FIVE THINGS YOU NEED TO SUCCEED AS A CREATIVE ENTREPRENEUR

Jennifer McGrew of McGrew Studios On 5 Things You Need to Succeed as a Creative Entrepreneur

More people than ever are trying to turn their creativity into a successful business, whether that means building a brand around art, design, music, writing, film, crafts, content, or any other creative skill. It sounds exciting, but it is rarely simple. Creative entrepreneurs have to balance making great work with finding customers, pricing, marketing, staying consistent, managing time, handling rejection, and building something sustainable without losing the joy that made them start in the first place. What are the most important principles, habits, and practical steps that help a CreativePreneur actually succeed? In this interview series, we are talking to successful creative entrepreneurs, creators, artists, designers, makers, founders, coaches, and anyone who is an authority on what it takes to build a thriving business around creative work. As a part of this series, we had the pleasure of interviewing, Jennifer McGrew.

(kindly insert your bio paragraph written in the third person here. The rest of the interview should be in the first person)

Jennifer works as a costume designer, cutter-draper-pattern-maker-fabricator and art department head. Through McGrew Studios located near Salt Lake City, Utah, she produces events and films and leads a cadre of some of the most talented and interesting artists you’ll ever meet. This team designs unforgettable costumes, sets, props and effects that captivate audiences – for film, stage, brands and bold storytellers. Among her shop’s celebrity clients are Verne Troyer, Adrian Paul, Larry Wilmore, producers Felix & Paul, director James Merendino, Broadway legend Candese Marchese plus Yo Gabba Gabba creators Christian Jacobs and Scott Schultz.

Thank you so much for joining us in this interview series! Before we dive in, our readers would love to learn a bit about your “origin story”. Can you tell us the story of your childhood, how you grew up, and the seeds for all the amazing things that have come since then?

Yes, hello and thank you! My childhood home in Colorado Springs was pre-internet and had only three (boring) tv channels. But I was also a latch-key kid in a house full of sewing machines, carpentry tools, reel-to-reel tape recorders and we had a big back yard. My parents were both super skilled, good at making things and fixing things. My friends and I invented many ways to entertain ourselves with drawing, painting, sculpture, dioramas, miniatures, crafts, sewing, puppets and lots of toy animals. We played with them, dramatizing their soap opera lives and wild adventures. The Barbies and the G.I. Joes were their mortal enemies. We created haunted houses for our neighborhood and recorded their spooky soundtracks, plus we invented and recorded crazy commercials, songs and talk shows. We cannibalized many household items, textiles and electronic devices to have our fun.

What inspired you to pursue your creative career, and how did your journey begin?

My creative career officially took off in my late twenties. I’d taken time away from college to be a respectable support staffer at a law firm and then at an aviation business. After dropping in and out of college a few times, I discovered theater while I was finishing up a mere six credits for my English degree. Financial aid required my enrollment for twelve. I saw a ‘costume history’ class in the course catalog and thought, “huh, that looks interesting.” My path turned 180 degrees that first day of class. Under the tutelage of an amazing professor, I immediately went to work in the university’s costume studio then stayed enrolled for an additional year. I took nearly 24 or more credits each semester and earned perfect grades, picking up another minor (in theater). I’d finally found my profession.

I was astonished to learn that this field even existed and that people could make their living (or at least were told they could) in the performing arts, and more specifically, the design for them. I headed straight to grad school for my MFA in costume design and theater, then some years later, to more grad school for an MA in performance studies. After deciding I was very done moving and working around the country, I started McGrew Studios in 2001 in Salt Lake City.

Can you tell us the most interesting story that happened to you since you began your career?

Yes, a miraculous thing happened in the midst of tragedy. In 2008, the Great Recession hit. By 2010 it had ripped through academia and finally through my departments (English and performing arts at Weber State University). I and many others were notified that our adjunct professor contracts were not being renewed. For ten years I’d been developing courses and teaching college while also running my storefront studio in downtown Salt Lake City. I had only three months remaining on my commercial lease there. I was ready to just go home and put a bullet through my head. It was such a huge loss of identity and ego- the loss of this ‘academic’ persona and the work.

