March 12, 2025 • 32 mins
In this episode, Susan welcomes Carina Gardner, a renowned fabric designer and CEO of multiple companies. Carina, who has designed fabric for Riley Blake Designs, dies for Silhouette, host of the Make and Design Podcast, creater of Design Suite, and is the founder of the University of Arts and Design, shares her journey and strategies for building a thriving creative business.
The episode covers Carina's latest exciting project, her new office 'the barn,' and its role in her content creation and family life balance. Carina also delves into the significance of niche marketing, follower engagement, and the real metrics of success. She discusses her approach to content creation and her notable achievement of founding the University of Arts and Design, offering comprehensive design and business education. Carina emphasizes listening to her community, pivoting based on needs, and the importance of impactful time management. Packed with actionable advice and inspiring stories, this episode is a must-listen for aspiring creative entrepreneurs.
01:04 Introducing Carina Gardner
02:26 Balancing Family and Business
07:29 Content Creation Strategies
12:21 The Importance of Niche and SEO
18:48 Design Suite and University Programs
26:51 Building a Lasting Legacy
30:10 Final Thoughts and Farewell
Want to try free motion quilting but don't know where to start? Here's 3 simple steps to get going.
Are you looking to ADVANCE your machine quilting skills?
Machine quilting can be very solitary, especially on a longarm. It's just not that easy to pack up your machine and head to a friend's house for the day, right? But it's important to have that community - that sharing of ideas and tips, encouragement and motivation.
For more information and to sign up, visit our website.
------------------------
If you enjoyed this episode, please consider leaving a rating and review here.
Resources:
ADVANCE, my monthly subscription membership
FREEHAND QUILTING MASTERCLASS, an on-demand comprehensive course
ALL-OVER FEATHER, sign-up for a FREE quilting class
And here's where you can find more of my work:
YouTube - LIVE & UNSCRIPTED episodes
Website - for more information on classes and quilting services
Facebook - current projects and photos
Instagram - current projects and photos
Pinterest - photo galleries and tutorials
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:04):
Welcome to Season 5 of MeasureTwice, Cut Once.
This whole season is anexploration into behind the
scenes of not just quilting, butbuilding a creative business
that truly lights you up.
As someone who's navigated theexciting, sometimes bumpy world
of turning a passion into aprofession, I'm excited to pull
back the curtain and share myown experiences.
(00:26):
Some episodes will be just me.
Diving deep into my personaljourney, while others will
feature guests who are alsonavigating the world of creative
entrepreneurship, will explorethe nitty gritty of building a
creative business, the lessonslearned and the unexpected
challenges that come withtransforming your craft.
Into a thriving enterprise.
And don't worry, I'm not leavingstorytelling behind.
(00:48):
Instead, I'll be weaving theminto the conversations about
what it takes to grow a businesswhile staying true to your
creative spirit.
So whether you're dreaming ofstarting your own business, or
you just love hearing aboutcreative entrepreneurship, this
season is for you.
Susan (01:04):
Carina Gardner is a well known fabric designer for Riley
Blake Designs and a die cutdesigner for Silhouette and is
the host of Make and DesignPodcast.
She teaches aspiring designershow to make the transition from
crafter and hobbyist toprofitable designer.
She was the creative director ofCarta Bella Scrapbook Papers.
Her kids brand, Mini Lou, hassold products for Nordstrom,
(01:25):
Peak Clothing, and 500independent retailers and
museums in the U.
S.
Her designs are also ondishware, jewelry, prints,
clocks, sewing patterns, andholiday products.
Carina has a PhD in design fromthe University of Minnesota and
taught there for five yearsbefore starting her own design
business.
She's the CEO of the Universityof Arts and Design, and that
(01:46):
university offers certificatesand master's degree in the
creative fields.
Carina is also the CEO of DesignSuite, a surface pattern and
crafting design program thatteaches designers how to create
a business as they learn todesign.
Welcome Carina.
Thanks for joining me on thepodcast.
Carina (02:04):
I'm so happy to be here.
Susan (02:07):
We always have a good time chatting each other up.
We seem to bounce ideas verywell off of each other.
So it's great to have you here.
I hardly even know where tostart.
You have so many differentthings that you're doing, but I
like to start by asking what'sone really exciting thing that
you're doing right now that'scurrent.
Carina (02:25):
Oh my gosh.
Actually, I'm going to tell youa very personal, exciting thing
that I'm doing right now.
And I'm not sure when thisepisode's coming out, so maybe
you'll be able to see it on ourYouTube channel, but in 2024 in
January, we made the decision tobuild an office in my backyard.
It's called the barn.
And the reason it's so excitingis because we have really gotten
(02:48):
into a lot of content creation,as takes up a lot of time and
space and energy.
And we decided to have adedicated space for this.
So the barn has multiple areas.
We are working on.
A cooking show, like a craftingin the kitchen show.
We are working on more designelements, design shows, more
(03:11):
crafting shows, just everythingon YouTube.
That is really exciting for usto dig into.
So that's really exciting.
And it really came out of thefact that we do, I do own three
companies.
I'm sorry.
CEO of three companies.
And we've just got a lot ofthings balancing out and I
needed to pull away from myfamily life so that they,
(03:34):
weren't entangled with podcastshappening every day and YouTube
videos being made all the timeand putting it into its own
space.
Susan (03:42):
That sounds like the best of both worlds.
Like I joke right now, my studiois in the basement, so I have a
17 step commute.
Yours is not much more.
It's probably about a 55 stepcommute, right?
But there is that separation,and that's what I see you're
reaching for.
Carina (03:57):
Yeah.
I think with kids in particular,I still have little kids at
home.
I do have teenagers, but theyhave.
Loud lives is what I'm going tosay.
They're in and out when theschool day ends, when the school
day starts.
And I realized that I wasn'tgetting the most out of my time
because I'd like to startearlier.
(04:18):
Especially if I'm teaching acourse at the university we have
to have quiet film time and weneed everything, like one of the
things that we're doing with thebarn is everything is
soundproof.
Everything was purchased withsoundproofing in mind so that I
could build new courses and.
I hope write more books in thisspace.
Susan (04:38):
My head is just buzzing with ideas, but pursuing this
one just a little bit further.
Something that I'm finding in mybusiness too, is when my
business is in my home, that isa super easy commute, that 17
step commute, but also it doesmake it difficult to get away.
So to turn off work when I wantto go home.
(04:58):
Is that one of your hopes isthat the barn will provide a
solution for that as well sothat when you do in fact go home
with your kids, you're all home,you're all mom.
Carina (05:08):
Yeah, I think it's actually one of the things I
have been fighting with for thelast 17 years of owning
businesses.
The whole point of getting intobusiness for myself was to stay
home with my very smallchildren.
And so I've been able to balanceit by being at home with the
children, but then running intothe office in the evening or
early morning to work well, asmy kids have gotten older and
(05:30):
they're at school part of theday, what I'm finding is that
I've never turned it off.
Because I was so used to hoppingaround my kitchen and in my
bedroom to run my businesses,that now I actually do have the
time and space, but I'm notturning it off at night.
