I’ve been obsessed with the world of arts and crafts or about 35 years. My number one love is knitting and crocheting, so I opened a yarn shop about 10 years ago. I needed a way to get Instagram followers so that I could draw more attention to my shop. I am in my 50s, and I am not used to all the savvy ways people use to get followers online themselves. I started an account, and I noticed within a month that not many people were following my company account. I needed to figure out how to change that so that my company won’t get lost in the mix of all the other businesses out there.
When I lost my husband, I had to figure out a way to make a living quickly. He was always happy with me being a stay at home wife, even after our children were grown and out of the house. I always stayed busy. When I wasn’t taking care of the house, I was busy making things for our house and for us. I even knit sweaters for both of us. He passed away suddenly, and I didn’t have much time to think. It was fine for two of us to live on the salary of one person, but with no money coming in at all, I was in a lot of trouble.
My husband’s life insurance policy is what allowed me to open my business. He had been very diligent about putting money away for our retirement, but I knew that I couldn’t touch those funds. That policy allowed me to buy food, pay all the monthly bills and keep things running at home. With the extra money, I took a big risk and opened a business. Living in a small town means that I would not have a lot of competition with selling yarn, and business was booming. To keep things running, I needed to hire another employee to handle online orders after opening social media accounts so that I could reach out to others to offer my products.