Right about this time, by sheer senendipity or confluence, I met fellow artist Hraefn (pronounced “raven” – it’s Anglo-Saxon). Wulfson, who would become a business partner. He and my other friends gathered around, persuading me to take my existing operation and “do it full time, do it 100%.” We completely remodeled the storefront’s public-facing parlour. We then rebranded the operation and expanded our services plus engineered a number of public appearances, events and press engagements as we grew to to become our region’s premiere entertainment design business.

He and I have talked about all this at length. I’d finally met a “peer,” someone that I chose to work with, someone who shared not only my drive but also my exacting standards. He’d previously spent about a decade working in Hollywood on sets, props, miniatures and special effects for bunch of commercials and films including Holes, Windtalkers, The Alamo and more. Among things I’ve really learned from him include a true fearlessness plus what I’ve come to regard as “the art of the ask.”

Through this transformation, I had to let go of the major imprint that my major professor in my undergraduate years had made on me. I always wanted to “be” her, in some lofty tenure-track position inside the sacred institution. But it was just never in the cards. It’s the American lie told to aspiring young people who work their butts off only to face frustration and disappointment in a different job market reality. Positions like these in academia are few to begin with, then are held by lifers. These jobs very seldom open to new applicants. Between 2001 and 2010, I applied for several posted positions I saw located west of the Mississippi, and even flew to a couple of campuses to interview. Pas de chance pour moi, as they say, or, no luck for me.

My meeting and working with Hraefn changed everything. Through crisis and reversal and the support of my friends, I re-invented my attitude towards who I was plus what we were doing. It’s so invigorating to design for a broader range of performances and events beyond just theater and dance. I decided to really step into the impresario role. It suits me. We’ve since met and joined forces with some other very creative artists and have enjoyed much success together.

What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now?

Right now I have a script developing for the sort of film I’ve always admired. I’ll use director Rebecca Thomas’ film, Electrick Children, as an example of what I mean. Just listen to its fun tagline: “Rachel, a teenager born and raised in her Mormon community, believes that she has been inpregnated by listening to music and must get to Vegas to find the “father” of her miracle baby.” It’s an incredible film. Its direction and cinematography are beautiful. It’s a magical, subtle iteration of the Virgin Mary story, told from the girl’s point of view and situated in a Fundamentalist LDS setting.

My film, similarly, has an archetypal story and a small cast, which are the two most important factors for me (a script needs to be producable, after all). Plus I like family dramas that are plausible but which also bypass rationality. My film is a psychological thriller/horror and rather inspired by the mythic story of Bluebeard. It takes place in a Mormon pioneer context and has a supernatural element throughout, although that isn’t the main thrust of the film. I’m still sweating through revisions and have a table read scheduled for summer of 2026. It is really hard to write good scripts!

Directors and producers give us theirs to get our bids for costume and production design. Their script incongruities always stick out like red flags. It’s trickier when the shoe is on the other foot. I grew intrigued with this idea after reacting to the many, many LDS-inspired historical films spawned in our region. I’ve face-palmed often, seeing not just the same old religious platitudes and preachin’ to the choir, but worse, seeing the same generic wardrobe (much of it identifiably shopped from either Gentleman’s Emporium or Historical Emporium) passed off as early settler garb. I thought to myself, we could do better, so that’s how this all started. My weird impulse to create costumes that are more historically accurate yet also intriguing and character-driven has prompted me to this ledge of creating a script for them.

Amid this, my studio partners and I generally spend time pleasing our clients. These projects are for commercial producers, ad agencies, films, etc. We build their sets, their props, their costumes, their mascots. I do really enjoy our private clients and especially the ones who hire us to create their themed weddings. They range from sci-fi to fantasy to historic to steampunk. Because these are such personal and memorable events, our relationships with these clients and our creations for them feel more meaningful and real. It’s good to have this balance amidst the corporate and ad agency projects.

Let’s now move to the main part of our interview. How would you define a CreativePreneur? How is a CreativePreneur different from a regular entrepreneur or business owner?

If they’re anything like us, creativepreneurs probably share this trait: They create a market plus a business structure for what they’re doing, where no prior market or structure or even demand may have existed. There may not be a model, a formula, a mentor or an academic program to teach or demonstrate the moves that have to happen, so a CreativePreneur is a pioneer, shaping the frontier while carving out a stake in it. That’s how it seems to me.

Our Utah region didn’t have any public-facing businesses that did what we do, so there weren’t really any local models to emulate. When I lived and studied in NYC, I worked in a couple of amazing fabrication shops, jobbing-in to help build big projects (Broadway stuff and touring shows), but their “management” was always very cloaked from us. I was hired as a costume technician, not as an accountant.

