Photo: Courtney Jones Photography
It goes without saying, but 2020 has been a challenging year. As a business owner, there's no go-to “playbook” on how to survive a global pandemic. Our company, like many others, was impacted when much of the world went into lockdown in mid-March. When sales suddenly take a hit, it's hard not to start rethinking everything. Don’t do it. Resist the temptation. Instead, this is the time when you really need to focus on solidifying the fundamentals of your business.
Over the last decade-plus, I’ve learned a lot as a business owner and entrepreneur. COVID-19 is certainly one of the greatest challenges we’ve faced as a business. However, it’s not the first hurdle, and it definitely won’t be the last. After a challenging early spring, we’ve managed to turn the corner and are expecting a strong holiday season. We didn't press the "reset” button. Instead, we doubled down on our long-term goals. No matter what comes your way, here are a few words of advice for weathering the ups and downs and coming out stronger on the other side.
Don’t compromise your brand.
Now is not the time to completely rethink who your customers are and what your brand stands for. I personally care a lot about authenticity. Early on in the pandemic, we took the time to look back at our mission statement and brand values. We’ve allowed them to guide us through this challenging period. Leatherology’s mission is the redefine simple, everyday luxury and celebrate the everyday. What does this mean for us today? We’ve always had a large gift business and we realized more than ever, customers wanted to send meaningful gifts to loved ones far and wide. We leaned into this and created a “Gift Joy” campaign. This holiday, we’re collaborating with four partners to create unique gift sets featuring some of our most popular items. 50% of net proceeds from each sale will go to a non-profit organization of the partner’s choosing.
Diversify opportunity and risk.
Never put all your eggs in one basket. While direct-to-consumer online sales have always been core to Leatherology’s business, we consider ourselves more than just a DTC brand. Consumer shopping behaviors are constantly evolving, so we’ve challenged ourselves to think beyond just direct-to-consumer. We have invested in a variety of customer acquisition channels and diversified our marketing mix. As a business, your growth should never be solely reliant on a single channel, such as paid social advertising, where rising costs can quickly deteriorate profitability over time.
Drown out the noise.
When the going gets tough, you start looking around to see what your competitors and peers are doing. While it’s always important to have a pulse on your industry, don’t do something simply because you see others doing it. Avoid the FOMO. What works for someone else may not work for you. Even though we've seen huge demand for PPE, we resisted the urge to suddenly offer new products like facemasks when they just didn’t fit our brand strategy. We also felt that the market would be incredibly crowded and prohibit us from being a leader. Instead, we made iterative changes. We planned up inventory in our home accessories line to meet increased customer demand while scaling back our travel accessories category.
Learn from the positives to prepare for the negatives.
How you get through a downturn is largely dependent on what you do when things are going well. Don’t get carried away by great sales. Business is cyclical, and you can’t assume things will always remain on an upward trajectory. Use this time to dig into the mechanics of your business. Track everything and gather as much data as possible to help you understand why things are going well. This will also help you uncover potential blind spots and get ahead of warning signals you may not have noticed otherwise.
Take care of your people.
This is arguably my biggest piece of advice. Building a great team is the hardest but most important part of the job. Great people are the backbone of any successful business. Take the time to understand what motivates each individual and how to support them through ups and downs. Never ask them to do something that you wouldn’t do yourself. David and I are fortunate to work with an amazing and diverse team of creators, analysts, artisans, innovators, and entrepreneurs. Leatherology wouldn’t be where it is today without our team.
“How you get through a downturn is largely dependent on what you do when things are going well.”
-Rae Liu, Co-Founder and Creative Director of Leatherology
About the Author: Rae Liu is the co-founder and the creative director of Leatherology, a direct-to-consumer brand of beautifully crafted, personalizable leather accessories, built on the premise of providing attainably priced luxury. Rae graduated from Columbia with a BA in Political Science. She worked for several years at the World Bank before making a complete career pivot to pursue her passion for product design, studying accessories at FIT. in 2008 she helped Alexander Wang launch his accessories and footwear business.
During her years working in fashion, Rae was struck by the fact that as a young woman living in New York, she could not afford the very products she spent her days creating, and that the ones she could afford did not have the level of design thoughtfulness, craftsmanship or quality of materials she knew was possible. Thus in 2011, she moved from New York back to her hometown, Dallas, to build Leatherology. She lives in Dallas and has two young children.
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