I will hop into the office, sendoff a message to the university
(05:51):
students, set up a meeting forthe master's degree set up a
meeting for my team.
And.
It's time.
Like I have felt it.
It is time to have someseparation so that my kids can
see me far more present.
I think I'm a relatively presentparent already.
As I get older, I start torealize that they're all the
(06:12):
stuff that we do is great.
But the only thing that remainsare relationships.
That's it.
And so I find myself wantingmore time with my kids, more
time with my spouse, more timewith people I love, and that
fills me up.
Susan (06:28):
So what I'm hearing here loud and clear is there's
seasons.
Mhm.
Sometimes you do have to do thething when your Children are
small and you're working whilethey're napping or after they've
gone to bed and you need that tobe convenient or you simply
couldn't get it done.
But then there are seasons whenthat doesn't have to happen
anymore, when you can actuallyclock some business hours.
(06:49):
And so you've come to thatseason.
And I love that.
I love that you're recognizingthat and taking steps.
Okay.
Carina (06:55):
I
Susan (06:56):
Go ahead, finish your statement and
Carina (06:57):
was gonna say, not only is it a great season, but also I
think if this barn had beenbuilt even 10 years ago, it
would have been irrelevant tome.
Like it wouldn't have, Iwouldn't, I don't need it, in
just being a designer, like Idon't need to create all this
extra content in owning auniversity and owning a design
suite program.
(07:18):
I do need content.
So it's also where your businessis at.
That's don't make things unlessthey are useful to what you're
currently doing.
Susan (07:28):
Solid advice.
Okay, now I want to ask youbecause I do content creation on
a much smaller scale.
But of course, one of thedilemmas that I run into then
is, how do I get someone tovideo me doing something or set
up a camera system?
What are maybe give us a simpleand then a more complex version
of how you create, let's say,some short form videos.
(07:49):
Let's just keep it simple.
Carina (07:51):
Yeah, we do a lot of short form and we are on five
platforms for short form.
So we do Pinterest YouTubeshorts Instagram, Tik TOK and
Facebook.
Yeah.
So all
Susan (08:05):
give us because a lot of people listening will be much
more beginner level than youare.
So give us a bit of a ramp intothat.
Like where did you start withthis production and then what
kind of came next?
You don't have to make it toodetailed or complicated, but I
want to see how in the world yougot to where you are now.
And I bet you, you have, amarketing manager and maybe more
than one who works in that foryou.
Carina (08:24):
Yeah, it's a convoluted journey guys.
That's the thing about the, allof the platforms.
That's very frustrating becausewe don't have massive numbers on
our channels.
Instead, what we have done istry to really dig into our niche
harder so that we have strongnumbers on our channels, which
is a really different way tothink about it.
I think sometimes because ofthat, people don't realize we're
(08:47):
multimillion dollar businessesand that, we own a university
and stuff because they're sobusy looking, Oh, Carina doesn't
have some ginormous number, butI think it's been far more
relevant to just really dig inand do your niche.
So this is what I, how Istarted.
I started with Instagram shortterm, short form video.
I did a lot of, because I didn'tlike.
(09:08):
Having to pre think out how Iwas going to do something.
I would just videotape myselfdoing the thing.
So for me, it's crafting, it'squilting, it's designing the
fabric.
It's any of those things.
And I would just film myself andthen I loved there was this app
and I think it still exists.
I haven't been using itrecently, but it's called splice
on my phone.
(09:29):
And I would just.
Put together a 15 second reeland then I would add music to it
when I went to Instagram.
It's gotten a little morecomplicated.
So if you don't want to just dothat, one of the best things you
can do, and I figured this out,even though it takes more time
at the front, it takes verylittle time at the end.
And that is now you'll notice ifyou go on my free, mostly we
don't do music, we do voiceover.
(09:49):
And that's because we don't haveto then choose music and we can
do automatic posting.
We use something called go highlevel, which is.
Not everybody's going to have,especially early on but Adobe
express planally, there's allthese softwares out there that
will do automatic posting foryou.
And what I found was I wasspending too much time in
posting every morning, eventhough I had them all set up, I
(10:10):
would still spend 30 minutesposting on all our channels.
And I was like.
We have to get rid of this.
This has to go away.
And we decided to go tovoiceover.
It's been one of the best thingsand the worst things.
Cause it means it's a lot ofwork up front.
Cause I do a voiceover on top ofthe video, but here's the thing
I've decided about it.
It's actually much better forthe viewer because they hear my
(10:31):
voice.
They actually get to hear whatI'm, seeing.
That's happening in the video,and it gives them far more
information than the descriptionwe just had, and this has been,
this is goes to show you reallycannot control what's going on
instagram or any other channel.
We just had a real go viral 1.
6 million over a weekend and it,I don't have a massive following
(10:55):
you guys.
So that's why I was like.
What is happening here?
And we've had this happenbefore, but usually on crafting
videos, it was a video Ireposted from Christmas day last
year of making a fort with a newtoy with my son.
That's it.
And I'm just explaining the fortand I'm explaining how I put it
together.
That's it.
And 1.
6 million views.
(11:15):
You guys like what?
Why?
And so the lesson learned hereis don't worry about it.
Just post because you don't knowwhat's going to go viral.
Susan (11:29):
I so agree.
But I hope everyone caught that.
To me, very huge tip about thefact that if you don't use
music, you don't run intocopyright issues with trying to
post on different platforms.
If it's your own voice and yourown voiceover, once you've made
it once, you can do that prescheduling and boom, that's
Carina (11:49):
platforms, guys.
Five platforms.
Susan (11:52):
Wow, that is key.
That is a massive time saver.
And even if you do that for nineout of 10 of your videos and you
still want that little bit ofmusic in there.
Great.
Okay.
Speaking of viral videos, I'vehad that happen to.
I had a video one time that wasme quilting at the long arm.
piece of silly music with it,and I think it was 15 seconds
long, 12 million views.
(12:14):
And that has never happenedsince I've had some go, viral.
But like, where in the world arethere 12 million people that
want to see quilting?
However, you've hit on a couplebig points, which are that
number of followers or evenlikes and views is very much a
vanity metric.
What matters in your bottom lineIs the loyal following of your
(12:35):
people, which is linked directlyto their interest and to the
value you're giving them.
So that's what I hear you doing.
How?
Carina (12:43):
people don't realize this because I will go on
Instagram and I will knowsomeone with 250, 000 followers
makes, if they are lucky, 30,000 a year.
I know someone else who has athousand followers who makes 10
million.
I a year.
And that's the difference.
When you know what's going onbehind the scenes, it becomes
(13:03):
much more clear what is reallygoing on with the content and
with the numbers.
And I think most people are sodazzled by the numbers that they
don't realize hey, there'sanother thing going on here.
And then also, I think, Ifyou're someone who is creating a
business and you're trying toget content out there if you
spend more time figuring outwhat the end goal is, like we
(13:26):
have some true end goals for thenumbers and they have very
little to do with actual numbersof followers has everything to
do with financials of thecompanies.