Similarly, Hraefn and Crit (two of my shop’s other partners) worked for various props and effects shops in Hollywood, but they also did not get to peek at the books, balance sheets, payroll info, etc. All that being said, I definitely make great use of my accounting software now. It generates and tracks everything- balance sheets, estimates, invoices, expenses, vendors, cash flow, staff and subcontractor payroll,1099s, you name it. Software has definitely come a long way and it’s made management smoother here. I feel like a pro.

As far as the “regular” entrepreneur is concerned, if he or she wants to open, say, a fast food restaurant or a dry-cleaning business, there are well-understood business models for how to do it. A franchise will even train a new owner how to run their business! In my shop, we’d all had a few models to follow but largely had to learn by ourselves over time.

Creativity is often seen as inspiration, while business is seen as structure. How have you learned to balance your artistic expression with the discipline required to build something sustainable?

We have the discipline here to not spend beyond our means and we’re pretty skilled at calculating for materials and time needed for projects. Structurally, we divide our labor and each department head oversees their own team of staff, subcontracted labor and even interns. For example, I’m a hack carpenter. I’ll never claim to be capable of designing and overseeing the bigger wood, metal, plastics and other fabrication projects that are totally in the wheelhouses of Hraefn and Crit, but I gladly jump in and assist as long as they tell me what to do. If we’re producing costumes and wardrobe, then I’m that project’s design lead. It’s just all about getting a job done.

For big bids and projects that require all our skill sets, we decide as a group what will be achievable with our time constraints, staff, abilities and resources. The projects must also artistically inspire us in some way, beyond simply generating income. The inspiration part is typically about saying yes to projects that help us stretch and demonstrate our own skill sets and problem solving abilities.

It’s a crazy business model, and it shouldn’t actually work in the real world, but it works for us. We give 100% of our efforts when we decide to partner with a client. And decide is the operative word here. It’s not just that we believe in the client’s project, but more that we believe in and are inspired by them, and we are choosing to help them articulate their vision.We are driven, famous, and most of all – methodical artisans who are very proud of our work. We always create the most beautiful items possible within each project’s scope of time, materials and budget.

Visibility plays a major role in today’s creative economy. How have storytelling, media, or personal brand helped you expand your influence or open new opportunities?

The shop’s visibility started early, and by design. I started producing and designing for local events after I launched in 2001. Some of these projects included producing entertainment for our local independent newspaper’s “Best Of” parties and producing local fashion shows.

My husband Robert who’s an FX artist and long-time multimedia genius, showed me early how to build websites with strong backlinks and skyscraper content. He’s done cool videos and photography for us, some of it during his tenure at the Salt Lake Tribune where he worked in programming, multimedia and photography for 20+ years. I continued to learn about SEO tactics on my own for fifteen + years and I still try to keep fresh. SEO is changing now with AI. As time permits, I’m consuming tutorials and articles about all these changes.

Around 2010, we diversified our client base to include directors and filmmakers and strongly courted them. We still remain good servants for the public. The public has a right to have great costumes, scenic fun and effects, too! We’ve exhibited at many conventions and themed holiday events.

In 2013 we produced our own (non-monetized) film based on a world-wide best-selling fantasy IP owned by someone else and which had never before been given any cinematic treatment (it’s the Robert Jordan bestselling fantasy Wheel of Time IP, in case anyone wonders- and fans loved our film and still love it). We did this many years before Amazon ever got a hold of the rights and produced its series). This project earned us some nice attention and showed off our group’s abilities. Our usual, core group of about four expanded to over 150 people on that project! The Wheel of Time IP is popular here in Utah. BYU professor of literature and renowned author, Brandon Sanderson finished the book series after Robert Jordan’s death.

We have a 5-star rating in our Google business page, which I appreciate and cultivate. Yelp is totally weird and is crawling with trolls everywhere. But it exists, and we are findable. Overall, we use zero paid advertising and zero paid media. Our client base is organic. Part of the “magic” of our business model is that we show off our work and then our clients largely self-select or are referrals as they seek and find our services.

We’ve leveraged so many opportunites for networking, public speaking, journalistic engagements and great SEO. Hraefn, our co-manager, orchestrated many of our appearances, press opportunities and networking events for us when he joined the operation in 2010.

