From Debt to Dream Business: The Money Journey That Changed Everything

Welcome to the Creative Mind Smart Money Podcast where we turn financial confusion into creative confidence. I'm Samantha Ek, the keeper and fractional CFO for creative entrepreneurs. Each week I'm sharing my financial expertise and actionable strategies to help you build a thriving creative business. Plus, you'll hear from industry experts who bring fresh perspectives on growing your business beyond the numbers. Because building a successful creative business starts with strong financial foundations. Your next chapter starts now. Hello, hello, hello, okay. So today we're diving right back into the personal stuff. We're really kind of diving more into a little bit more of my background and the time that things changed. And I started to gain a deeper relationship with money and where I started to really dig deep into things overall. So this is where I get brutally honest with you guys and just really dive into everything. But let's kind of get into it. So just to recap from last episode, we recapped where I was a group in Canada. We moved to Texas in 2020, how I had my first business in Canada where I was making kids clothes. And then when we first moved here, there was a variety of things that I started doing. I was a accounting assistant when I first moved here because obviously I had that accounting experience, everything like that. So when I first moved here, one of the jobs that I had was an accounting assistant, I had invested in an iPad where I started drawing and I started to draw every day. And I found prompts on Instagram and things like that. Or there's these challenges called draw this in your style. It's where you take someone's image and you draw a image. And I'm so sorry if I'm itching my nose or if you hear me itching my nose. For some reason, whatever I film, my nose gets super itchy. Just straight up honesty right now. But anyway, so I started drawing every day and I had decided at some point after seeing a bunch of different artists and things like that, I was like, hey, like, you know, my drawing is getting slightly better. Maybe I should try making some stickers. Maybe I should try making some postcards, post it notes, things like that. I should try making this stuff and telling it. And so the birth of, I think it was called a collectipin studio. I don't think it was even called a collectipin studio. I think it was a collectip studio or something like that. It was something, something along those lines. I'm going to start off by saying right off the bat, I did not run the business properly again. It was a time, I think it was 2021, 2022 and my dad was doing art access still. So my dad would do two projects every year and he would, you know, ask for all our documents to get things done for us. Actually, yeah, I know it was in 2022 because when we first came here, my husband wasn't working because we were waiting for his thesis slash green card to come in. So he actually had a little bit of downtime, which was nice for him to actually kind of relax for a while, the opposite of what we were used to with me kind of taking the backseat with him, working full time and me doing, trying to run my business. He wasn't working. I was working and then eventually when he got his green card and everything had that. And I was let go from my current position. I had a tough time finding another job at the time. I started just focusing on my stickers. And while I was at that job, I was doing my stickers. So it wasn't anything that I wasn't not doing. I started doing my stickers consistently. And of course, this job that I did have I'd worked from home, I think which is why they'd kind of let people go because they were getting back to that point where they wanted everybody in the office and they just didn't have enough space. But that's when things started to feel really off because when we started to come here, you know, we came here with no debt. But my husband and I, I don't even know what it was. A lot of the time I started to get into debt because I would buy material. And of course, I didn't have my own bank account. I started a lily account, but I didn't really think about putting the money in there. Like sometimes the up to money would go in there. But most of the time I was like, oh, it's just easier if I hit my personal account. You know, I didn't think about all those things. And that's when money started to feel tight and started to feel really heavy. Because we were living with my parents when we first moved here. Like when we came from Canada, we didn't just immediately go and get our own apartment. We were actually living in my parents upstairs kind of sweet. So they have like a bedroom upstairs that had like a, it's just a bedroom with a closet. It's had a walking closet and then also a bathroom, which was really nice for us because it gave us the space that we needed and kind of like to grow into, to grow into Texas really. So things started to feel really uncertain and heavy. And we didn't really have a lot of rent to pay because my dad was very lenient with the amount of rent that we paid and he was like, what's fair to you guys and we told him. But there was a point in time where because we just got out of debt in Canada. So we had zero debt. We came to the US with zero debt. We started gaining debt again because I was doing my business and I was just buying things like crazy. And that's when something clicked in my head when I was like, okay, we're in a lot of debt again. Like what's going on? Like what am I doing wrong? I started to look at money podcasts. I started to look at money books. I started to look at money YouTube. I started to look at all these videos and all these things that were going on and all these money, you know, things. And that's when things started to click like, okay, I'm doing something wrong here. That's when I found YNAB and I know I've talked about YNAB before where it's the budgeting app YNAB and how much I love it. And that's where I found YNAB and why I really dove into YNAB is something that I'm sure that I love because that's when we really started to get out of track was when we started budgeting. When I found that out and I found out how much debt we were in and how many things we were doing and things like that. And realistically, the reason that we had so much debt when we came to the US was because of my business. And I'm not ashamed to say that and I'm not ashamed to say that I made some mistakes in the past because that makes me human, right? And I want you guys to see me as that human and I want you to see me as this flawless person. I'm not flawless. I've gone through these trials that have brought me to this point in my life where we're going to get you guys are getting to know me and really feel me. So of course, that's where I started to look at money. And when we started to put our numbers into YNAB, we started to look at everything and say, okay, this is where we're at. This is what we need. This is what we've got coming in, what we've got going out. That's when I realized I needed to get a job. And so I couldn't continue to just do the stickers. It wasn't profitable enough. And I was working my butt off trying to do TikToks and everything at that. And I was like, oh, I'm going to do TikToks of all these orders and things like that. But then the problem with that is it's so much work and not enough payback. And I'm not seeing stickers on a profitable business. You need to be selling like hundreds per day. You know, it'd be really