Susan (13:37):
Yes, I so agree.
So is this something that youteach Carina within your the
courses that you.
Teach at your university, likenot only the design, but the
business, the administration.
Carina (13:50):
Yeah, we do teach business, but for most people
it's because your brand spankingnew as a designer, you don't
have good business foundations.
So we actually start with thatbecause we actually don't
recommend, especially fordesigners.
So if you're someone who owns acreative business, you probably
have to start with contentcreation.
Designers don't.
And there's a reason for that.
(14:11):
It's because we use onlineplatforms to run their
algorithms.
And so instead it's better forthem to learn SEO.
It's better for them tounderstand keywords and tags.
It's better.
for them to understand thosetypes of things so that they can
make money without even anycontent creation.
My, my sister alone makesmultiple six figures.
Nobody knows who the heck she isbecause she, it's based on the
(14:32):
money and the sales.
And so because of that, we'reable to get away with not doing
content creation.
Now, Once you get to a certainpoint, it's time to build a
brand.
And usually that's in second orthird year.
So we do have a branding andsocial media class within our
coursework, but we actuallyrecommend people don't take it
until way after they get theirbusiness foundations in place
(14:53):
and they're actually makingmoney in sales.
Yeah.
Susan (14:56):
I think that is so good.
It is all too easy to get caughtup in the glitter of what
someone looks like on socialmedia.
So here's a tiny example becauseYouTube's kind of my homey place
and I'm in some groups ofYouTubers, that are building
channels, studying, et cetera.
And recently someone celebratedtheir a hundred thousand
follower silver button, right?
(15:17):
I have about 20, 000 followers,but here's the kicker.
We had the same number of viewsbetween us.
So what's the difference?
The difference is my people comeback again and again and again,
and just scoop up everythingthat I deliver.
So the same principle isapplying and you're underlining
that what's key is that youdeliver the thing and that
(15:38):
you've got a method for reachingpeople and selling.
And that's what SEO or searchengine optimization is all
about.
Can people find you?
And truthfully, Social media onits own does not do that for
you.
That's the people that like thepretty things in the catchy
music.
That's not necessarily thecustomers or students, right?
Carina (15:58):
Yeah.
I think as long as you have apurpose in your business, your,
whatever your creative businessis, then, and you're showing
that it's going to, you're goingto find the right people.
The algorithm will help you findthe right people.
So if content creation is themain way you're getting
audience, you're getting peopleinto your back pocket so they
can see what you're doing.
(16:18):
It's going to be super helpfulto you to have a thousand
followers that are very strongversus a hundred thousand that
wouldn't pay you a dollar to dothe things that you're doing.
Susan (16:30):
So then you're even your early content creation played
into that.
In other words, you were showingliterally what it was that you
do, skillset and knowledge baseare.
And therefore the people thatare attracted to that, right?
Are the people that want tolearn about that.
Carina (16:47):
Yeah, it's interesting because I've had to pivot over
the years, right?
Cause my businesses have changedas happens, but surprisingly, we
don't get a huge drop off.
People are still interested inthe weird stuff that I'm doing.
So for example, the.
Instagram feed that CarinaGardner feed used to be
completely devoted to fabric.
And actually in the early dayswe tried to do both my SVGs, my
(17:11):
scrapbooking and fabric all inthe same feed.
And it did not work.
Like it's like it lost peoplebecause of the fabric piece.
And then they would come in ifthey were in SVGs, but then
they'd see me post too muchfabric stuff.
So they would leave.
And so it just didn't work inthe early Instagram.
Now the algorithm has changedsince then.
And then there was a pivot whenI started design suite.
(17:33):
And so I had to start showingmore design stuff versus just
fabric.
So now I have a mix of, teachingand showing design.
And then the same thing happenedon the Carina Gardner paper
craft feed because we separatedthose out.
So that actually has a prettybig following.
But what we did was we changedthat to the university feed.
So the university of arts anddesign, we started in 2024, it's
(17:54):
a graduate school program.
And we went ahead and changedthat because I was like, I am
not going to continue to showjust design stuff anymore.
Now I'm showing design stufffrom our students and I'm
showing design products that arebeing made by members.
And I've changed andsurprisingly people have been
okay with kind of seeing thatevolution along with me.
Susan (18:17):
I find that really interesting, and probably most
of us, myself included.
Haven't evolved to that levelwhere we've got enough and large
enough branches that we woulddivide.
But I find that interesting andI love the way how you thought
about that systematically.
Who is this one trying to reachand am I serving them up what
they need?
And if I'm serving them morethan what they need, should I
(18:38):
maybe have a parting of the waysof those?
And that's a really good way toapproach it.
I love that.
Tell me more about your designschool, whether it's Design
Suite or whether it's theuniversity you pick.
I want to know what drives this,what kind of people are coming
to it.
Yeah.
Carina (18:54):
This is, it's, this is such an interesting evolution.
So one of the things we have indesign suite is follow the
money.
We always say follow the moneybecause very often most people
follow the passion.
I feel very passionate about mycreative thing.
And so they follow the passion.
Susan (19:11):
You sound like Mike Rowe.
Carina (19:13):
Yeah.
So instead we say follow themoney because here's the thing.
The more you follow the money,actually, the more you get to
follow your passion in a lot ofways.
If you're in the creative fieldsanyway I always use the example
of Pablo Picasso because wefeature him in one of my books,
make art that sells.
He was able to do 50,000artworks during his lifetime,
and the only reason he was ableto do that much is because he
(19:35):
got paid for the artwork.
If he had to get a side job or aday job, he wouldn't have
produced 50,000 works.
So if you wanna do the thing youreally wanna do, then you gotta
learn how to make money doingit.
Three and a half years ago.
Almost four years ago, I starteddesign suite and the reason
behind it was I started seeingall these niches of design,
(19:57):
stationary design, surfacepattern design card design.
And there were all these littleniches.
And what I realized is peopleweren't getting a really good
comprehensive design education.
And you mentioned in the bio, Ihave a PhD from the university
of Minnesota.
So I would teach.
My, my specialty was typographypackaging design.
So I was a lot with the juniorsand stuff as well.
(20:20):
And I just, I started havingthis feeling of there's nothing
out there.
That's like just being like,Hey, let me teach you
comprehensive design.
So you could design in any fieldyou wanted to, but also you
understood how to build abusiness.
Off of that and then at anypoint in your career, you could
pivot to wherever you want to gobecause you understood the
(20:42):
fundamentals of both and
Susan (20:44):
it gained
Carina (20:45):
it, it gained traction like stupidly fast in a way I
had no idea it was going to gaintraction.
We now have a cap.
We do not allow over a certainnumber of members in that per
year.
As we're doing this, as I builtit, one of the things you get
when you're really dug into aprogram like mine is you get a
lot of feedback.
(21:05):
And we did all the things themember members wanted us to do.
They were like, we want acommunity.
Great.
We'll give it to you.
We want to talk to each other.
Okay.
Let's build Marco Polo groups.