We liked showing up in unexpected places, and we did. When I worked for Salt Lake Comic Con in 2014-2015 as the cosplay competition director, I wrote an article about the cosplay phenomenon (featuring pics I’d collected from a half dozen very admired local cosplay artists) and published it specifically in a local magazine that was typically more dedicated to organic gardening, environmentalism, homeopathy and related subjects. I won a Society of Professional Journalists’ Award for it.

And like everyone else, we all used to be pretty active and visible on social media, but we’ve largely let go of our presence(s) there in the past few years. Nothing like visiting someone’s fallow page, right? Covid and life changes and politics and exhaustion played big parts in that decision for most of us. Our website, our local listings, our listings in our state’s film commission site plus in the LA411 directory of entertainment vendors draw the right sort of clients for us.

I am currently considering doing a bit of affiliate marketing for products I would and actually do use when I design and fabricate costumes and props (e.g. shears, sewing tools, power tools, workroom tools, etc). I haven’t taken the leap yet, but will definitely consider speaking publicly and favorably about quality products which relate directly to my work.

Can you share with us a story of a challenge or setback that forced you to rethink how you showed up as a creative leader? What did that story teach you?

Oh, I definitely have a story. I broke a couple of my personal rules and regretted it. One that I broke (and it’s the cardinal sin in this business) was to always get all project agreements in writing. Another one I bypassed was that I’d always vowed to personally vett and work with a new person before taking them into someone else’s big project on location.

At the tail-end of Covid I worked as a costume designer on a production that came to shoot in Utah, and I needed an assistant. My usual, go-to network of assistants and dressers was scattered. Everyone was unavailable thanks to the pandemic upheaval. I recruited and interviewed someone new who had great experience, but then at the last minute she wouldn’t get vaxxed. It was a loss but I respected her decision.

By then, however, preproduction had already begun and I still needed a helper, and fast. I agreed to bring on a person recommended by the 2^nd Assistant Director (whom I actually referred to the production and considered a friend). I met my new assistant who was amiable, personable, and in the beginning seemed promising, but then revealed themselves to have such severe ADHD that I was unable to properly manage them during prep and shoot. This costume assistant shared with me so many heartbreaking stories about their struggles, their ADHD diagnosis, their medications, and their hopes for a future in the arts. I am not kidding when I say that this person just scrambled my brain. Mistakes were made, and I made my share.

It’s impossible on a film set that has a base camp plus remote locations to be in two places at once, and I learned it’s impossible to even trust such a person to “do just one thing” at a time. I had to chase them down when they were off wandering or chatting somewhere with other crew. I had to re-do their work and finish unfinished parts. I had to bail them out when they lost their car keys. It went on and on.

I should underscore that I mean no disparagement towards anyone. My interests include helping other people succeed, especially young people who usually work “below the line” in film production. If you dig into this subject you’ll read and hear so many stories of mismanagement and abuse in this industry. Prior to working on this particular set, my advantages were always that I cultivated and trained assistants, stitchers and dressers under very controlled circumstances and in very controlled spaces before they were ever thrown into the bloody trenches of someone else’s location shoot. I was able to get to know my technicians, their strengths and their idiosyncracies before throwing them to the wolves, and I’m supposed to be the mother wolf who protects my helpers and my department.

An assistant needs to be the secondary eyes and ears of the costume designer and supervisor. My sympathy and empathy for this young new helper, my wanting to nurture them and “save” their job resulted in frustration and errors. I thought I had superhuman management powers, having successfully overseen for about 25 years many dozens of costume shop staff, production assistants and college interns, some of them quite “special” in their own ways. My goals have always included setting people up to succeed, but this situtation just came out of left field and confounded me.

Looking back, I’m not positive that the 2^nd AD deliberately sabotaged me, but I still have questions. The assistant had no substantial sewing or alterations background and had worked on precisely one previous production. It was a production with a much bigger budget, with multiple dressers and multiple costume assistants. This person’s symptom-masking probably flew under everyone’s radar there. That production had more people on its payroll. It had more wardrobe department workers with eyes, ears and hands to fill in the gaps.

The experience taught me that I’ll never again acquiese to poor judgement from producers, especially millenial producers who think they’re smarter than the seasoned pros they hire to actually get their films made. I didn’t create written addenda that listed their oral promises and make them sign. I left the door open for abuse and then they walked all over me and my department. They ignored or refuted advice and requests about everything. Then they lied.

