Welcome to the podcast! Today, we’re diving into the five biggest profit drains that can silently sabotage your interior design business. If you’ve ever wondered where your money is going or why your profit margins aren’t where they should be, this episode is for you. Grab a pen and paper—because you’ll want to take notes on how to boost profitability and take control of your money management starting today. 

• Pricing  

• Financials 

• Ideal Client 

• Managing Cash Flow Effectively 

• You cannot sell more of something at a really bad price and continue to make money, a bad price is a bad price.  Michele Williams 

   

• An ideal client is somebody who has the same value statements that we are coming in with as the company and there's a value continuance between us and that client.  Michele Williams 

   

• The more we're fighting people, processes, or not knowing what the numbers are, the more it's going to cost us the profits and the money, but also the profitability of peace in our lives.  Michele Williams 

   

• Know how money comes in, know how revenues are recognized, know how profit is recognized, and know when you need those funds.  Michele Williams 

   

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Work with Me

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today   

• CFO2Go

• Metrique Solutions

• Metrique Solutions - Free Month Promo Code

• How to Build, Manage, and Execute on a Business Strategy course beginning August 2025 sign up now!

• Profit First by Mike Michalowicz

Joining me is Jessica Harling, founder of Behind the Design. Jessica is a seasoned expert in employee and process development, specializing in recruitment, training, and change management for design organizations. Her work helps businesses streamline costs, increase productivity, and develop high-performing teams.​ In this episode, we'll discuss practical business strategies for interior designers for effective hiring, onboarding, and retention to ensure your team thrives.​ Enjoy the conversation!

• Employment

• Strategy

• Accountability

• Employee Training

• Fears are normal. How we analyze them and deal with them is determinate based on the strategy that we have for our business.  Michele Williams

   

• You still need, as the manager, the owner, to be able to either prepare or have an oversight over that plan and not just delegate or dump it to another person and not know what they are covering.  Jessca Harling 

   

• We're not executing with success. We're executing within the moments of the day, and what feels good today, but today's feel good might not line up with tomorrow's plan and goal.  Michele Williams 

   

• Look at the strategy of the process, the finances and things like that before you make a reactive decision to jump and add someone on.  Jessica Harling 

   

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Email: [email protected] 

• Facebook: @BehindtheDesign

• Instagram: @GoBehindtheDesign

• Website: GoBehindTheDesign.com

• LinkedIn: @BehindTheDesign

• Work with Me

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today   

• CFO2Go

Welcome to the podcast! Today, we’re talking about Profit First—a powerful money management system that is proven to boost interior design business profit. If you're making money but never seem to keep it, or constantly juggling funds, you're not alone. 

We’ll show you how Profit First helps you separate money with purpose, avoid the “robbing Peter to pay Paul” cycle, and make smarter financial decisions. Whether you're just launching or scaling your design business, this episode is packed with strategies to help you pay yourself first and grow a more profitable interior design business. 

• Profit First

• Money Management

• Sustainability 

• Financial Strategy

• What Profit First is really trying to do is put you in the mindset that we want the business to live within the means of what the business can afford to live in, so that we're not spending money that the business truly doesn't have. Michele Williams 

   

• It is being able to separate out your money into bank accounts where it can then be looked at in smaller chunks with a purpose in mind, so that we're not overspending on the wrong things.  Michele Williams 

   

• The more that we can plan for profit and be very clear on where the money is coming in and going out, the more that we have the power to actually use those numbers to move us forward.  Michele Williams 

   

• The very first thing is to truly understand how money flows in and out of your business, and that means the amount, the timing, and the revenue recognition.  Michele Williams 

   

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Work with Me

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today   

• Master Your Profit course

• Profit First by Mike Michalowicz

• Profit is a Choice episode 248: All Roads Can Lead to Profit

• Profit is a Choice episode 189: Reviewing Your Profit First Strategy

• Profit is a Choice episode 092: How to Start Profit First with No Profit in Your Design Business

• A Well-Designed Business-The Power Talk Friday Experts by LuAnn Nigara

Welcome to today's episode. I’m thrilled to have Rebecca Ward with me. Rebecca is an award-winning interior designer based out of Sacramento, California, and she’s truly dedicated to nurturing emerging talent in the design industry. Not only does she host the Design Curious podcast, but she also runs a mentorship program called My Design Mentor. Rebecca focuses on answering those essential early questions for anyone looking to build their business in interior design. In this episode, we’ll discuss the many paths people take into the industry and the common questions new designers face as they start their careers. Tune in for valuable insights on how to kickstart your journey and make smarter business decisions in interior design. I hope you enjoy our conversation! 

