebecca Zavoloff Interiors, because Rebecca Zavoloff is a very unusual name. It's a Z. You know, it resonates. People remember it. And obviously, there's all of the association with that name. We didn't want to do that for many reasons. And Rebecca and I literally spent days and months going. Rebecca would research infinite amounts of things and say, what about this name? We'd look it up. We'd talk to our IP attorney. It's like, no, this is not possible. RZ: You had to back up. So we had a name. We had a name and we owned and we had the Instagram handle and we had the website. We had all the things. I own like a gajillion website, you know, addresses and our URLs. And, and the attorneys told us that it was being used by another consulting firm, that it was borderline whether or not we would have to fight it off for years. You know what I mean? And so we made the decision to not, I still sometimes think that we should have taken the chance, but we made a decision not to be in lawsuits for the rest of our life or have to answer letters of cease and desist, you know what I mean? Because we knew that it was going to be more of a national company, not just local. And the trademark thing is important, you know, it's really important. You can... NN: To pay somebody, we also had to pay an attorney to tell somebody to cease and desist who was using kitchen lat. And she was not interested in doing that until she had to be literally threatened with legal action. She had taken assets from us and set up in a different city and basically was saying, the point is that we knew this is not a road that you want to go down. And then the other thing to say about Imparfait is that we came, Rebecca is really good at reaching out to people and saying, will you help me? We don't have any money. Can we trade? And so in research, came up with this amazing, well, I mean, look, we will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today sort of idea. She came up with this guide, this amazing branding firm in San Francisco called 100 Monkeys, and said, hey, can we hire you? I know we can't afford you because you do this amazing work. But here's our story. Will you talk to us? And he said, sure. And then we had a conversation with him. And he was very, very generous with his time and said, I will do this for, you know, basically for an hourly rate, which was, you know, a decent amount of money to us and to anybody. But it was super transformational because he said, don't be afraid to say to do something that is different and Imparfait. You know, my mother who speaks French is like, you know what imparfait means imperfect in French, right? And we're like, yeah, we understand. And you know, it also, and it's also something that we can trademark. And it's also something that is very similar to what we do from an aesthetic standpoint, which is, you know, things that evolve over time. You know, imparfait is the French tense that is past continuous as well. And so all of these things, when I heard it, when Rebecca's like, what about Imparfait? I'm like, that's it. And then that's the name. And then we ran it by Eli and he's like, that's the name. And Rebecca wasn't as sure as I was, but it was just after going through millions of iterations and really being frustrated, it's like, look, here's a great name. This is perfect for what we want to do. No, you can't use it. It's been used. RZ: It's not that you can't use it. And this is something I want to talk about a little bit. It's not that you can't use it. You just have to understand that it's going to only be used in a limited basis. So if you're a local company in a small town and you don't care about where you're going and this is just going to be your generation, your life work, and that's it, then it's fine. Who cares? No one's going to sue you. You know what I mean? It's like they're not going to bother. But if you're getting published and you're a national firm and you've got clients all over the country, and that consulting firm decides to expand into your space. They owned it first. And so there's just, it was just too much of a gray area to spend this much money on a rebrand or a branding exercise and, and, make a mistake like that. So there was that. And, and the other part too, is that Eli said, and he's the guy from a hundred monkeys. He said, you know, one of the things about it, they've named, so their company is not just branding, it's naming. Like that is what they do. And I said, and I want to be very clear here. I didn't ask him for it for free. I said, we can't afford you and the way that you do things. Cause he's basically one of his teammates emailed us back and was like, this is how much it is. And we're like, we're not, you know, Google. I mean, you know, we don't need like, I mean, we're not Aero, whatever. So we, you know, and they were in the West coast. So, but I said, can you, I have two questions for you and I will keep it to two questions. That is it. You know what I mean? And so, because I'm, I mean, I do this for a living. We, and I told him flat out, we don't do hourly. We will not do an hourly consult for a client. So I