Originally, they were not willing to rent any trailers for the shoot, but changed their minds at the last minute. I’d initially asked, “so… um… you want us to work out of our cars?” They finally did provide a wardrobe trailer on location, but only at the last minute. We had completely inadequate time to load-in and get everything organized. It created chaos. It could have been have prevented. More chaos ensued with production’s constant last-minute casting. Totally avoidable. They’d promised to have all talent cast by the start of our prep period and I just kept coping and working hard to find and customize wardrobe items at the last minute.

The producers also promised me costume fittings in advance with all the talent, but then reneged, claiming they didn’t actually have the funding to pay actors for any advance fittings. I wound up with only about ten minutes each per actor as they arrived in the mornings, fresh off an airplane. No time for trying on alternate looks and showing the director, no time for needed adjustments or alterations.

I stupidly stayed on when I should have quit several times over. I think our local crew (including me) were thrilled just to be working again after Covid decimated our industry here. You could say my judgement was clouded. I’m betting I wasn’t the only one. I’ve since heard other horror stories from crew on that set, about events I didn’t witness personally. I suppose I thought I was superhuman. Despite all my experience, I was reminded I’m mortal just like everyone else, and I musn’t ever compromise my most important principles that actually protect and enable me, my crew and my department to do its best work.

Many creatives struggle to turn their talent into income without losing authenticity. What advice would you give to someone trying to monetize their creativity while staying true to their art, creativity and values?

Creatives should probably parse what we mean when we say “authenticity.” It’s unclear if its definition is universal. If you’re a creative in any business, you’ll always be able to work on what you want if you’ve the cushion of money and time. One question I’d ask any creative is this: If your work is authentically making money, does your personal authenticity really matter? Can’t that just be your own private experience? Can’t you just evolve and adapt, according to your own tastes and over time if you want to? Do you direct your efforts towards something marketable now? With plans to change your direction once you have enough time and money to do what you like? You have choices and you can make them.

I recently read a cool article somewhere online about Tom Petty’s album Wildflowers, and how it detoured in such an intensely intimate and personal way from his prior work with the Heartbreakers. Petty had the time, luxury and privacy to introspect and reflect when he made that album.

Moreover, if it’s true that all art by definition is a type of creative performance, does it actually matter what your own “authentic” values are? Or that you’re a different person on the inside? Someone that people can never really know? Do we culturally always need to judge the art by the artist? This is a mistake. It’s definitely, morally wrong cancel or crucify creatives in conjunction with their artistic products. Their personal behavior is a wholly separate matter to judge. There are just so many questions to ask about who really “owns” your art, “who” it’s for plus how these things matter. With my group of creative colleagues, the lines are super clear about when it’s our own art and when it’s for someone else.

Crit Killen, another of my very esteemed studio partners (who is actually THE most famous of our group – just have a look at his IMDB page), has reminded me that a film director is like a painter. Our job, whenever we go work on someone else’s film production, is to hand the director whatever brush or tool he asks for. The director is the artiste- the person in charge.

I should remind everyone that films require many artists and technicians, despite the pervasive myth of the solo filmmaker who does it all by himself. That mostly doesn’t happen.

Our work needs to be good enough for the director and the scenes and the film, but it may not be as exacting or as beautiful as the work we might create on our own time, when the art has sprung from our own ideas or impulses. If we create something that’s “good enough” or is for “someone else,” it doesn’t mean that we are “selling out” or that we’ve given up any “authenticity.” In theory, we should be happy we’re working on someone’s film, especially if they’re notable. We should be happy we’re working at all.

Consider the work of my associate Hraefn Wulfson, who actually IS a fine artist. His paintings are amazingly technical. So much careful craftsmanship in them, even though their chief subjects are metaphysical. Each is a meditation on an idea that HE is in charge of exploring or articulating. Yet he is so experienced and so skilled at painting, that even under stressful time constraints, his set paintings and hero painting (which means painting for close-up shots of props and set pieces) look equally as beautiful as his personal paintings.

To ask him if he “cares” more about his personal paintings may be the wrong question. He likes to make a living just as much as the rest of us do. But he definitely cares much more about the bigger questions in life as he explores them through his personal work. That’s the more important, long game, for him. It’s ok that these are separate realms. His clients in each are different, too, with different kinds of goals and desires. It’s ok and in fact, it’s good to diversify your income streams.