profitable. You can't just be selling two or three per day or one to three per week. And I think a lot of product-based creatives will resonate with that and understand that. That's when I got a job. And that's when I found my first ever, I think it was called, I can't even remember what the actual position was called, but it was an accounting position for a company here in Austin. And I was doing phenomenally well. Like I started off, I learned this system in like two days and they were so shocked because I like people need usually take two weeks to pick this up and get all the stuff going. And they started to give me like account actual accounting things. And that's when I realized, okay, I actually like this. Like, what is this? I want to learn more about it. So I was already doing the YNAB part of things, the budgeting part of things. I was already getting my money on track. We were on track to start. We were paying off things. We were getting things done. And how do I say it? That was when we really started to figure things out. And while I was at that job, they actually offered to pay for school for my accounting degree. We'd started my accounting degree and I'd started to get into my business and everything else like that that happened. But then I can't even remember what it was like 2023. It was early, very early 2023 when there was a lot of like slowdown and housing stuff. And I can't, I don't think it was a recession, but there was a slowdown and like building houses and stuff like that. And they had actually overhired. So they had decided to keep just the people who were there before they hired me. And there was I think four of us that got hired at around the same time and they'd let all four of us go. So it was impactful for me to experience that, but I kept going to school and I kept doing what I was doing. And I had found another job for a small business where I was doing almost all accounting. And I was still doing my degree at that time. So there was a CPA there that started to teach me some other things like how to do things in QuickBooks, how to do this. And when I was in that position, that was when I really felt it. That was when I really understood and I was like, hmm, I was looking at QuickBooks and I was like, I could do this. I feel like I could do this on my own. And that's when I got advertised the bookkeeping course that I took. And it was like, Hey, like, would you like to learn about bookkeeping? Would you like to do this? And I was like, yeah, I would. I would. And I don't know if I mentioned this, but I had accelerated my degree because I wanted to just get through this fast as possible. So while also learning about accounting and doing all this stuff, I started taking this bookkeeping course. And at that point, anytime that's when we started to move out of my parents place because we were so close to being out of debt. Again, that I was like, okay, let's move into our own place. Again, I did get let go from the company. Well, actually, that's not even true. I left the company. I left the company. I didn't get Lego. I'm mixing up my companies that I got Lego 'cause I got, there was a couple that got closed out, but for this one, I did leave the company because I wanted to start my own business. And this was the scariest point in my life because we were so close to being out of debt and we didn't have a lot of money saved up, but we were doing so well with our budget and like making sure that we were keeping track of things. And I looked at my husband and I said, "Hey, "I said, "do you trust me? "Like, do you trust me to do this?" Like, is this something you think we can actually afford to do? And he was like, "Yeah." He's like, "I think you've got this." He's like, "I trust you. Go for it." And I was like, "Okay, well, if I don't make money "in like three months, let's give me three months. "If I don't make money in three months, "then I won't keep doing this." And I can't remember, I mean, you guys know I'm a Christian, but I felt so passionately about this that I was like, "Hey, we're gonna start this." And that's when, you know, that's when Fierce Store Finance was born. And that's when everything really changed for me. That's the season of permanence for me. We did wind up going back into debt a little bit because money got tight when I first started by business. And it did take a month for things to start flowing, but after that first month, like I had money flowing in and it was coming in on a monthly basis. And I was able to afford things. And it was really cool. Just to kind of like get even a little bit more into this kind of aspect. There was a point in time when my husband got let go. And this was the scariest time in my life because he was working for a startup and he was doing so well, he was doing phenomenally well. And he was making enough money that he could support both of us and it was such a good feeling. And it was crazy because I was at this point in my business where I was doing so well that my husband got let go and his business shut down. Like they shut down literally they were operating and then they let everybody know that they were shutting down and it just got shut down. Like he wasn't even supposed to go back to work the next day. And I remember feeling the pressure in my chest and being like, oh my gosh, my husband just lost his job whatever you're gonna do. I'm working in my own business. My business had been doing so well at that point like for bookkeeping. We didn't have to stress about anything. Like I was able to support the both of us on my business alone because I had taken all this time to dig into my background to get my degree to build up all this experience, to understand really what it was to have that fear of not making enough money and everything like that. That was the transformational period in my life was 2022 to 2023 where Firestorm's finance started was really the point where everything kind of like changed and that's where things grew. So I mean, to catch you up to speed, that's my background. I started off in logistics. I moved to accounting. I started two businesses that both failed and then I started a third business and it's just been a phenomenal journey and all of the business owners that I've met regardless of if they're with me or not anymore have just been phenomenal people to work with. And I love every minute of Firestorm Finance. I love what I'm doing of Firestorm Finance. I love doing this podcast and I love working with creatives. That's really what we're gonna get into in the next episode why I love working with creatives and what's special about them. You know, I'm getting a little bit emotional when I think about it because it's just been a crazy journey these past almost three years. As we wrap up this episode, you know, I just wanna say thank you. If you have been here for almost two years of the podcast, thank you for sticking around. Like thank you for hanging out with me and listening to my voice and just, you know, you didn't even really know me. So I hope this is enjoyable for you to get to know me a little bit. But thank you for hanging out and getting to know me and hang out with me in it. If you wanna get to know me more, please hit me up on Instagram because I'm always sharing stuff on there. But I really do appreciate you guys hanging out with me and listening to my voice every week. And if you like this episode, please share it, subscribe. What people know about it. As always, you guys, I wish you the best week ever and we'll see you next week. Farewell, a lot of travelers.