2020 in retrospect
January 2021 is already behind us, and I’m doing lots of recalibrating. Every year (even after a pandemic year), one thing about the month of January remains the same — it FLIES by. While this January is still in the not-so-distant past, I wanted to take a moment and do some healthy reviewing, recalibrating, and even celebrating with you — our community. Featherlane has grown in ways I didn’t expect in the last 2.5 years, and as we’ve wrapped up yet another year (+ a month) I want to be sure to document this growth.
Our team meets monthly for decompression meetings; we call them “retrospectives.” In them, we review the work we’ve done, talk through highs and lows, things we are proud of, things we can improve on, and we speak honestly about areas that need improvement. In this vein, here is my retrospective for 2020.
What Went Well:
Our small business survived a pandemic.
We supported many new interior design clients and staged many beautiful homes, all in all improving 175 spaces… that is a ton of projects!
Our team grew by two full-time employees and a part-time contractor!
We had our first Holiday Pop Up and partnered with Courtney Christmas Trees providing a one-stop shop for all things Christmas.
Our Instagram following went from roughly 3k to over 4k — still shocked and so honored by all the growth on this platform for a business of our size.
We started partnering with Bedrosians Tile and Stone for beautiful, diverse tile selections that we have been high-key obsessing over.
We were nominated for Best of the Best by the Chattanooga Times Free Press! (& we were the only interior design company that offers staging on the line-up)
We were scouted by some amazing people at The Scout Guide for a very exciting 2021 Volume 8 — can’t wait for this in February.
We started 3 of our largest projects to date! These will be wrapping up in 2021 so stay tuned. :)
What Did Not Go Well:
Covid shut us down for roughly 1 month, and we had to cancel our Spring Pop-Up Shop which we worked very hard on.
A member of our moving company’s team died mid way through the year after battling depression.
We struggled to get our invoicing and internal software systems working as we’d hoped.
We didn't update our website with projects from the year or add much new content.
We didn’t make it to the finals for a show that was being developed by Netflix (more on that in next month’s blog).
What Can We Improve:
Our clients’ experience with our website, consultations requests, and all around CRM.
Content! — Learning the balance between investing in great photographs & sharing the yummy iPhone shots we can snag in the in-between moments. We’re so thankful that we stay busy, but we want to make sure we create time for creativity in this area. Also… reels?
Our Instagram engagement — yes, friends! We love interacting with you. Not only does it help us feel seen, but it provides helpful feedback so we can better curate our content just for you. (Thanks to all who continue to engage with us!)
Our voice — the ecosystem of “design” for us has always felt VERY ethnically unbalanced. I’m reminded often that it's okay to be a woman in design, but it's really hard to be a woman of color in design. There are so many amazing designers of color out in the world working hard — @plot_twist_design, @breeganjane, @mrserikaward, @dressmyroom to name a few. These women inspire me to be unapologetic in sharing my thoughts on design and in being a woman of color.
Our follow-up can always get better, and one way we plan to help that is through our new CRM we’re stepping into this year.
Whew.
So. Much. Happened. 2020 had some crazy ups and some crazy downs, and this list is really just a snapshot of it all. But I hope that it helps shed some light on the kinds of things that keep us going and keep us motivated to improve all the time. At the end of the day, we know our work environments — as well as personal, social, mental, etc. — affect our lives greatly, and in 2021 we will continue to work diligently to make featherlane a great place to work with and a great place to work for.
To all of you who support us, thank you. Your likes, comments, texts, emails, and smiles mean the world to us.
Here’s to another start and a wonderful year ahead.
Best,
