Back in 2007, my sister and I loved reading books and blogs by our favorite author, The Yarn Harlot. She loved to knit, and I loved to spin. We decided to start a yarn and fiber business and we created a Podcast called The Sassy Sheep. At this time, podcasts had just become popular. Finding new content was pretty challenging. We listened to a lot of other podcasts to learn about trends, and sometimes this would give us a direction to go in. However, we enjoyed our sessions the best when we got to do interviews.
One interview sticks out the most in our minds and changed how to did business. We had been dying yarn in the microwave. You need heat to set acid dyes. It is a very cumbersome way to dye and it took us an entire day to make ten skeins of yarn. There is quite a famous dyer of yarn in Montana called Mountain Colors and they actually decided to let my sister and I interview them and tour their facility.
These ladies are some of the most amazing women I have ever met. They decided to create their business model to allow other women to be able to love working and still have time for their family. They created an environment that allowed for completely flexible hours and even found ways to have tasks that people who worked from home could do. There was a set of workers that would pick up the just dyed yarn, dry it in their homes and package it for sale. I watched a large group of very busy people focused on work, but every single person had the most amazing smile on their face. This company was important to them.
My poor sister always had to do the audio editing whenever we were done. Normally, she would drag her feet. Until you do editing of your audio, you will never know how many times you repeat words and phrases. One time she called me after a particularly wandering podcast and informed me I had "um" over 40 times. I am not sure that I will ever make another podcast, and am almost certain the ones we made have been lost to the internet forever, but the chance to meet the ladies and other people while doing was a life changing event. Meeting people who know the industry and can act as mentors can completely change your perspective and outlook.
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