To me it seems possible that creatives may often confuse the what of their creativity with the conditions under which they have to perform.

Remember your earlier question about a challenge or setback that forced me to rethink how I showed up as a creative leader? You’ve definitely got to have your boundaries, but sometimes you don’t know what they are until experience teaches you what you will and will not tolerate. The conditions, working on that particular film, were intolerable. Still, I gave them my best service and my best art because I “value” good art and it’s built into my psychological software. I could not do otherwise.

When my core partners and I manage projects together for our own clients, we squabble amongst ourselves and hash out many artistic differences, and despite this, we always know we’ll be lifelong friends and associates. However, when any of us jobs-out to work with new people on someone else’s production, there’s a risk. Therefore, you never rock the boat. You don’t backseat drive. The new people are in charge. There’s a hierarchy. It’s just basic set etiquette. You have to take directions just like everyone else in preproduction or on set. We can’t exactly be the super-committee of elitist control freaks when it comes to other people’s projects when we are not the ones financing or directing the work.

Here is our signature question. What are the five things you’ve learned along the way that every CreativePreneur should know in order to succeed? Please share a story or example for each.

1 . Always under-promise and over-deliver. Clients love this. On a project, when time permits, I like to add extras and cool features and details to a costume, prop or set design, etc, then tell my client or a director, “Hey, I added some extras for you here that you’re really gonna like and that really underscore the mood of this environment or the psychological/historical/rhetorical traits of this space or character’s costume, etc.” Then you can go on to explain the esoteric wisdom, learning and digging that have informed your design decisions.

2 . Produce excellent work for all your clients, whether they’re civilians, private clients, big advertising agencies or film productions. That’s fair, and treats them as equals. That said, however, first decide if the project, and moreover, the client, is a good fit for your own artistic skills, interests, and your values. You’ll do your best work if you can hit all three. Sometimes you’ll only hit two. It’s ok. It’s also ok to suggest an “alternative shop or another artist who has the right tools” if you really don’t jibe with this potential client and/or don’t like their project. If you can develop good rapor and have reasonable conversations and negotiations with a client, it’s a pretty good bet that all parties will end up happy.

3 . Learn and practice poker strategies when negotiating a bid or pricing for your work. If a producer or client asks you to produce some art, get them to ante up first andreveal their budget. You never want to undercut yourself. Just respond to a potential client like this: “Wow, really cool project!- what’s your budget?” Then you can haggle.

In the arts, there’s the classic triangulated diagram of “good,” “fast,” and “cheap.” Let a client know they can have any two of those factors at one time but not all three. Everyone deserves to be able to horse-trade fairly, and with respect. The entertainment arts business differs from businesses such as galleries that sell paintings, because paintings are already completed works, finished things, ready to purchase. Their perceived value and pricing are worked out differently.

In Utah we have unique circumstances because so many producers and directors native to our state also happen to be Mormons. Back in the earlier 2000’s, they’d come my shop to seek bids on projects, then seem surprised and even somewhat shocked that as a woman artist, I wasn’t exactly agreeable about working for little to nothing (their churches operate largely on a system of volunteerism and they definitely make good use of women’s free labor). I think the word is out now, and we don’t get approached much by these types anymore locally. We sell our expertise and labor. These cost money. It’s fun to engage people in a real negotiation. It lets you know where people stand.

4 . Get contractual details, agreements and delivery dates in writing and have everyone sign. Even if these agreements are simply hand-written (if you’re in a hurry). We developed short, multipurpose forms for custom design and labor for items we build all the time in our shops. We use this form with our private clients who come to us directly. Often, I’ll make a quick thumbnail sketch of a costume or prop (or a photo of something that’s a “known,” iconic look, then staple it on and have the client sign off on it as well. It becomes an attachment to the short contract. My accounting software generates clear, great looking estimates and invoices. Make certain all parties get photocopies or pics of everything. Doing this underscores that you are engaging in a business transaction, with promises made. If there are bigger, longer term contracts, get your lawyer to review them, answer any of your questions, plus add your terms and stipulations, then the film or other big production must sign the revised contract. It saves you grief in the long run and actually helps you make money.