We want we want to understandhow you do workflow, Carina.
Okay.
Let's build a class for it.
Hey, there's this new AI thing.
Can you teach us how to use it?
Carina?
Okay.
Let's build a class for it.
So it's expanded into this crazyprogram.
(21:27):
We meet once a week.
It's 17 courses that I update.
All the time, constantly.
There are bonus courses.
There are Marco Polo feeds thatyou get to talk to with people
every single day.
We do these five hour virtualconferences at quarterly with
everything that's updated.
In the new year.
We always go over all thetrends, everything that's going
(21:48):
on.
And then we always say once adesign suite member, always a
design suite member.
So we do an annual meeting inJanuary telling.
Everyone, even if you're notcurrently in design suite, if
you're a design suite alumni, wetell everybody all the upcoming
trends, where we see theindustry going, we just, we
really we really play into whatthey need.
(22:09):
And that came from justlistening to our members.
Susan (22:12):
And
Carina (22:13):
in 2024, as we're like moving along, as my team has
been growing and we're doing allthis stuff.
I realized that.
Susan (22:21):
We
Carina (22:22):
We had something special like that we hadn't seen
anywhere else.
And a lot of it was the factthat I was actually building
university level coursework,plus listening to the needs of
the members and really buildingsomething special.
Susan (22:36):
talk
Carina (22:36):
this idea came along of what would it be like to start
an actual university?
What would.
What would this look like?
How hard would it be?
And so I started digging in.
I started going to conferenceswith higher ed department of ed
type things, and I can't talk alot about it, but I will say
this.
(22:57):
It became very clear that wewould Set ourselves apart and be
able to give people the kind ofdegrees that you aren't finding
at universities right now.
A design degree that teaches youhow to also run your own
business or be a creativedirector or know how to run a
team or use project managementsoftware doesn't exist.
(23:20):
And I was like what would it belike to not only be a unicorn in
the design industry, but be aunicorn in the university
industry, which That was veryappealing.
Susan (23:34):
agree.
And just right off the top of myhead, I see one of your huge
strengths being that you arelistening to your students and
pivoting quickly or answeringquickly or growing quickly to
meet the need.
That is something thattraditionally universities and
frankly, High schools andelementary schools don't do
right.
(23:54):
There's there years behind theactual developments in the
actual world.
You've got boots on the groundand you're keeping up.
That's awesome.
Carina (24:03):
Yeah.
It's been interesting as wedeveloped curriculum for the
university.
So we're mostly a graduateschool and we're only licensed
right now in 23 states.
By the time this comes out,maybe 24, but we like it is
building a university requires alot of stamina.
First off I do have a PhD indesign, which is.
itself.
There's only at least one, maybetwo universities in the entire
(24:26):
country who give a PhD indesign.
The terminal degree is an MFA.
A master's of fine arts.
So you can teach at theuniversity level with an MFA.
And always one of my goals as, Aceo was to produce high level
designers who could then also goout and teach my curriculum.
So what did we build into ouruniversity?
(24:49):
We have an mfa program So wehave a master's of fine arts in
digital design.
We have a master's of arts indesign Business.
So if you just want a businessdegree, you can get a master's
of arts in that.
And we have a designcertificate.
So if you don't have abachelor's degree and you still
want this like very good, strongbusiness design curriculum, we
(25:09):
have a design certificate forthose who want to do it.
This is the start.
I can't tell you where it'sgoing because it's insane.
We already have plans.
So we have a 10 year plan at auniversity.
You, people don't realize this.
I had to literally sign my next60 years away to Utah, letting
them know that I would givetranscripts out for the next 60
(25:30):
years.
So like creating a universityisn't the same as a regular
business.
You can get into business andget out quick.
This is not the case with theuniversity.
Once you're in it.
And that is a really good thing,I think, because I think people
know I'm not going away and theuniversity isn't going away.
It's not built on just Carina aswe build out faculty, as we
(25:53):
build out advisors, we have aregistrar, we have, we just
hired our first lot.
You have to have a library.
Did you know that foruniversity?
Susan (26:00):
I did not.
Carina (26:01):
There are all these things.
And so there's a structuralpiece that most people don't
understand because it's not justbuilding a business.
It's building something thatwill stay strong for generations
and years to come.
Susan (26:14):
I'm so impressed in this current market of So many
digital courses about everytopic under the sun.
Inevitably, there are some inthere that are, professed to be
a thing, but aren't necessarilyor have a skill set or be able
to teach something, but can'tnecessarily.
So what you're saying is it's anonerous procedure for you, but
(26:34):
for the consumer, there's thatabsolute security in knowing
that you do have all thesethings in place.
You're for real.
And what you teach is legit.
I hope it will all be worth itin the end for you.
It's so exciting because I dothink this is absolutely
groundbreaking.
Carina (26:51):
I think it's more about purpose, right?
I thought to myself, what issomething that could live on
past me?
How could we make sure thatpeople are learning how?
And so forth are reallyunderstanding how to run
businesses, become creativedirectors, become leaders in the
industry.
And I was like, this is the waywe're going to do it.
This is how we get the prestige.
This is how we get the degreesfor it.
(27:13):
And it's been.
I'm not going to lie.
It's an exhausting process.
The number of meetings I sit in,we had to hire consultancies and
I would recommend you don't dothis unless you have a nest egg.
There's quite a bit of moneythat goes into the front end of
the first three years ofbuilding a university that most
people don't realize.
That has very little to do witheducation, has everything to do
(27:34):
with operations.
Susan (27:36):
I can imagine.
My last question is a personalone.
It's often being said that youcan't do everything.
And I know women say this quitea lot.
You can't have everything.
You can't be everything.
How, Carina, do you approachchoosing which are the things
that are most important to youand where you're going to spend
your time?
Carina (27:57):
Always the most impact.
What is the thing that I'm goingto have the most impact on?
Is it better for me to sit in aone hour meeting with my 12
people on my design team or thefaculty at my university?
Knowing that it's so hardbecause I will say I'm a doer.
Like I want to spend that onehour creating or making or,
something when it's better forme to spend an hour in a meeting
(28:21):
delegating to everybody to makesure that it gets done.
So whatever has the most impactis what I'm going to be doing.
If I am the only person who canwork on licensing, if I am the
only person who can attend theuniversity meetings, cause I'm
the only one who has adoctorate, if I'm the only one
who can teach the graduate levelclasses, then that is the job I
(28:42):
have to do.
I am not allowed to spend mytime in admin work.
I'm not allowed to even spend mytime.
I have an executive assistantwho had to send out emails to
all the faculty members for meto set up meetings.
I'm like, I'm That is not a jobI should be doing.
I like I can't be doing that.
There are too many people atplay.
And this has been a hard thing.
(29:02):
I will say becoming CEO of acompany is recognizing that.
The team matters.
We have, I think, 12 people overon the design suite team.
Probably a little bit more thanthat because we've got people in
and out for different types ofjobs.
And then we have seven people onthe university team and that's
growing extremely rapidly as wehire new faculty and stuff.
