Blog

Hurt and unsure. A designer last week told me that she was really struggling with the fact that her husband didn't take her business seriously, in part because she’s never used any kind of interior design contract or letter of agreement in her entire career. My heart...

Showhomes create amazing credibility and celebrity. Celebrity is an important element for up-leveling your business. It’s what makes it possible to have those bigger and better clients. The recognition and positioning you have with show house attendees is another...

This is a big issue for interior designers because we get a lot of "emergency" phone calls... Even though no one has ever died of 'sofa' - it hasn't ever happened - nor from 'tile grout' or 'plumbing valve'. Yet, these random calls lead us to have a knee-jerk...

Best career advice for interior designers: never share your discount with clients! Doing so opens a pandora’s box of issues and you’re setting up a potential nightmare for both you and your client. The first issue with sharing your discount with a client is it tells...

How can you charge more as an interior designer? That's a fair question since I’m always talking about getting paid what you're worth… so, let’s dive in. The very first thing is that you need to know about getting paid more is - it's an inside game. That inside game...

I was working with one of my interior design students on what it takes to grow a successful interior design business. She was looking for one big thing that was going to make it ‘all’ happen: an amazing job that’d propel her to the top or an amazing high-end client....

There are a lot of great, new interior design projects popping up these days and it might be the right time to accelerate your interior design business growth! You may become very busy, with lots of new clients and activity in the coming months. If so, that’s fabulous...

Step out of your comfort zone and into something scary in order to take your interior design business to the next level! Now when I say scary, I don't mean someplace where you're going to get hurt. Think more like having your toes over the edge of the unknown, where...

Starting with the end in mind is one of my all-time favorite interior design business management tools and strategies. This concept is pretty easy for interior designers because we always start with the end in mind when we begin a new design job. We have a very clear...

This week one of my IDBA coaching members asked for the going rate for commercial TI's and finishes selections. This same question has been asked multiple times by a variety of designers, so I thought it’d be a good subject to dive into with you. Now, the reason why...

Along the journey of raising your rates and fees, getting your margins up, and correctly pricing an interior design job… there are some scary things might happen. The first scary challenge is hearing ‘no’ from clients who've never said it to you before. It’s truly...