I WISH I COULD DO MORE

Three years of running this photography business by myself. I am definitely happy but I am tired. Tired of wanting and wishing that I could do everything better, more efficient, more true to the way I’ve dreamed of running my business. I am so caught up in the daily to-do list that I find the business is running me! I am not complaining… I wear jeans to work, I make my own schedule, and work at my own pace… with my cat on my lap. But I wish I could do more; serve my clients better, provide more products, options and overall a more amazing experience. I went to school for hospitality management which, of course, is all about the experience and the service. I am a service provider! A people pleaser! I just need more time to please my people!

THEN THERE IS JULIA…

The love of my life, my partner of 5 years. She works her butt off as Assistant GM of Hotel Indigo Sarasota (a badass eco friendly hotel, by the way). She has worked up to her ‘dream job’ for 3 years now. I see her wake up super early…well my eyes are definitely shut at 6am but nonetheless…she puts in 50-60 hours a week striving every moment to work harder than the day before. She is also a people pleaser. She is providing the service I dream of and running the business too. (Of course she has an entire team of people doing it with her.) Over the course of time, as she has progressed in her position at the hotel, she has learned a whole lot about running a successful business. She comes home and tells me about complicated stuff…managing the accounting, human resources and front office operations. She talks about how her head hurts from compiling the general ledger and profit and loss statements… She never imagined she would even like this kind of job, she is such a people person and all about hospitality too (we actually graduated from the same school with the same major) turns out, she not only loves managing the operations and the employees, but loves those super important things…the numbers.

TALK ABOUT THE PERFECT COMBO

We have always talked about running a business together, how we are seriously the perfect combo, how awesome it would be to be in total control of our lives. And to be together all day?…priceless. We are so similar in so many ways, our personal and business values and morals are an exact match. The awesome thing is… we are so much alike where it matters and we are different where it is needed. Where I am creative, she is detailed and structured.

WHY THE HECK DON’T WE DO IT??

So one day, about 6 months ago, in the midst of putting together invoices, reconciling my bank account and writing back emails, it hit me! “Why the heck don’t we do it??” We are young, we have no mortgage, no car payment, no kids (although I am getting baby fever with all of these adorable newborns in our studio). My point is, if there was ever a perfect time for Julia to quit her job and jump in with both feet, it was now. We were super excited, giddy even. We allowed ourselves to indulge in the amazing ideas and possibilities with absolutely no limits. About 20 minutes later, Julia got really serious. I could almost see the wheels turning. She put a ton of thought into it, crunching the numbers and creating crazy spreadsheets to see if it ‘would work’. Here I am, “it’ll work!! it’ll work!!” But this was a huge change, she would leave her hotel job, her career. She put quite a detailed plan together of how she was going to go about it so that every aspect was covered. She gave 3 months notice to her boss at the hotel and reinforced her bridges with 2×4‘s. She saved every penny and created a budget for us, meanwhile, I was busy as heck keeping the engine running and designing her new business cards: Julia Allerdyce, Owner | Studio Manager, Cassie Leah Photography.

SO, TO MY WONDERFUL CLIENTS…

Here we are, 2 weeks in and I am so excited to have her by my side! So, to my wonderful current and future clients, I’d like to introduce to you, my other half. Julia will be doing all of those amazing but time consuming things like managing the accounting and all of the praise-less structured business management duties, allowing me to spend more time behind the lens! We are super excited to roll out our new way of doing business, completely designed around you, our awesome and amazing clients that deserve the best full-service experience that two hospitality majors, people pleasing, business-running chicks can give!