We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Ryan Johnson a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Ryan, so happy you were able to devote some time to sharing your thoughts and wisdom with our community. So, we’ve always admired how you have seemingly never let nay-sayers or haters keep you down. Can you talk to us about how to persist despite the negative energy that so often is thrown at folks trying to do something special with their lives?
This is an interesting question. Most of my business comes from social media. And if there is anything we know about social media, it’s that people LOVE to hate. IT’s fair to say that many people say things through a keyboard that they wouldn’t say otherwise. For me and my business, I’ve just decided to ignore it. Likely these people either don’t mean what they are saying or don’t understand what they are saying. Although, once in awhile I do love a good one line response.
Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?
Sawdust and Stuff LLC was birthed a few years back. My wife and I had recently purchased our first home and didn’t have the money to furnish it. We also had a good chunk of debt from college that we really wanted to pay off. I actually made our dining room table with a hammer, glue and nails and brought it inside. We did not like it in our space, so I listed it online and sold dozens of the exact table in the coming weeks. From there, Sawdust and Stuff has evolved into a small business that specializes in woodwork, epoxy work and laser engraving. Over the last 12 months we have really dug into the laser engraving world and had great success engraving just about anything. Custom home decor, cutting boards, tumblers, leather patch hats, and much more! We get excited to support other small businesses, so we spend a good amount of energy creating custom hats and tumblers for small businesses across the country to use as closing gifts, Christmas gifts and branding in general.
There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?
Hard work. Sacrifice. Integrity. All three of these things are vital to succeeding in a small business. It isn’t always easy to do the right thing. It isn’t easy to sacrifice your time. It’s not easy to get home from a full time job and go back to work on your small business. My advice to others is to know what you’re signing up for and commit to it! I like to chunk my commitment into small time periods. “For the next month, I’m going to do ______.” This helps me see the end and reassess from time to time about how things are going!
If you knew you only had a decade of life left, how would you spend that decade?
Currently I’m facing the challenge of knowing how to balance my time. With a daughter who just turned 10 months, I want to spend as much time with her and my wife as possible. At the same time I also want to provide the best life for them. Sometimes this means that I spend late night hours in the shop getting orders out. Other times this means I need to let my business stay idle for a day so that I can soak up an afternoon walk with my family. This challenge is one that many small businesses face as their business grows. I’m hopeful to seek advice from others who have walked this journey!
Contact Info:
- Website: sawdustandstuffllc.com
- Instagram: @Sawdustandstuff
- Facebook: facebook.com/sawdustandstuff
- Youtube: youtube.com/Sawdustandstuff
- Other: Tiktok: @Sawdustandstuff_
Image Credits
Alexa Myli Photography Will email photos soon!!