respect you if you say no, but I thought it would be a fun exercise for him. And I did title the email an indecent proposal based on the movie as a joke. And I knew he would get a kick out of it. So, so anyway, so, so that's kind of how that happened. But he, his point was that when you go to name something. You want to boil stuff down. And we bought his book and we like bought his, he's got this great card deck. It's actually really fun. And I found him in the Business of Home, actually. I found him. That's where I found him. He's got a card deck, which is called go name yourself. I mean, it's really clever stuff. This guy is very, you know, his firm is very, very clever. He said, you want to boil it down to the most, the essence of what you are, right? Like a name. If you can find a name that is the essence of what you are and what you do, then that is like gold. You know what I mean? so we, none of us. NN: That name has to be that name has to be trade RZ: It has to be trade markable. know exactly right exactly so that's a very long-winded answer AC: No, no, no, it was great. One of my first episodes, I interviewed Julia Miller with Yond Interiors, who went from having her namesake company to Yand. And she had, believe, was her brother, her brother-in-law who worked in branding. And he suggested, you know, think of the biggest brands there are. Google, Facebook, think of these things that are names that didn't mean anything, that have nothing else associated with them so that you can build what that association is. And that's how she had come up with Yond. And I thought that that was such great advice and a lot easier to trademark when the word has no meaning other than what you want to make of it. Guys, as we get ready to wrap up, I'd love to ask a few last marketing questions, especially when someone is thinking about rebranding what their business name is because they don't have that, you know, Kitchen Lab clout in existence or they are, I think what comes up most commonly in our design studio is people have named their studios after themselves and they're getting older and thinking that maybe I don't want to be the face of this brand forever or maybe I want to sell it or maybe I want to hand it off to someone who's working for me and me being the face of it doesn't make sense anymore. And I feel like that's what a rename happens most often for interior designers, I'm curious in hindsight, What do you feel have been the best use of your marketing time or dollars? However, that is, know you do your marketing in-house since launching Imperfait. Like, was it going with PR firm? RZ: Absolutely. I would say the branding exercise was incredible. What you just mentioned though about what's the term I'm looking for, when you think about selling or transitioning out or whatever. That was also a huge part of what influenced us to not want to name it after me. Plus, I just didn't want it to be about me. You know what I mean? I really believe that the team, everybody should have a part in the business. And I think that by naming it after yourself, you're already in a tough spot and that you should try to rebrand way sooner than you're ready to exit. Do that way earlier, build that equity. But I would definitely say that after the one thing, so this is an interesting story also. This is actually, it was a really good question. This is a great answer for it is that after we went through the branding exercise, which was like I said, like serious group therapy, okay, or marriage counseling or business counseling, it hit me all of a sudden. I'm like, holy shit, we have got to hire the right PR company for this, or this was all a waste. Does that make sense? And so I started, cause we had gotten referrals, these guys can do it for you. These guys, they'll do your social media. They'll get you out there. They'll figure this out. They'll do your Instagram. You know, they'll help you market this and get this out there. All of a sudden I was like, my God, like this is the most important decision that we have to make if we are serious about this, because we just put all this money behind the branding. And so I went online and I'm a research lunatic. I will literally surf the entire internet until I'm happy with my answers. And I researched and researched and I actually ended up reaching out to like five different firms after and we interviewed like, I don't know, four five, but I reached out to a bunch. Some were not taking on new clients. Some were like, can't do it. And I reached out to this company online, pr.net that I filled out a form and they called me the next day and were like, we will match you with a company. Tell us a little bit more about what you're looking for. And Nylon out of New York was one of the companies that they matched us with. And we ended up having to wait to work with them until November. So we actually pushed back our launch date to work with them. And it was a fabulous decision. We loved them. I mean, we have been very, very happy with them. NN: It is it's taking that leap and it's you know, will say that that I agree with you But I would also say that on a lesser