I have a confession to make.

I am an accidental entrepreneur.

Even though throughout my 20s I was constantly searching for my ‘thing’ – my passion – I never once considered I could make my living from running my own business.

In school I was a total science nerd – my goal was to go to Uni and become a research scientist – PhD and all! I had absolutely NO interest in business whatsoever. I thought business was completely dull and boring, and I was all against commercialism, too, man.

So how did I get from that to this?

In 2008 I landed my first ‘businessy’ job – as the manager of a tuition centre. I had never been a manager before (unless you count running a classroom as managing… and I do) so learning the business side of things was a steep – and to my utter surprise, exciting – learning curve.

I learnt how to manage people. How to sell. How to market (pre-social-media). I learnt how huge the overhead in traditional business is. I learnt how to hire and fire (kinda, still hated that part).

And, best of all, I got to attend a company conference that taught me some business fundamentals that I tucked away in my head for future reference.

All of that was golden experience for this total business noob. It meant that when I fell into selling jewellery online, I had at least SOME idea of how a business runs. But really, I had to figure it all out for myself as I went.

I started selling jewellery because I was making it as a hobby, and I simply had too much lying around. Not to mention, I wanted to re-coup some of the materials costs!

When I started my Etsy store and this blog in 2008, that was my aim. To sell the results of my hobby, and share what I was doing on my blog.

It never really crossed my mind that I could make a full-time living from my craft.

Yet here I am, 4 years later, doing just that.

How exactly did I get from hobby to business? Well, that’s another story for another time… till then, I suggest you check out some other stories from fellow indie entrepreneurs.

22 indiepreneurs will be sharing one of the following stories throughout July as part of the Unfettered Ink blog hop. You can find out all about this blog hop on Brigitte’s blog here.

So, what are the 5 stories every indiepreneur must tell?

1. Your origin story. How did you start doing whatever it is you’re doing now?

2. The tale of the delighted customer (or reader if you’re a blogger without a product).

3. What you overcame.

4. What you learned along the way.

5. How you did it.

The lovely ladies preceding and following me are:

July 10: Stacie - Soul to Substance

July 12: Sarah - Redline Design

Why not tell one (or all!) of these stories on your own blog?

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