Lisa Earle McLeod* believes that in a fast-changing world, there is a danger in listening to advice that may be already outdate and useless.
Julie loved making cards. For her, they were a work of art.
She started out making them for friends and family, beautiful creations of paper, ribbon, tissue, and anything else she could find.
People swooned over her cards.
She loved watching the look on someone’s face when they opened the envelope expecting a regular greeting card and instead were stunned by the dimensional, textural beauty of a Julie creation.
By the time she went to art school she had so many people requesting cards she started charging for them. She became known as the Queen of Paper.
By then she was charging $12 a card. Every woman on campus wanted to give or get one of Julie’s special cards.
Then came the day of the portfolio show — a chance for the students to show their work to potential employers.
Julie had an entire table of cards ready.
She heard a buyer for one of the big card and novelty companies was coming to look at the artists’ portfolios. This was her chance.
In her dream world, he would be so taken by her cards that his company would start a new line of Julie cards.
The buyer came for the show as expected. He took one look at Julie’s table and said: “Honey, you’ve designed for a world that doesn’t exist.” She was crushed.
He went on to explain: “No one is going to pay $10 for a card. It would cost at least $5 to produce these. The pricing doesn’t work.”
Julie quickly realised he was right. She had been selling $12 cards to college girls; she’d never seen $10 or $15 cards in any store.
What had she been thinking? There was no market for her work.
So she packed up her table, and decided right then and there that her cards would just be a hobby.
She switched her major from art to social work. She graduated, started a career and was pretty happy for the next 10 years.
Of course, she still gave her friends, family, and now clients, cards, and people still swooned.
Once again, she started charging for them, and could barely keep up with the requests.
Everyone said she should make a business of this, but Julie had the voice of a true expert in her head, telling her there was no market.
The problem was, Julie listened to the wrong expert.
The man who said there was no market was the expert in the current business model.
The university girls who were paying $12 a card were the experts in the future market.
How often do we allow our ideas to die because we listen to the wrong ‘expert’?
If you’re trying to do something new, don’t look to people invested in the current model for validation.
Instead look at the people you want to serve. See how they respond to your offering.
Julie did eventually create a card business. She has a beautiful retail store where she also teaches people how to create beauty out of paper.
Customers line up to pay $25 or more for a Julie creation.
It was true Julie was designing for a world that didn’t exist — yet.
What she didn’t realise back then was that the world didn’t exist because it was waiting for her to create it.
*Lisa Earle McLeod is the leadership expert best known for creating the popular business concept Noble Purpose. She can be contacted via her website www.mcleodandmore.com.
This article first appeared on Lisa’s blog.