5 . Rejuvenate yourself often. I’ve always liked Julie Cameron’s prescription in The Artist’s Way for solo outings to see other new kinds of art, nature and events to nurture yourself. It’s certainly inspiring to get lost in thought while wandering through a gallery or book store, plus to see works of other artists, see their shops, their tools, and hear their ideas about the world. I always get shop envy, too. And you should SEE our new welder’s shop. It’s immaculate. And the TOOLS he has! I’m always incredibly astonished at the ways in which artists work. They are so varied.

From your perspective, how can the arts continue to shape leadership, innovation, and community impact?

Young people emulate what they are shown and what they feel attracted to. They should be able to participate in the arts just as much as they’re encouraged to participate in STEM curricula. We still host college and high school interns here, plus we do art and costume workshops with a local junior high in our area. In Utah we have a state-run program called CRE (Career & Technical Education) that does a good job of matching students with internships and work opportunities before they finish high school. This is a teriffic way to find out what someone likes to do and is good at. It is also a great way for one to learn what they absolutely do not like to do.

Working in the shop alongside us as a paid intern dispels the myth that production design, fashion design or costume design are glamorous careers. Young people get to see the excruciating work, the care, the detail, the mistakes, the stress, and all of the decisions and techniques that go in to each project. Maria Skelton, the student advisor for Salt Lake Community College’s Fashion Institute does an amazing job of steering students to us who are already in the “technical” track in their program. These students already know they love pattern-making, draping and garment fabrication. Students on a different track in the program focus more on fashion merchandising, sales and promotion. Maria’s teriffic at finding internship opportunities for them, too. To me, she’s exemplary in shaping leadership, innovation and community impact. We have a great partnership with SLCC.

With so many of our high school shop, sewing, home ec and other vocational/artisan programs being cut now, we like to provide this exposure to young people. Our public schools are failing. They aren’t producing well-rounded anything. My shop partners and I were once exactly like these creative young people. I’ve always been an artist and a costume designer, but I didn’t find my way into an actual arts career until my late 20s! And it was practically by accident that it even happened! At my rural high school, the college recruiters never came and spoke to us. Nor did other employers, except for the dairy and mink farms and of course, the army recruiter. I had to stumble around for years before I found my niche. We want things to be different for young people now.

Looking ahead, what does the future of creative entrepreneurship look like to you?

I’m betting and hoping that creative entrepreneurs will develop competing platforms that more fairly show off and compensate makers. I’m loving the exposure that artisans achieve on Etsy and similar platforms, but I am not a fan of their margins, nor am I a fan of many of their algorithms and policies that harm artists.

By now, most of us have heard author Cory Doctorow’s term “enshittification” which describes how bad things have become with everything from software to streaming contracts. Companies lock in subscribers who are then held hostage by the algorithms and terms. At the same time, companies jack up their prices while providing worse and worse service. I’d like to see creative entrepreneurs working to help other creatives get a fairer slice of the pie. Let’s do it.

Our shop itself does not sell any of our work through any of these platforms, but I definitely rely on them and delightedly discover many trims, ornaments, embellishments, buttons, jewelry pieces and other doo-dads from many of these makers. I purchase them, then they are incorporated into bigger projects around here. I definitely admire these artisans and their niches. Their products are crucial in the supply chain for our own work. They deserve better recognition, terms and treatment.

As for ourselves here, our future in creative entrepreneurship has us organizing our approach for developing an historical series that makes use of our large collection of WWII era research, journals, correspondences, maps, interviews and memorabilia, plus uniforms and artifacts belonging to William O. Darby and some of his fellow servicemen. Our goal with this project is to reveal a dramatic true story about the Army Rangers that will really bug conventional historians and shake up the canonical way their story has been told. Another of our creative colleagues spent a couple decades of his life conducting these interviews and putting together this super big collection. We’d like to honor his work as well as the Rangers’ service and their legacy.

On the day-to-day around here, we are each learning new skills, acquiring new tools, continuing to make new art for our clients, plus turning our focus to book projects and scripts. Hraefn has a book he’s working on (about runes: their histories and etymologies plus the scholarly disagreements about their origins, forms and meanings) and Crit has one (laying out his famous formula for story structure and analysis in script writing). Robert is developing the code for Crit’s book to make the product interactive and user friendly, plus he’s currently editing a film, salvaging its poorly recorded sound plus creating fantastic new effects and scenes for it with animations and AI. Then there’s me, with my weird script project driven by my desire to see better stories and costuming in period films coming out of Utah. So we’ve each got our thing.