• Mentorship 

• Community 

• Sharing information 

• Support 

• Those hard lessons sometimes are the best lessons that are getting our attention. They're sometimes painful along the way.  Michele Williams 

   

• I see mentorship as this is something that I'm still actively doing. I'm still learning in my business. I'm still learning the best way to do things, and as I do it, I adjust, and I share that information.  Rebecca Ward

   

• I think when you really love people, it's easier to be willing to want to help and to give than to say, well, I fell, so it's normal you fall.  Michele Williams 

   

• There are a lot of hard things and I want to make sure people are aware of going in with their eyes wide open before they get into the career, but I also talk about the great parts of it, but I want them to have a realistic view.  Rebecca Ward 

   

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Email: [email protected]

• Instagram: @rwarddesign

• Facebook: @rebeccawarddesign

• Website: https://rwarddesign.com/ 

• LinkedIn: rwarddesign

• Pinterest: rwarddesign

• X/Twitter: rwarddesign

• You Tube: @rwarddesign

• Work with Me

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today   

• CFO2GO

• Design Curious Podcast

• E-Myth Revisited by Michael E Gerber 

On the podcast today is Julia Bocchese, an SEO and Pinterest consultant for small businesses in the creative industry. We’re discussing business strategy for interior designers, covering essential strategies for your website, Pinterest direction, and SEO. Julia shares some simple, actionable reminders that will help position your business to be found online. If you're an interior designer looking to improve your digital presence, this episode is packed with expert tips to enhance your strategy and grow your business. Tune in to learn how to effectively optimize your online strategy! 

• SEO strategy

• Social Media Management

• Google Business Profile

• Website Content

• Knowing who you are, what you do, who you serve, how you serve them, and being very clear with that on the website is important.  Michele Williams 

   

• Whatever blog posts, portfolio photos, or things like that that you have, that's going to dictate your strategy on Pinterest.  Julia Bocchese 

   

• What we're really trying to do is create this big communication and feedback loop, that runs through all of our Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, and all the different socials that we're using trying to keep everything connected in this little ecosystem so that people are staying within your ecosystem.   Michele Williams 

   

• In terms of the type of content, I do recommend thinking about what your ideal client would be searching for, and what would be beneficial to them.   Julia Bocchese 

   

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Email: [email protected] 

• Instagram: @uliareneeconsulting

• Website: https://juliareneeconsulting.com/ 

• LinkedIn: julia-bocchese

• Work with Me

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today   

• Financial Courses at Scarlet Thread Consulting

• CFO2GO

• Julia’s SEO Freebie

I am so excited to have you join us on the podcast today! I’m going to be joined by Courtney Bramlett, who is the director of marketing and operations here at Scarlet Thread Consulting. She also owns her own company, The Good Sower, and today, we’re diving into an incredibly important topic: financial planning for interior designers. Maybe you've heard the buzzword over and over—know your numbers, know your financials—and it sounds great, but it has almost become an irritant, and you’re still not sure what it means. Today, we’re going to break down what it really means to understand the financials that are affecting your business strategy for interior designers and how these numbers impact your growth. We’ll talk about how you can create a solid financial plan for interior designers that will help you grow your company in the way you envision. So, stick around—I’m thrilled to have you here! 

• Financial understanding

• Profitability

• Cash Management

• Strategic Planning 

• I think it is important for owners of companies to understand how money is made, how money flows through their company, and how they can determine the money that is left over after everything has been paid for.  Michele Williams 

   

• If you don't truly know what each type of profits is, you don't really know how much money you actually get to take home at the end of the day.  Courtney Bramlett

   

• The reason that I focus on gross profit so much is because that is the number one indicator that tells me if I'm selling it at the right price and paying the right amount in cost of goods, but it's also the number that is telling me do I have enough to run the company and do what I need it to do as the owner?  Michele Williams 

   

• Profitability is tied to just raising your prices, and of course, that's a piece of it, but there's still a lot more that goes into being profitable.  Courtney Bramlett 

   

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Work with Me

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today   

• Understand Your Business Financials in Less than 8 Weeks / New Group Coaching

• Financial Courses at Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Profit First by Mike Michalowicz

Joining me on the podcast today is Courtney Bramlett, director of marketing and operations for Scarlet Thread Consulting. We are going to talk about values, how they lead to setting expectations, and having accountability in our firms. It's not every day that we have everything set up so perfectly that everybody comes in and does what they do without questions or confusion about their job. We will talk through some of the things that you can do establish practices that will help your employees or contractors all move forward in the same direction and towards the same goal. So, enjoy and listen in. 

• Values

• Vision

• Expectations

• Accountability 

• If we hire the right players, and we can draw the vision for them, they hopefully know what they're getting into, and they're coming in excited and with ideas.  Michele Williams 

   

• As you said, when you can get vulnerable as a business owner with this stuff, I think you get more help and you don't feel alone.  Courtney Bramlett 

   

• The more that people get constructive, positive feedback, the more they can keep going.  Michele Williams 

   

• The only person who suffers when you cannot hold someone accountable or get out of your comfort zone to hold someone accountable, the only one who suffers is you.  Courtney Bramlett 

   

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Work with Me

• Metrique Solutions The Five Dysfunctions of a Team

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today   

• CFO2Go

• The Five Dysfunctions of a Team by Patrick Lencioni

• It's Okay to Be the Boss by Bruce Tulgan

• Who by Geoff Smart and Randy Street

• Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy

Today, I'm joined by Leslie Shreve, a workload and productivity expert, and the founder of Productive Day. She’s also the author and creator of Taskology, a comprehensive system designed to help manage tasks, time, email, and information. In our conversation, we’ll explore the distinction between organization and productivity, uncover where time might be slipping away in your workday, and dive into much more. 

