How creative entrepreneurs and local craft markets benefit the community
Start-up entrepreneurs from around the Lower Mainland have turned their craft into a business, supporting sustainability efforts and the local economy
Whether you're looking for crafting supplies, clothing, or fun knick-knacks, there are local businesses with personal stories all around us. (Submitted/Austin Kelly)
Every small business is different, whether it’s what their craft is or how they got there — it’s all a part of the appeal and their story.
Shopping locally is not only sustainable but supports community members, Forbes reported. This is something entrepreneur and craft markets tend to foster — a valuable exchange, for both artists and customers.
Leah Yard, of Leah Yard Designs (LYD), is one of these artists. Her jewellry designs display a classic, elegant style that emphasizes small details like the sheen of rose-gold metal, the burst of a lilac-coloured stone, or the filigree-braid detailing around the rim of a cigar ring.
Growing up in an untraditional, isolated childhood living in various lighthouse stations across B.C., Yard’s family was often the only stewards residing in places like Cape Beale and Lyell Island. Yard and her brothers were creative almost out of necessity, she says.
“I definitely am not a born entrepreneur. It’s not something I ever thought I would do when I was little. I made jewellry from the time I was really young just because I loved working with my hands,” Yard says.
“We were playing with whatever we could find and making stuff out of sticks and rocks. You had to really think outside the box and be creative, and I am so sure that that’s where a lot of my designing comes from.”
Building LYD from the ground up, Yard doesn’t have formal design training and didn’t graduate from high school. She started designing on the side after spending 10 years working various jobs in retail, construction clean-up, and reception.
In “survival mode” throughout her young adult life, she says she never had a clear career path. Buying thrift store bags of vintage jewellry to take apart and redesign, she learned about colour and balance in her own way. She started selling these items at pop-up markets, developing LYD into a full-time career.
“To me entrepreneurship is just personal development 101. It forces you to see all the things you’re bad at, and then it forces you to get better .… I’m such a different person now than I would have been, had I not done this,” Yard says.
Craft marketplaces started and continue to service LYD, even just through social exchange and kinship, she says.
“I’m there selling jewellry, but the whole mission and everything I’m trying to do, I’m now realizing it’s a lot deeper than that. It’s this sense of connection, the sense of not feeling alone.”
Buying from local artisans not only supports someone’s work and leads to positive social interactions, but also builds a sense of community. A poll by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) found supporting small businesses is important to 86 per cent of consumers, with top reasons being supporting their community, helping small businesses succeed, and the friendliness of owners and staff.
To start up your own small business, Yard says it doesn’t matter what official qualifications you have, you just need the right attitude.
“So much of building something is mindset. If you want to build a company, build a brand, you’re the only one who really has the vision,” she says.
“You start hearing of other people that have done something with themselves, that didn’t go the traditional route. It’s so important to hear different stories because if you don’t know it’s possible, then you don’t know what is out there for you.”
Becoming an entrepreneur without formal training has never been so accessible. Research by the National Library of Medicine found social media helps people with entrepreneurial entry. Yard says social media is different now than when she started her business.
“It was more about having aesthetically beautiful content. … Now you show up as you are.”
Another brand that shows up as they are is Gracias, a creative textile business composed of a husband-and-wife team — Finnish fashion designer Hanna Tahvanainen and Panamanian artist Felipe Arias. Gracias is a unique blend of their cultures with a logo of a bear, to represent Finland, eating watermelon seeds, to symbolize the tropical nature of Panama.
Dubbed clothing for “good times,” on their website, the playful streetwear includes colourful bucket hats, swaggy sweatshirts, toques with textured chenille patches, graphic tees, and fun pins.
Tahvanainen trained at different fashion schools including art and modern design college Akademie Mode and Design (AMD) in Germany. After several years of working at international retailer, Esprit, Tahvanainen went traveling to Panama, where she met Arias. They established Gracias in 2016, selling their wares in stores and hosting their own creative pop-up up events with other artists.
Now living and working in Vancouver, the brand offers a taste of their home cultures, connecting their styles seamlessly, and doing so from a seeded dream.
“I always wanted to have my own clothing brand from the get-go,” Tahvanainen says. “Working for a big company, your creativity is quite limited because you have to fit their style and their requirements. It’s a good starting point, … but at some point I thought, ‘I need to have my own.’”
At seven years old, Arias was already selling his own T-shirt basics he painted on, hawking to local bystanders.
“He’s very creative. So we just combined both of our creativity. Our designs, our artwork, and we work well together,” Tahvanainen says.
From printing limited quantities of their collections to choosing sustainable trade practices, Tahvanainen and Arias are considerate with the work they put into Gracias. They ask production partners to eliminate any plastic wrapping for all samples. At markets, they forgo using price tags on merchandise to save paper.
“I’d rather have the conversation with people about prices. I try to minimize waste,” Tahvanainen says. “[They’re] little things, but it adds up a lot if you are able to leave certain things out.”