(29:22):
And then we have over a hundredpeople in design suite and we
have multiple people in theuniversity.
So there's like a lot of peoplebeing overseen here.
And if I don't Think verysmartly about my time.
Then I am doing a disservice toevery single one of those
people.
Susan (29:42):
So that's a whole, it's another level in growth of an
entrepreneur, right?
This, creating your ownbusiness, then becoming CEO of
your business, but then becomingthe person who invests in and
oversees and brainstorms thebusiness is yet beyond a CEO.
It's fascinating to see youdoing that.
Yeah, I'm so inspired.
Thank you so much for spendingthe time with me today.
(30:04):
It has been a real pleasure asalways.
Carina (30:07):
Thanks so much for having me, Susan.
Susan (30:10):
Thank you, my friend, for tuning in.
If you've enjoyed thisconversation with Carina, would
you take a moment and review thepodcast?
Always so much appreciated.
And until next time, may yoursorrows be patched and your joys
be quilted.
Welcome to Season 5 of MeasureTwice, Cut Once.
This whole season is anexploration into behind the
scenes of not just quilting, butbuilding a creative business
that truly lights you up.
As someone who's navigated theexciting, sometimes bumpy world
of turning a passion into aprofession, I'm excited to pull
back the curtain and share myown experiences.
(00:26):
Some episodes will be just me.
Diving deep into my personaljourney, while others will
feature guests who are alsonavigating the world of creative
entrepreneurship, will explorethe nitty gritty of building a
creative business, the lessonslearned and the unexpected
challenges that come withtransforming your craft.
Into a thriving enterprise.
And don't worry, I'm not leavingstorytelling behind.
(00:48):
Instead, I'll be weaving theminto the conversations about
what it takes to grow a businesswhile staying true to your
creative spirit.
So whether you're dreaming ofstarting your own business, or
you just love hearing aboutcreative entrepreneurship, this
season is for you.
Susan (01:04):
Carina Gardner is a well known fabric designer for Riley
Blake Designs and a die cutdesigner for Silhouette and is
the host of Make and DesignPodcast.
She teaches aspiring designershow to make the transition from
crafter and hobbyist toprofitable designer.
She was the creative director ofCarta Bella Scrapbook Papers.
Her kids brand, Mini Lou, hassold products for Nordstrom,
(01:25):
Peak Clothing, and 500independent retailers and
museums in the U.
S.
Her designs are also ondishware, jewelry, prints,
clocks, sewing patterns, andholiday products.
Carina has a PhD in design fromthe University of Minnesota and
taught there for five yearsbefore starting her own design
business.
She's the CEO of the Universityof Arts and Design, and that
(01:46):
university offers certificatesand master's degree in the
creative fields.
Carina is also the CEO of DesignSuite, a surface pattern and
crafting design program thatteaches designers how to create
a business as they learn todesign.
Welcome Carina.
Thanks for joining me on thepodcast.
Carina (02:04):
I'm so happy to be here.
Susan (02:07):
We always have a good time chatting each other up.
We seem to bounce ideas verywell off of each other.
So it's great to have you here.
I hardly even know where tostart.
You have so many differentthings that you're doing, but I
like to start by asking what'sone really exciting thing that
you're doing right now that'scurrent.
Carina (02:25):
Oh my gosh.
Actually, I'm going to tell youa very personal, exciting thing
that I'm doing right now.
And I'm not sure when thisepisode's coming out, so maybe
you'll be able to see it on ourYouTube channel, but in 2024 in
January, we made the decision tobuild an office in my backyard.
It's called the barn.
And the reason it's so excitingis because we have really gotten
(02:48):
into a lot of content creation,as takes up a lot of time and
space and energy.
And we decided to have adedicated space for this.
So the barn has multiple areas.
We are working on.
A cooking show, like a craftingin the kitchen show.
We are working on more designelements, design shows, more
(03:11):
crafting shows, just everythingon YouTube.
That is really exciting for usto dig into.
So that's really exciting.
And it really came out of thefact that we do, I do own three
companies.
I'm sorry.
CEO of three companies.
And we've just got a lot ofthings balancing out and I
needed to pull away from myfamily life so that they,
(03:34):
weren't entangled with podcastshappening every day and YouTube
videos being made all the timeand putting it into its own
space.
Susan (03:42):
That sounds like the best of both worlds.
Like I joke right now, my studiois in the basement, so I have a
17 step commute.
Yours is not much more.
It's probably about a 55 stepcommute, right?
But there is that separation,and that's what I see you're
reaching for.
Carina (03:57):
Yeah.
I think with kids in particular,I still have little kids at
home.
I do have teenagers, but theyhave.
Loud lives is what I'm going tosay.
They're in and out when theschool day ends, when the school
day starts.
And I realized that I wasn'tgetting the most out of my time
because I'd like to startearlier.
(04:18):
Especially if I'm teaching acourse at the university we have
to have quiet film time and weneed everything, like one of the
things that we're doing with thebarn is everything is
soundproof.
Everything was purchased withsoundproofing in mind so that I
could build new courses and.
I hope write more books in thisspace.
Susan (04:38):
My head is just buzzing with ideas, but pursuing this
one just a little bit further.
Something that I'm finding in mybusiness too, is when my
business is in my home, that isa super easy commute, that 17
step commute, but also it doesmake it difficult to get away.
So to turn off work when I wantto go home.
(04:58):
Is that one of your hopes isthat the barn will provide a
solution for that as well sothat when you do in fact go home
with your kids, you're all home,you're all mom.
Carina (05:08):
Yeah, I think it's actually one of the things I
have been fighting with for thelast 17 years of owning
businesses.
The whole point of getting intobusiness for myself was to stay
home with my very smallchildren.
And so I've been able to balanceit by being at home with the
children, but then running intothe office in the evening or
early morning to work well, asmy kids have gotten older and
(05:30):
they're at school part of theday, what I'm finding is that
I've never turned it off.
Because I was so used to hoppingaround my kitchen and in my
bedroom to run my businesses,that now I actually do have the
time and space, but I'm notturning it off at night.
I will hop into the office, sendoff a message to the university
(05:51):
students, set up a meeting forthe master's degree set up a
meeting for my team.
And.
It's time.
Like I have felt it.
It is time to have someseparation so that my kids can
see me far more present.
I think I'm a relatively presentparent already.
As I get older, I start torealize that they're all the
(06:12):
stuff that we do is great.
But the only thing that remainsare relationships.
That's it.
And so I find myself wantingmore time with my kids, more
time with my spouse, more timewith people I love, and that
fills me up.
Susan (06:28):
So what I'm hearing here loud and clear is there's
seasons.
Mhm.
Sometimes you do have to do thething when your Children are
small and you're working whilethey're napping or after they've
gone to bed and you need that tobe convenient or you simply
couldn't get it done.
But then there are seasons whenthat doesn't have to happen
anymore, when you can actuallyclock some business hours.
(06:49):
And so you've come to thatseason.
And I love that.
I love that you're recognizingthat and taking steps.
Okay.
