#832: What Happens When 90% of Your Business Disappears Overnight

Welcome to the Boutique Chat Podcast, where we're gonna help you build a profitable, sustainable business without you having to sacrifice your profitability, your family, or your sanity. Each week we're gonna dive into real conversations with retailers who have been exactly where you are and industry experts so you can learn and know exactly what to do next, all in community over competition. Whether you're just getting started or you're growing past an 8-figure business, you're in the right spot. So let's get into it. Welcome to this week's episode. Hey guys, welcome back to the podcast. This week I have been excited to bring you guys this story and to talk about this for a long time. Dana, thank you so much for being on the podcast with me today.

Yes, I'm so excited to be here. Thank you.

Uh, we're gonna have an honest conversation that I think every single business owner needs to hear, and we talk a lot about not putting your eggs in one basket, and we talk a lot about you know, pre-planning worst-case scenarios, what to do when things fall apart. And today, I mean, everyone needs to hear what happens when that happens and what to do about it. Um, so before we get there, I want to go back to the beginning. Um, I would love to hear from you. How did you get started with Lionberry? What, what made you want to jump into this business in the first place?

Yeah, so back in 2013, my youngest, um, Ava was heading off to kindergarten, and I just felt like I wanted to take my love of crafting and bring it into like a small business to kind of help the family, help, um, kind of like wanted to set up like an Etsy store, I guess. Etsy was like kind of new back then and exciting.

Right.

Everyone had a cute trendy Etsy name for their business, and so I just kind of like played with some words to come up with the Limeberry. I like margaritas, so I like limes, and I like purple, so pink and purple, so kind of like a berry color. So that's kind of how I come up with the name Limeberry because a lot of people ask a lot of times. And when I started the business, I was kind of doing a lot of just crafting, and I started to notice that moms wanted cuter spirit wear. Like, they just get these boring choices on their kids' teams. And so I wanted to elevate that. I started it with the glitter vinyl on shirts and rhinestones back then. And then one day I was like, back to those trends, right? The blingy trends is how we started.

Yeah.

I was in Walmart one day and this friend said, you should sell on Jane.com. And I kind of knew about Jane, so I looked into it. I, um, started— I submitted to be a seller on there and did my first deal, is what they called it, because it was a deal platform. And the first morning my deal went live, I was excited. And then I started seeing the sales come in, and I was like, oh my gosh, like, how am I going to ship these shirts? Right? Like, it's just figuring it out as the orders came in. And I think by noon we had sold over 100 shirts. Oh my gosh. So, like, it kind of just became addicting. Like, just that putting out a deal and seeing the sales come in. So at that time, with my kids still being little, I just kind of sold on Jane every once in a while, just kind of ran a 3-day deal. and then fulfill the orders. It was just done. So that's kind of how I got my start with Lineberry. At that time, e-commerce was hard. It was easier to sell like on Facebook or on Jane versus like websites. Just the tech that we have now with like Shopify is so much better than it was back then.

Yeah, it was brand new. I'm going back to that time in my mind and Shopify was brand, brand new. Not a lot of people knew about it. I can remember doing website consults with people and I was like, is your site built on Ruby on Rails? Like it, like the oldest technology ever. So Jane was really very innovative at that time. Remind everybody, so the idea of a deal, you had to put your stuff up there and it was almost at wholesale. Like it was—

Yes.

It had to be way below a retail cost. Is that right?

Yes, I think if I remember the first deal, and I don't even wanna say the price, but back then I think it was $14.99 for a t-shirt.

Oh man, yeah.

Yeah.

So you were sacrificing margin, but you were doing so much volume.

Right, correct.

Okay.

Yeah.

So as that went on and you were like, okay, this is great, I'm addicted to it, let's keep going.

Yeah.

You grew significantly on Jane. Tell me, you know, kind of at the peak, what kind of volume and business you were doing on the platform.

Yeah. So 2019 is when I got— when I purchased or rented my first warehouse, brought— I think I grew from 2 employees in 2018 to 10 or 12 in 2019. We just experienced rapid growth. We were just pumping out the deals on Jane. We were working with influencers at that time on Facebook. So that was kind of neat because they would promote our deals on Facebook through the Jane platform, and then Jane would pay them the commissions. So it was kind of not really double dipping, but it was just kind of a strategy that we used to influence, like use those influencers also.

Yeah.

We hit our first million dollars of sales, I think in August of 2019. And then 2020 happened and we, everyone wanted t-shirts and leggings and that's what we sold on Jane at that time. So our sales, gosh, I guess tripled. We hit $3.7 million that year. I think May of 2020, we hit 22,000 orders that we shipped out. So—

Wow.

And, you know, we couldn't shut down the warehouse. We had to keep going. I had to pull the team back in. We had to spread apart and just get those orders out. So it was, it was fun. We had fun along the way, but a lot of learning experience with just being cautious with employees and bringing all the aspects of that time in. Yeah.

