December’s highlights included launching Mental Health Matters, delivering 10,000 stickers to the Field Museum, revealing the new branding for Radish Kitchen, and joining the Museum Store Association.

If you’re new here, welcome to my business journal. This twenty-forth edition of the monthly business journal blog post celebrates the wins and serves as a space of reflection of this business journey, which has been such an important practice for me since January 2020.

The Big Wins

• Launched a new passion project around mental health! The Mental Health Matters collection is now available in our shop - or you can purchase these stickers wholesale via Faire.

• Delivered 10,000 stickers to the Field Museum! The Field Museum’s gift shop has five of our most popular Chicago designs - I Heart Chicago, Chicago Pizza, Chicago Hot Dog, Chicago Heart, and Chicago Skyline - as well as five custom designs - Fighting Elephants, Sue Skull, Hall of China Lion, Field Museum Building, and Science is For Everyone.

• Launched Radish Kitchen’s new branding. Radish Kitchen is the evolution of Up Beet Jams, so the new branding is essentially an evolution as well. Read the full story in our latest interview with owner Jam Rohr.

General Updates:

• I read 5 books: Adventures in Opting Out, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, Trick Mirror, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, and Hola Papi.

• My kindergarten best friend asked me to be one of her bridesmaids. Michelle and I have been friends since 1999 (we went to school together from K-8) and have stayed friends through different high schools, colleges, and multiple cities.

• Columbia College Master of Arts Management students presented a strategic plan to Lettering Works alongside three other woman-owned businesses. Some of Jordyn, Mirta, and Molly’s suggestions have already been implemented - check out our refreshed website homepage and click around to see their recommendations in action.

• We attended two concerts, an art exhibition, and hosted friends from Peoria and England. Daniel and I saw Dawes at the Vic and Watkins Family Hour at the Old Town School of Folk Music. We went to see Barbara Kruger’s exhibition at the Art Institute. We had fun hosting two friends, Alex and Maris, from Peoria and another friend, Amanda, who was visiting home from England for the holidays. My mom also came for a quick visit and we celebrated her birthday with one of her Chicago favorites, the jibarito.

• I had two cysts removed from my head. Aside from some minor pain and stitches staying in an extra week due to holiday closures, everything went really smoothly and the dermatologist confirmed the cysts were benign. I wanted to squeeze this procedure (as well a scheduled echocardiogram in this month) before the end of the year.

• I popped up at Madewell on Southport and sold my stickers, cards, and other hand-lettered goods. I also applied to their Madewell Hometown Heroes program as well as the Goldman Sachs 10,000 Small Businesses Program - which comes highly recommended from some of my fellow business owner friends in Chicago.

• I joined the Museum Store Association (MSA) as a vendor member. I am excited to pursue more opportunities with selling wholesale to museums in 2022. I also attended the conference kickoff meeting for the Airport Minority Advisory Council (AMAC), the other trade association I joined this year to help advance my wholesale opportunities within airport gift shops.

• I spent time reflecting on 2021 and filled up another growth journal from Rachel Fisher Creative. If you want to adopt this helpful weekly reflection practice in 2022, you can order a copy of The Growth Journal via Blurb here. Full 2021 recap blog post coming soon!

It’s hard to believe that 2021 is about to be behind us - I am looking forward to a few exciting projects that are already lined up for 2022 as well as increased wholesale opportunities that are in the works.

Thank you for being here, for supporting me, and for following along with this beautiful journey entrepreneurship has taken me on.

PS - Have a project you’d like to chat about? Grab your free 20-minute project consultation and ensure your project gets on our calendar in 2022. Bring on all the logos, branded merchandise, and brand identity projects… let’s make some beautiful and impactful things together.