Gracias also has a comprehensive way of selling which is effective in its multi-pronged approach — targeting local markets and festivals while also selling in various collective storehouses like Shop Makers in North Vancouver and Gastown and The Storehouse Vancouver on Main Street. The craft markets and joint retail spaces mean shared rent or friendlier fees for businesses, 100 per cent profit for the creators, and act as a central hub for locals to shop.
Tahvanainen says she’s seen community enthusiasm with local markets.
“I’ve noticed that in Vancouver … it’s more important to [customers] to speak to you in person because then they can ask you questions [like] ‘Where is this made? What is the story behind it?’ And that’s when they buy it because they like your story,” she says.
“It’s nice that you have this kind of culture here where people support you because they were able to talk to you.”
While people still shop from retailers like Amazon and Walmart, Tahvanainen says there is public interest in being more ethically conscious consumers.
“I think it has to do with knowing that [Amazon founder] Jeff Bezos makes billions of dollars and the work environment is so bad. People don’t want to support it,” she says.
“So I guess they’re more prone to support someone with a small business and just want to put their money where they know the money goes.”
A report by the CFIB found small businesses support the local economy. For every dollar spent at a small business, on average 66 cents stays local in comparison to 11 cents when shopping at a multinational retailer. In 2022, businesses with one to 99 employees made up 98 per cent of all employer businesses in Canada, Statistics Canada found.
While local entrepreneurs can have a positive impact on the economy, they also support morale, which Tahvanainen says is what Gracias is all about.
“We just want to make people smile. We want to spread positivity, happiness, [and] good humour .… We want to integrate different languages and other cultures to include everyone.”
Another creative entrepreneur whose work focuses on crochet is Egg Atelier’s Yucheng Lu — a hobbyist who started stitching to find peace after a stressful work layoff during the COVID-19 pandemic. She came across a random video about crochet on YouTube, took a liking to it, and started to practice by herself.
Lu says the idea to start Egg Atelier was to keep her family together, her mother Mu and daughter Laura.
“I think why not just start with a small business online, together? And also I try to find something for [Mu] to stay in Canada [and] take care of my little girl,” she says.
Lu started selling at occasional pop-up markets in summer 2022, created an Instagram page, and established a small Shopify business. In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, there was a rise in independent entrepreneurs and start-ups, The New York Times reported. In 2021, Shopify revenues increased 110 per cent, Global News reported.
Egg Atelier’s products vary from whimsical keychain animal characters dressed as humans to micro-crochet jewellry. Stitching delicate blossoms and fruit, little lemons or strawberries dangle on chain bracelets and earrings, creating unique wearable art. The business is now enough for Lu’s entire family to be involved to keep up with the orders, including her parents, husband, and in-laws.
Lu’s advice to other aspiring entrepreneurs is to just keep going.
“It doesn’t matter to make a business or keep the hobby, just keep doing it,” she says.
“Don’t think about it too much, think about ‘How can I start the business? How can I set up an Instagram page? How can I set up a website?’ … Just start, and once you start, you’re going to know what’s the next step.”
The glue that often brings small businesses like LYD, Gracias, and Egg Atelier together is organizations like Got Craft, Vancouver’s handmade marketplace, founded by Andrea Tong and Robert Tucker.
Got Craft is designed to organize and exhibit local creative businesses. Starting as vendors themselves, Tong and Tucker’s idea to start Got Craft stemmed from wanting to fill a void — to create a market that would bring together multiple artists they would want to buy from themselves. Got Craft aims to build a “conscious community seeking to support small businesses,” as stated on their website.
Established in 2007, Got Craft developed organically as the founders drew vendors together, made posters at Staples, handed out postcards about their event, put up signs in cafes, and talked to other interested makers. They had no official business plan, just ideas written down on a piece of paper.
Tucker says having the perfect business plan can sometimes be the biggest fear and setback for people.
“When you hear the stories of some of the most exciting businesses, they didn’t sit down and create a business plan from a template,” he says.
“There’s all these people that love to dream, and they have ideas. But they always want to take a course on how to make that happen, and at some point you just need to do it. … That’s the biggest thing that we had learned. At some point, you just got to try.”
While Got Craft hosts around two to three annual events, the growth and frequency of partnerships and collaborations has only increased post-pandemic — a combination of a rush for the return of in-person events and growing social media recognition.
“People just started reaching out to us. I think because during the pandemic … we moved everything online. We were more visible on Instagram and Facebook. People started messaging us and approached us to ask if we wanted to be part of their event,” Tong says.
In addition to their own Got Craft marketplaces, they work in partnership with the Concord Pacific Dragon Boat Festival, Etsy, and Vancouver Fall Home Show.
The marketplaces aren’t just for vendors either. Due to the hours and skill most creative entrepreneurs take with their craft, market items have a sense of care and connection for patrons, something that is respected and valuable for both the planet and people, Tucker says.
“The items that people are buying from our makers … or other local markets, they aren’t thrown away in the same way [as things] from fast fashion or things purchased elsewhere,” he says.
“They don’t just disappear from people’s lives in the same way. They have longevity, … they’re kept, used, and maybe cherished.”