What was your biggest lesson? Do you feel like when you grew so rapidly, you know, new levels, new devils, something always breaks? What were some of your biggest lessons at that time when you were experiencing that level of growth?

I think it's just a continuing pivot. It's like month over month you're pivoting and like perfecting like an efficiency or perfecting— you're like working on something, either hiring or trying to make something better. Like there's always a problem to solve. Looking at like customer service, okay, why does this error keep happening? What do we need to do to change our process and procedures to Yeah, I think that's so true.

And I love that you mentioned just like processes, procedures, because I think that's a mistake that we often make as, you know, starting as a solo entrepreneur and you're just trying to hustle and figure it out. And then pretty soon as things grow, everything is still funneling back to you and you're the complete bottleneck if you don't have everything mapped out. So are you ready to team up for Pink Friday 2026? Yeah, I'm ready. You are officially invited to join us and to save the date, November 20th, 2026, to support Small First. If you're ready to team up with fellow small business owners around the world, literally over 10,000 small business owners, we're gonna team up the Friday before Black Friday, held annually every year, to show the world what it means to support small businesses first. You know, on Black Friday, everyone can shop at big box stores and spend their budgeted funds, but what about supporting small businesses like yours first? Pink Friday is your opportunity to collaborate in community over competition with all types of small business owners, to get on the Pink Friday map, to host Pink Friday events either in person or online, and to also team up with your local media to tell the story of why you started this business and why it's important for customers to think of shopping your small business first. So sign up, save the date, and join us on Pink Friday coming November 20th, 2026. So this is all happening. You're having all of this growth on Jane, but all of a sudden that all comes to a head. Tell me about what happened next when this all kind of came to a screeching halt.

Yeah. So September, October of 2023, I started to notice that the payments for Jane weren't hitting as consistently as they had in the last, you know, 10 years. They never missed a payment. Never. Everything was always accurate. So it was kind of odd. Started talking to a couple other sellers who were like, what's going on? Kind of asked my personal Jane rep what was going on. And the same odd story kept coming up that an employee was out, the one that handles everyone's payments. She hand processes every seller's payments every day. And so they just didn't have anyone to do the payments. And kind of an unbelievable story because there's 2,000 sellers. So one person is not processing all these payments in 2023. There's technology here that can get this done.

Yeah.

And so I would ask the CFO, the CEO, you know, continually ask for the money that was owed because it kept growing, right? We kept selling and we kept shipping out orders. Our responsibility to the contract that we had with Jane, and they would pay a little bit, I think, to keep kind of build the trust that they will pay just to keep the products on the platform. And it just became really suspicious talking to more and more of the bigger sellers. One morning, I woke up. It was actually the day that Jane shut down and emailed several people, even including the owner, and just said, if you're not gonna pay me what you owe me, then take all my products off the website. 10:00 AM, I start seeing all my products start to show turn off. So I just knew right then and there, like, that's it. Like, they're shutting down. probably going bankrupt, and I would not see the money that was owed to me. So I think I calculated that it was, um, 6 weeks of sales that I was not paid for, um, which is— it's a lot. It's hard. It was hard. It was just like mind-blowing that a site that you trusted for so long would just shut down overnight. Not a care, not a word to the sellers, not a word to the customers. Just gone.

Just gone. Can you— are you comfortable sharing roughly, like ballpark, what they owed you?

So they, on all of the documents, um, they say they owe me $152,000. I think with their accounting it was probably $180,000.

Unreal. So I'm just trying to process this. So you're— I mean, All in one day. What, like, what do you even do? I'm thinking about the panic attack I would be having in that moment, like, as a business owner, and you've got these employees sitting there going, okay, what am I going to ship out this afternoon? How did you handle that?

So that day when I saw the products, like, starting to come off the website, I told my staff, I was like, don't ship anything out. Like, we just can't do it. Like, let's just wait and see. Just throughout that day too, you just see other products going off the Jane site. It's like you would look and see there was like, I don't even know the number now, 2,000 graphic tees. And then by noon there's 1,200 graphic tee deals and it would just go down and down. Went to bed that night kind of concerned, like I didn't know what was happening. I woke up the next morning, my husband looks over and he goes, the whole site's gone. Just black. Not a 404 error, not we have a problem, like just completely gone. It just knew. Then I— it was, you know, just so weird going through like that day, all the emotions of I can't believe this. How did this happen? What am I going to do? Like you said, I have 10 employees at that time. What do I tell them? Um, just how do I go through the day, keep the company like alive? And also this was a week before Black Friday, so just knowing all of those holiday sales were not going to happen.

Oh my gosh. Um, and at this time, did you have Shopify or any other platform set up, or was Jane really your number one?

I had Shopify, and I would say as much as I wanted, like, I knew, I knew if Jane shut down that my business would be over.

Okay.

And trying to grow that alongside of Jane at the time with a high volume was really hard. So we probably had about a 10% split on Shopify at that time, 90% on Jane. And as much as I wanted, I tried for years growing at 50/50, it was just It was hard at that point.