You are a person of enormous influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

I’d like to see more of us working with our hands. On woodworking, gardening, cooking, sewing, crafts, everything. Especially the learning of new skills. This year, I’m signed up to take welding lessons (scary and new for me!) but I’m going to practice what I preach.

Culturally, we need respite from the doomscrolling, social media and politics. Not to mention the voices in our own heads. When you’re working with your hands, you generally cannot hold your phone at the same time. Working with your hands is good for you. It can become meditative. Then when you get pretty good at a skill, you can get into the really sweet flow states.

Decades of research underscore its benefits for your mental health. Working with your hands creates competence, pride, satisfaction and meaning, which tend to be the main things that drive most of us throughout our lives (even if we think we’re mostly motivated by money or fame, etc). Based on my manifesto here, I’ll probably do more cooking in my own kitchen this year, plus schedule additional workshops with our local junior high students!

How can our readers continue to follow your work online?

Readers can learn more about us and our work at https://mcgrewstudios.com/

This was very meaningful, thank you so much! We wish you continued success!

Thank you! This has been teriffic to reflect on your great questions- I really appreciate it! It’s good for creatives to self reflect. You do us a good service by publishing these articles about creatives in business. I learn a lot from these!

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About the Interviewer: Diane Strand is a multi-award-winning serial entrepreneur, executive producer, best-selling author, nonprofit founder, TEDx and national speaker with more than two decades of success in media, education, and creative entrepreneurship. She is the majority owner of JDS Video & Media Productions, Inc. and JDS Actors Studio, and the founder of the nonprofit JDS Creative Academy (JDSCA) — a 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to advancing education, inclusion, and workforce development through the arts. As the creator and executive producer of Spirit of Innovation: Arts Across America — a nationally streamed and locally broadcast ABC TV series — Diane continues to break new ground in creative media, producing the first magazine-style news and information show of its kind in Riverside County. A trailblazer in inclusive education, Diane has authored two state-approved training programs — a Title 17 video production job-training day program for adults with developmental disabilities and a California State Apprenticeship program in media and the arts.

Diane has helped launch more than 100 creative careers, as actors, writers, directors, and producers transforming lives and strengthening the creative workforce pipeline in Southern California and beyond. In 2017, Diane founded DigiFest® Temecula, an award-winning annual festival that celebrates digital media, storytelling, and innovation across all creative disciplines. Now entering its 10th year, DigiFest® has evolved into a nationally recognized event uniting students, professionals, and thought leaders from film, television, gaming, design, podcasting, and emerging technologies. The festival embodies Diane’s mission to merge creativity, community, and opportunity — showcasing how the arts can drive education, empowerment, and industry growth. Diane’s Hollywood career includes credits on Friends, General Hospital, and Veronica’s Closet, as well as producing for Barbra Streisand, Disney Channel, and Universal Creative, where she helped launch Playhouse Disney and Toon Disney and contributed to the high-definition control room build at Staples Center (now Crypto.com Arena).

As a Lead Columnist for Authority Magazine, Diane now shines a national spotlight on visionary thought leaders, entertainers, changemakers, and philanthropists who are shaping the future of creativity, inclusion, and social impact. If you’re a celebrity, industry innovator, or business leader passionate about using the arts to transform lives, Diane invites you to connect, collaborate, and share your story to help inspire the next generation of innovators.

Outtakes:

Friends and close colleagues know me for being very direct and often blunt with my requests, terms and opinions. They also know I can be hyper-critical of other artists’ products, especially costumes. But I’m old enough now and smart enough to keep my opinions to myself whenever I’m in mixed company, which always includes new associates. Plus I always keep in mind the stress, the lack of resources or expertise as well as the deadlines designers are no doubt under when they’re scrambling to produce work. The fact that films and productions get made at all is a bloody miracle.

A former theater mentor always told us that it doesn’t matter that you’re the most skilled and excellent at your craft: others will only want to work with you if you’re cool to work with.

Our business itself creates “possible worlds” and various “personas” for entertainment projects. The worlds we build and the personas we costume are always changing with each and every project.

College and then two graduate degrees taught me all about the ‘art’ that entertainment needs, but neither of our educations taught us how to run a business. We figured it out as we went along.