• Organization

• Productivity

• Task Management

• Methodology

• Any process is only as good as the way that we apply it and stay consistent with it. It's the inconsistencies that usually catch us. It's not the lack of the process itself in most cases.  Michele Williams 

   

• I quickly dispensed with the whole notion of getting organized because that's not it. That's not even the first step. That's not even a step. It's a byproduct. Because when you learn how to become more efficient, effective, and productive, automatically you're going to be more organized.  Leslie Shreve 

   

• A system or a methodology is only as good as we follow it and stay, on top of it.  Michele Williams 

   

• The three places where time and productivity are hiding are in your task management process, your information management process, and your email management process.  Leslie Shreve 

   

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Email: [email protected] 

• Facebook: @ProductiveDayLeslieShreve

• Instagram: @productivedayleslieshreve

• Website: https://productiveday.com/ 

• LinkedIn: @LeslieShreve

• You Tube: @LeslieShreve

• Work with Me

• Metrique Solutions

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today   

• CFO2Go

• Taskology: How to Unleash the Power of Your Most Productive Workday by Leslie Shreve

• What’s Your #1 Productivity Blind Spot on Productive Day

• Productive Day Smart Steps free gift

Joining me today is Ciara Stockeland. She is a fractional CFO focusing on inventory-based businesses. She has a podcast called Inventory Genius along with a book by the same name. She also has a new book called Profit Genius that is out soon. Today we're going to demystify inventory. All about inventory, how it works in your financials, why it's so important to find resources and people who understand it and how you can strategize around it.  

• Inventory

• Resiliency

• Profitability

• Financials 

• Because every decision, every choice, everything that's sitting on that strategic plan, every product line that we bring in, it is all tied at some point in multiple places all the way down the chain.  Michele Williams  

   

• It's a hard skill, but learning how to edit in your business, how to slow down, that all comes from really understanding what the numbers mean so that you know what you should be focusing on.  Ciara Stockeland 

   

• I think that was a lesson for us too, that you can do it all right, and have things go wrong. There's not a direct cause and effect between right and wrong. But what could we have done differently?  Michele Williams 

   

• Every mess can be cleaned up, every problem can be solved. So even if they feel like it's all out of control, like, we can fix it, it might take some time and some money, but it can be fixed.    Ciara Stockeland 

   

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Email: [email protected]

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/inventorygenius/

• Instagram: @ciarastockeland

• Website: www.ciaraastockeland.com 

• LinkedIn: @ciarastockeland

• Work with Me

• Metrique Solutions

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today   

• Understanding Your Financials course

• Inventory Genius podcast

• Inventory Genius by Ciara Stockeland

• Profit Genius by Ciara Stockeland

• Scarlet Thread Origin Story podcast

Joining me today is Ciara Stockeland. She is a fractional CFO focusing on inventory-based businesses. She has a podcast called Inventory Genius along with a book by the same name. She also has a new book called Profit Genius that is out soon. Today we're going to demystify inventory. All about inventory, how it works in your financials, why it's so important to find resources and people who understand it and how you can strategize around it.  

• Inventory

• Resiliency

• Profitability

• Financials 

• Because every decision, every choice, everything that's sitting on that strategic plan, every product line that we bring in, it is all tied at some point in multiple places all the way down the chain.  Michele Williams  

   

• It's a hard skill, but learning how to edit in your business, how to slow down, that all comes from really understanding what the numbers mean so that you know what you should be focusing on.  Ciara Stockeland 

   

• I think that was a lesson for us too, that you can do it all right, and have things go wrong. There's not a direct cause and effect between right and wrong. But what could we have done differently?  Michele Williams 

   

• Every mess can be cleaned up, every problem can be solved. So even if they feel like it's all out of control, like, we can fix it, it might take some time and some money, but it can be fixed.    Ciara Stockeland 

   

• Email: [email protected]

• Facebook: Scarlet Thread Consulting

• Instagram: @ScarletThreadATL

• Website: ScarletThreadConsulting.com

• LinkedIn: Michele Williams

• Email: [email protected]

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/inventorygenius/

• Instagram: @ciarastockeland

• Website: www.ciaraastockeland.com 

• LinkedIn: @ciarastockeland

• Work with Me

• Metrique Solutions

• The Designers' Inner Circle - Become a Member Today   

• Understanding Your Financials course

• Inventory Genius podcast

• Inventory Genius by Ciara Stockeland

• Profit Genius by Ciara Stockeland

• Scarlet Thread Origin Story podcast