Carina (06:55):
I
Susan (06:56):
Go ahead, finish your statement and
Carina (06:57):
was gonna say, not only is it a great season, but also I
think if this barn had beenbuilt even 10 years ago, it
would have been irrelevant tome.
Like it wouldn't have, Iwouldn't, I don't need it, in
just being a designer, like Idon't need to create all this
extra content in owning auniversity and owning a design
suite program.
(07:18):
I do need content.
So it's also where your businessis at.
That's don't make things unlessthey are useful to what you're
currently doing.
Susan (07:28):
Solid advice.
Okay, now I want to ask youbecause I do content creation on
a much smaller scale.
But of course, one of thedilemmas that I run into then
is, how do I get someone tovideo me doing something or set
up a camera system?
What are maybe give us a simpleand then a more complex version
of how you create, let's say,some short form videos.
(07:49):
Let's just keep it simple.
Carina (07:51):
Yeah, we do a lot of short form and we are on five
platforms for short form.
So we do Pinterest YouTubeshorts Instagram, Tik TOK and
Facebook.
Yeah.
So all
Susan (08:05):
give us because a lot of people listening will be much
more beginner level than youare.
So give us a bit of a ramp intothat.
Like where did you start withthis production and then what
kind of came next?
You don't have to make it toodetailed or complicated, but I
want to see how in the world yougot to where you are now.
And I bet you, you have, amarketing manager and maybe more
than one who works in that foryou.
Carina (08:24):
Yeah, it's a convoluted journey guys.
That's the thing about the, allof the platforms.
That's very frustrating becausewe don't have massive numbers on
our channels.
Instead, what we have done istry to really dig into our niche
harder so that we have strongnumbers on our channels, which
is a really different way tothink about it.
I think sometimes because ofthat, people don't realize we're
(08:47):
multimillion dollar businessesand that, we own a university
and stuff because they're sobusy looking, Oh, Carina doesn't
have some ginormous number, butI think it's been far more
relevant to just really dig inand do your niche.
So this is what I, how Istarted.
I started with Instagram shortterm, short form video.
I did a lot of, because I didn'tlike.
(09:08):
Having to pre think out how Iwas going to do something.
I would just videotape myselfdoing the thing.
So for me, it's crafting, it'squilting, it's designing the
fabric.
It's any of those things.
And I would just film myself andthen I loved there was this app
and I think it still exists.
I haven't been using itrecently, but it's called splice
on my phone.
(09:29):
And I would just.
Put together a 15 second reeland then I would add music to it
when I went to Instagram.
It's gotten a little morecomplicated.
So if you don't want to just dothat, one of the best things you
can do, and I figured this out,even though it takes more time
at the front, it takes verylittle time at the end.
And that is now you'll notice ifyou go on my free, mostly we
don't do music, we do voiceover.
(09:49):
And that's because we don't haveto then choose music and we can
do automatic posting.
We use something called go highlevel, which is.
Not everybody's going to have,especially early on but Adobe
express planally, there's allthese softwares out there that
will do automatic posting foryou.
And what I found was I wasspending too much time in
posting every morning, eventhough I had them all set up, I
(10:10):
would still spend 30 minutesposting on all our channels.
And I was like.
We have to get rid of this.
This has to go away.
And we decided to go tovoiceover.
It's been one of the best thingsand the worst things.
Cause it means it's a lot ofwork up front.
Cause I do a voiceover on top ofthe video, but here's the thing
I've decided about it.
It's actually much better forthe viewer because they hear my
(10:31):
voice.
They actually get to hear whatI'm, seeing.
That's happening in the video,and it gives them far more
information than the descriptionwe just had, and this has been,
this is goes to show you reallycannot control what's going on
instagram or any other channel.
We just had a real go viral 1.
6 million over a weekend and it,I don't have a massive following
(10:55):
you guys.
So that's why I was like.
What is happening here?
And we've had this happenbefore, but usually on crafting
videos, it was a video Ireposted from Christmas day last
year of making a fort with a newtoy with my son.
That's it.
And I'm just explaining the fortand I'm explaining how I put it
together.
That's it.
And 1.
6 million views.
(11:15):
You guys like what?
Why?
And so the lesson learned hereis don't worry about it.
Just post because you don't knowwhat's going to go viral.
Susan (11:29):
I so agree.
But I hope everyone caught that.
To me, very huge tip about thefact that if you don't use
music, you don't run intocopyright issues with trying to
post on different platforms.
If it's your own voice and yourown voiceover, once you've made
it once, you can do that prescheduling and boom, that's
Carina (11:49):
platforms, guys.
Five platforms.
Susan (11:52):
Wow, that is key.
That is a massive time saver.
And even if you do that for nineout of 10 of your videos and you
still want that little bit ofmusic in there.
Great.
Okay.
Speaking of viral videos, I'vehad that happen to.
I had a video one time that wasme quilting at the long arm.
piece of silly music with it,and I think it was 15 seconds
long, 12 million views.
(12:14):
And that has never happenedsince I've had some go, viral.
But like, where in the world arethere 12 million people that
want to see quilting?
However, you've hit on a couplebig points, which are that
number of followers or evenlikes and views is very much a
vanity metric.
What matters in your bottom lineIs the loyal following of your
(12:35):
people, which is linked directlyto their interest and to the
value you're giving them.
So that's what I hear you doing.
How?
Carina (12:43):
people don't realize this because I will go on
Instagram and I will knowsomeone with 250, 000 followers
makes, if they are lucky, 30,000 a year.
I know someone else who has athousand followers who makes 10
million.
I a year.
And that's the difference.
When you know what's going onbehind the scenes, it becomes
(13:03):
much more clear what is reallygoing on with the content and
with the numbers.
And I think most people are sodazzled by the numbers that they
don't realize hey, there'sanother thing going on here.
And then also, I think, Ifyou're someone who is creating a
business and you're trying toget content out there if you
spend more time figuring outwhat the end goal is, like we
(13:26):
have some true end goals for thenumbers and they have very
little to do with actual numbersof followers has everything to
do with financials of thecompanies.
Susan (13:37):
Yes, I so agree.
So is this something that youteach Carina within your the
courses that you.
Teach at your university, likenot only the design, but the
business, the administration.
Carina (13:50):
Yeah, we do teach business, but for most people
it's because your brand spankingnew as a designer, you don't
have good business foundations.
So we actually start with thatbecause we actually don't
recommend, especially fordesigners.
So if you're someone who owns acreative business, you probably
have to start with contentcreation.
Designers don't.
And there's a reason for that.
(14:11):
It's because we use onlineplatforms to run their
algorithms.
And so instead it's better forthem to learn SEO.
It's better for them tounderstand keywords and tags.
It's better.
for them to understand thosetypes of things so that they can
make money without even anycontent creation.
My, my sister alone makesmultiple six figures.
Nobody knows who the heck she isbecause she, it's based on the
(14:32):
money and the sales.
And so because of that, we'reable to get away with not doing
content creation.
Now, Once you get to a certainpoint, it's time to build a
brand.