level, you know If you don't have the budget to hire PR you can do some of this stuff on your own But SEO is something that we were such fools for not really engaging in and I think that there's so much smoke and mirrors that is around SEO and when you look at some some websites that have been SEO optimized. They just look like they look like trash. RZ: I talked into having to do that. Like you need to be on WordPress and you know because of this and it's like no we want our thing to look good we're designers are you like losing your mind. AC: We have this come up against us so often with clients that we've done beautiful websites for and they come back and they're like, oh, I got all these emails from SEO experts and said we should have been on WordPress and that we would get them to rank and they'll never rank on whatever it is that we built them on and all of these things. And it's this conversation that I have to have over and over again. And they always will come back to us and be like, you know, we wanted to listen to the SEO expert. They rebuilt us in WordPress, promising it would look exactly like what you guys built for us. It doesn't look anything like it, and it's super spammy and terrible. And I'm like, there's so much work you can do for your SEO that doesn't involve these very, very spammy. RZ: Who do you want to find you? You're not selling, you know, I don't know, know, lawn tools. Like you're not, you know what I mean? You're not, it's like, you don't need everybody to be able to find you. And I think that that's something. NN: If you're getting a hundred emails today a day saying I can fix your website. You probably should you should be suspicious of that. You know, why is everybody doing this? AC: Sounds like your website's working great because you're getting to hundreds of spam emails. RZ: Yeah, so we did not follow the, we almost did though. We almost got suckered by somebody who sold us a really hard bill of goods about, and all of us was like trying to replace our branding team. I mean, that's the thing. You really have to think for yourself and like trust your gut, you know, trust your gut. Like what do you want your brand to look like? What do you want your website to look like? And I mean, we had made mistakes. I mean, we had made mistakes prior, obviously. And I do want to do a shout out to Rachel from She Does Strategy because you know, she did, she's the one that we worked with on our SEO and she's been so great. It's like, cause I, the term just still gives me the heebie-jeebies and I know a lot of people feel that way, but I want to say like, if you find someone and you tell them this is what I want to spend and only this, and this is what I'm interested in, if they listen, then they're a good hire. It's no different than hiring a good designer that listens to you, right? And since someone that bulldozes you and tells you what to do and doesn't listen to what you want. So I think that that's really critical. And I think between that and Laura and Laura Benloss at Nylon, it's been an amazing team that has helped us get to where we are. I mean, we could absolutely not have done this on our own. And I joke with them today, we actually had a call with them today that we are like their poster child for success because we actually did what they told us to do. Because that's the other thing. Like if I could, mean, if they have so many clients that they do strategy for and they don't listen, they don't execute, they don't get around to it. And it's like, if you're putting money behind it and that's, so one of the things that was really great is we hired someone right out of school to do our Instagram posts, even though I check everything and I write, I like to make sure the copy is consistent with what we like and things like that. Having someone in-house to implement because I do not have the time for that. And anybody who doesn't knows that it is like a full-time job. It's a lot of work, you know, to do reels and figure out how to post consistently and all of that. And it really does matter, you know, it does, it makes a big difference. So. AC: Well, guys, I feel like I could just talk to you for hours and hours more. We carved so much in, I know I've already gone over with the time that you already promised me. So thank you so much for joining me today. This was such a master class and so thought provoking. And like I said, a conversation that I think comes up a lot more often than people openly discuss. So I really appreciate you taking the time to dissect your incredible journey. RZ: Thank you. It was such a pleasure. I could talk to you for hours. Speaker 2 (01:06:29.88) For more in-depth analysis of this interview, including exclusive downloads, examples, and more, don't forget to subscribe to the Interior Collective on Patreon. We are building an amazing private community of interior designers and industry experts open to candid conversations and answering questions. Join us on Patreon in the show notes or at patreon.com /theInteriorCollective. Thank you so, so much for tuning into this episode. 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