And usually that's in second orthird year.
So we do have a branding andsocial media class within our
coursework, but we actuallyrecommend people don't take it
until way after they get theirbusiness foundations in place
(14:53):
and they're actually makingmoney in sales.
Yeah.
Susan (14:56):
I think that is so good.
It is all too easy to get caughtup in the glitter of what
someone looks like on socialmedia.
So here's a tiny example becauseYouTube's kind of my homey place
and I'm in some groups ofYouTubers, that are building
channels, studying, et cetera.
And recently someone celebratedtheir a hundred thousand
follower silver button, right?
(15:17):
I have about 20, 000 followers,but here's the kicker.
We had the same number of viewsbetween us.
So what's the difference?
The difference is my people comeback again and again and again,
and just scoop up everythingthat I deliver.
So the same principle isapplying and you're underlining
that what's key is that youdeliver the thing and that
(15:38):
you've got a method for reachingpeople and selling.
And that's what SEO or searchengine optimization is all
about.
Can people find you?
And truthfully, Social media onits own does not do that for
you.
That's the people that like thepretty things in the catchy
music.
That's not necessarily thecustomers or students, right?
Carina (15:58):
Yeah.
I think as long as you have apurpose in your business, your,
whatever your creative businessis, then, and you're showing
that it's going to, you're goingto find the right people.
The algorithm will help you findthe right people.
So if content creation is themain way you're getting
audience, you're getting peopleinto your back pocket so they
can see what you're doing.
(16:18):
It's going to be super helpfulto you to have a thousand
followers that are very strongversus a hundred thousand that
wouldn't pay you a dollar to dothe things that you're doing.
Susan (16:30):
So then you're even your early content creation played
into that.
In other words, you were showingliterally what it was that you
do, skillset and knowledge baseare.
And therefore the people thatare attracted to that, right?
Are the people that want tolearn about that.
Carina (16:47):
Yeah, it's interesting because I've had to pivot over
the years, right?
Cause my businesses have changedas happens, but surprisingly, we
don't get a huge drop off.
People are still interested inthe weird stuff that I'm doing.
So for example, the.
Instagram feed that CarinaGardner feed used to be
completely devoted to fabric.
And actually in the early dayswe tried to do both my SVGs, my
(17:11):
scrapbooking and fabric all inthe same feed.
And it did not work.
Like it's like it lost peoplebecause of the fabric piece.
And then they would come in ifthey were in SVGs, but then
they'd see me post too muchfabric stuff.
So they would leave.
And so it just didn't work inthe early Instagram.
Now the algorithm has changedsince then.
And then there was a pivot whenI started design suite.
(17:33):
And so I had to start showingmore design stuff versus just
fabric.
So now I have a mix of, teachingand showing design.
And then the same thing happenedon the Carina Gardner paper
craft feed because we separatedthose out.
So that actually has a prettybig following.
But what we did was we changedthat to the university feed.
So the university of arts anddesign, we started in 2024, it's
(17:54):
a graduate school program.
And we went ahead and changedthat because I was like, I am
not going to continue to showjust design stuff anymore.
Now I'm showing design stufffrom our students and I'm
showing design products that arebeing made by members.
And I've changed andsurprisingly people have been
okay with kind of seeing thatevolution along with me.
Susan (18:17):
I find that really interesting, and probably most
of us, myself included.
Haven't evolved to that levelwhere we've got enough and large
enough branches that we woulddivide.
But I find that interesting andI love the way how you thought
about that systematically.
Who is this one trying to reachand am I serving them up what
they need?
And if I'm serving them morethan what they need, should I
(18:38):
maybe have a parting of the waysof those?
And that's a really good way toapproach it.
I love that.
Tell me more about your designschool, whether it's Design
Suite or whether it's theuniversity you pick.
I want to know what drives this,what kind of people are coming
to it.
Yeah.
Carina (18:54):
This is, it's, this is such an interesting evolution.
So one of the things we have indesign suite is follow the
money.
We always say follow the moneybecause very often most people
follow the passion.
I feel very passionate about mycreative thing.
And so they follow the passion.
Susan (19:11):
You sound like Mike Rowe.
Carina (19:13):
Yeah.
So instead we say follow themoney because here's the thing.
The more you follow the money,actually, the more you get to
follow your passion in a lot ofways.
If you're in the creative fieldsanyway I always use the example
of Pablo Picasso because wefeature him in one of my books,
make art that sells.
He was able to do 50,000artworks during his lifetime,
and the only reason he was ableto do that much is because he
(19:35):
got paid for the artwork.
If he had to get a side job or aday job, he wouldn't have
produced 50,000 works.
So if you wanna do the thing youreally wanna do, then you gotta
learn how to make money doingit.
Three and a half years ago.
Almost four years ago, I starteddesign suite and the reason
behind it was I started seeingall these niches of design,
(19:57):
stationary design, surfacepattern design card design.
And there were all these littleniches.
And what I realized is peopleweren't getting a really good
comprehensive design education.
And you mentioned in the bio, Ihave a PhD from the university
of Minnesota.
So I would teach.
My, my specialty was typographypackaging design.
So I was a lot with the juniorsand stuff as well.
(20:20):
And I just, I started havingthis feeling of there's nothing
out there.
That's like just being like,Hey, let me teach you
comprehensive design.
So you could design in any fieldyou wanted to, but also you
understood how to build abusiness.
Off of that and then at anypoint in your career, you could
pivot to wherever you want to gobecause you understood the
(20:42):
fundamentals of both and
Susan (20:44):
it gained
Carina (20:45):
it, it gained traction like stupidly fast in a way I
had no idea it was going to gaintraction.
We now have a cap.
We do not allow over a certainnumber of members in that per
year.
As we're doing this, as I builtit, one of the things you get
when you're really dug into aprogram like mine is you get a
lot of feedback.
(21:05):
And we did all the things themember members wanted us to do.
They were like, we want acommunity.
Great.
We'll give it to you.
We want to talk to each other.
Okay.
Let's build Marco Polo groups.
We want we want to understandhow you do workflow, Carina.
Okay.
Let's build a class for it.
Hey, there's this new AI thing.
Can you teach us how to use it?
Carina?
Okay.
Let's build a class for it.
So it's expanded into this crazyprogram.
(21:27):
We meet once a week.
It's 17 courses that I update.
All the time, constantly.
There are bonus courses.
There are Marco Polo feeds thatyou get to talk to with people
every single day.
We do these five hour virtualconferences at quarterly with
everything that's updated.
In the new year.
We always go over all thetrends, everything that's going
(21:48):
on.
And then we always say once adesign suite member, always a
design suite member.
So we do an annual meeting inJanuary telling.
Everyone, even if you're notcurrently in design suite, if
you're a design suite alumni, wetell everybody all the upcoming
trends, where we see theindustry going, we just, we
really we really play into whatthey need.
(22:09):
And that came from justlistening to our members.
Susan (22:12):
And
Carina (22:13):
in 2024, as we're like moving along, as my team has
been growing and we're doing allthis stuff.
I realized that.
Susan (22:21):
We
Carina (22:22):
We had something special like that we hadn't seen
anywhere else.
And a lot of it was the factthat I was actually building
university level coursework,plus listening to the needs of
the members and really buildingsomething special.
Susan (22:36):
talk
Carina (22:36):
this idea came along of what would it be like to start
an actual university?
What would.
What would this look like?
How hard would it be?
And so I started digging in.
I started going to conferenceswith higher ed department of ed
type things, and I can't talk alot about it, but I will say
this.
(22:57):
It became very clear that wewould Set ourselves apart and be
able to give people the kind ofdegrees that you aren't finding
at universities right now.
A design degree that teaches youhow to also run your own
business or be a creativedirector or know how to run a
team or use project managementsoftware doesn't exist.
(23:20):
And I was like what would it belike to not only be a unicorn in
the design industry, but be aunicorn in the university
industry, which That was veryappealing.
Susan (23:34):
agree.
And just right off the top of myhead, I see one of your huge
strengths being that you arelistening to your students and
pivoting quickly or answeringquickly or growing quickly to
meet the need.
That is something thattraditionally universities and
frankly, High schools andelementary schools don't do
right.
(23:54):
There's there years behind theactual developments in the
actual world.
You've got boots on the groundand you're keeping up.
That's awesome.
Carina (24:03):
Yeah.
It's been interesting as wedeveloped curriculum for the
university.
So we're mostly a graduateschool and we're only licensed
right now in 23 states.
By the time this comes out,maybe 24, but we like it is
building a university requires alot of stamina.
First off I do have a PhD indesign, which is.
itself.
There's only at least one, maybetwo universities in the entire
(24:26):
country who give a PhD indesign.
The terminal degree is an MFA.
A master's of fine arts.
So you can teach at theuniversity level with an MFA.
And always one of my goals as, Aceo was to produce high level
designers who could then also goout and teach my curriculum.
So what did we build into ouruniversity?
(24:49):
We have an mfa program So wehave a master's of fine arts in
digital design.
We have a master's of arts indesign Business.
So if you just want a businessdegree, you can get a master's
of arts in that.
And we have a designcertificate.
So if you don't have abachelor's degree and you still
want this like very good, strongbusiness design curriculum, we
(25:09):
have a design certificate forthose who want to do it.
This is the start.
I can't tell you where it'sgoing because it's insane.
We already have plans.
So we have a 10 year plan at auniversity.
You, people don't realize this.
I had to literally sign my next60 years away to Utah, letting
them know that I would givetranscripts out for the next 60
(25:30):
years.
So like creating a universityisn't the same as a regular
business.
You can get into business andget out quick.
This is not the case with theuniversity.
Once you're in it.
And that is a really good thing,I think, because I think people
know I'm not going away and theuniversity isn't going away.
It's not built on just Carina aswe build out faculty, as we
(25:53):
build out advisors, we have aregistrar, we have, we just
hired our first lot.
You have to have a library.
Did you know that foruniversity?
Susan (26:00):
I did not.
Carina (26:01):
There are all these things.
And so there's a structuralpiece that most people don't
understand because it's not justbuilding a business.
It's building something thatwill stay strong for generations
and years to come.
Susan (26:14):
I'm so impressed in this current market of So many
digital courses about everytopic under the sun.
Inevitably, there are some inthere that are, professed to be
a thing, but aren't necessarilyor have a skill set or be able
to teach something, but can'tnecessarily.
So what you're saying is it's anonerous procedure for you, but
(26:34):
for the consumer, there's thatabsolute security in knowing
that you do have all thesethings in place.
You're for real.
And what you teach is legit.
I hope it will all be worth itin the end for you.
It's so exciting because I dothink this is absolutely
groundbreaking.
Carina (26:51):
I think it's more about purpose, right?
I thought to myself, what issomething that could live on
past me?
How could we make sure thatpeople are learning how?
And so forth are reallyunderstanding how to run
businesses, become creativedirectors, become leaders in the
industry.
And I was like, this is the waywe're going to do it.
This is how we get the prestige.
This is how we get the degreesfor it.
(27:13):
And it's been.
I'm not going to lie.
It's an exhausting process.
The number of meetings I sit in,we had to hire consultancies and
I would recommend you don't dothis unless you have a nest egg.
There's quite a bit of moneythat goes into the front end of
the first three years ofbuilding a university that most
people don't realize.
That has very little to do witheducation, has everything to do
(27:34):
with operations.
Susan (27:36):
I can imagine.
My last question is a personalone.
It's often being said that youcan't do everything.
And I know women say this quitea lot.
You can't have everything.
You can't be everything.
How, Carina, do you approachchoosing which are the things
that are most important to youand where you're going to spend
your time?
Carina (27:57):
Always the most impact.
What is the thing that I'm goingto have the most impact on?
Is it better for me to sit in aone hour meeting with my 12
people on my design team or thefaculty at my university?
Knowing that it's so hardbecause I will say I'm a doer.
Like I want to spend that onehour creating or making or,
something when it's better forme to spend an hour in a meeting
(28:21):
delegating to everybody to makesure that it gets done.
So whatever has the most impactis what I'm going to be doing.
If I am the only person who canwork on licensing, if I am the
only person who can attend theuniversity meetings, cause I'm
the only one who has adoctorate, if I'm the only one
who can teach the graduate levelclasses, then that is the job I
(28:42):
have to do.
I am not allowed to spend mytime in admin work.
I'm not allowed to even spend mytime.
I have an executive assistantwho had to send out emails to
all the faculty members for meto set up meetings.
I'm like, I'm That is not a jobI should be doing.
I like I can't be doing that.
There are too many people atplay.
And this has been a hard thing.
(29:02):
I will say becoming CEO of acompany is recognizing that.
The team matters.
We have, I think, 12 people overon the design suite team.
Probably a little bit more thanthat because we've got people in
and out for different types ofjobs.
And then we have seven people onthe university team and that's
growing extremely rapidly as wehire new faculty and stuff.
(29:22):
And then we have over a hundredpeople in design suite and we
have multiple people in theuniversity.
So there's like a lot of peoplebeing overseen here.
And if I don't Think verysmartly about my time.
Then I am doing a disservice toevery single one of those
people.
Susan (29:42):
So that's a whole, it's another level in growth of an
entrepreneur, right?
This, creating your ownbusiness, then becoming CEO of
your business, but then becomingthe person who invests in and
oversees and brainstorms thebusiness is yet beyond a CEO.
It's fascinating to see youdoing that.
Yeah, I'm so inspired.
Thank you so much for spendingthe time with me today.
(30:04):
It has been a real pleasure asalways.
Carina (30:07):
Thanks so much for having me, Susan.
Susan (30:10):
Thank you, my friend, for tuning in.
If you've enjoyed thisconversation with Carina, would
you take a moment and review thepodcast?
Always so much appreciated.
And until next time, may yoursorrows be patched and your joys
be quilted.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
The Breakfast Club
The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy And Charlamagne Tha God!
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.