Yeah, well, and especially when Jane was such a deal website. I mean, it was— that was volume. Um, oh my gosh. Okay, so what did you do? What was your next step?

So my next step, first we looked at the customers, our open orders, reached out one by one. I think all of my team was on our ticketing system emailing customers, trying to, you know, saying like, if you still want your order, Please process your payment on Shopify, telling them to submit like a credit card claim to get their money back, and just telling them what happened. Talking to sellers also, like other sellers, we were like in it together, right? Like the bond of that happening at that time.

Trauma bond.

Yeah, trauma bond. And just trying to figure out what to do next and I couldn't even focus on the dollar amount at that point, like, that they owed me. All of that operational cost, like, if I focused on that, I knew I wouldn't be able to continue. I wouldn't be able to. It would just devastate me and put me in a mindset that I wouldn't be able to continue the business.

Yeah.

So I really just looked at what I wanted to do. Like, do I, You know, I first wanted to get through the holidays, try to recover as much of the sales that we could, and then just really reflected, did I still want to do this? The answer kept coming back to me, yes, there's a reason on purpose that Lionberry is going to continue. And then just figuring out how, like, how do I grow this business again? I'm a really positive person, so I thought I would be able to recover that sales in like 6 months. But I've been taught that it takes a lot longer. You know, stable growth is a lot better than just, you know, a high climb really fast. So yeah, it's been an interesting journey of trying to regrow this business.

I mean, an interesting journey. I don't know how I would describe it. Interesting is not the word. I'm wild. I don't know, like, yeah, roller coaster, so many emotions. But man, I mean, we all, we talk about like, okay, don't put your eggs in one basket. But man, when one thing is working so well like that, it's really hard not to. And you never think something like that is going to happen. And I think the same about Facebook, Facebook ads, like the, the followings that we all build across different social channels. Like, we're all way more vulnerable than we think. I personally, we had a very similar business experience this year with something that went kind of haywire. And I mean, you can go from the highest high to the lowest low in 24 hours flat. So, I appreciate you sharing this story of what happened to you and to let other people going through it know that they're not alone. But what I witnessed from you, because we met shortly after that whole thing happened.

Yes.

I witnessed you coming out of that like a woman on a mission. And you were just like, okay, here I am. You weren't embarrassed by it, not that I ever saw. You were just like, I'm owning this and this is my goal. This is what I want to do. Can you help me?

Yeah.

And then, you just did the work. You just went to work. So, I'm not even sure when you and I first met. I think you came into Retail Bootcamp at some point shortly after that. And you just got to work. Tell me about that process.

Yeah, I knew that I had to lean into the experts, get community support in order to, you know, make this company survive and thrive again. And so as hard as it was to pay for Retail Bootcamp when I still had $150,000 of debt from those operational expenses, I knew I had to do it. I had to invest in that program. I also did the VIP program with you to have that one-on-one with you and Sarah and Jeff.

Yeah.

Because I just saw the value in that and just leaning in on your guys' expertise to help grow my business back and just get there faster. And then doing the work, you know, showing up day after day, no matter how hard it was, just continuing and working on the business. Long nights, every weekend, just talking to people and just the little tips, just absorbing all of that and making changes.

What does your business look like now for those, you know, like no longer being on Jane, but now you have a retail and a wholesale side? So kind of tell us like, how has the landscape of your business changed? Who are you selling to and how have your prices, margins, like how's all that shifted?

Yeah, so I have 2 Shopify stores now. Retail and wholesale are separate, which is very nice. I would say wholesale is probably about 60% of the business currently, and it's something that I'm very passionate about, being out at like markets, meeting the other retailers and supporting them. The support that I've received like with this chain happening is something that just means so much to me. So I want to give that back and support others. My biggest joy, I think, is just hearing from customers, wholesale customers or retail, of like what the shirt means to them. That's the purpose that I have in this business. So with Jane, we didn't really have to do any marketing. So that's the one thing I really had to learn was marketing.

Yeah.

Joined Botica Black, worked closely with Jeff, And doing all the Facebook, the Google Ads, the Shop Ads, the Agentic Ads now, just that continually changing landscape and technology is something that I've just really worked on in the business also.

That, I mean, that makes a huge difference, just building a brand name for yourself versus building the brand name of Jane or somebody else. What's been, do you think, like the most eye-opening or biggest lesson you've learned like on the marketing side now that you're in control of that?

Just, I think how much work it is. The continuing, the creatives, the copy, the little adjustments, the like the problems in Ad Manager, those little like glitches that pop up. Like you go to build an ad and then it just like the headaches like appear. But, and also seeing those results, right? Like seeing the ROAS and just an ad take off is really cool.

Is there any advice you would give to other business owners listening who are like, oh man, like how else could we protect ourselves or how else could we build our business in a way where we make sure we have, you know, something in place to kind of be like the catch net? Like if something falls apart, what's gonna, you know, be the net that really catches us at the end of the day? What advice would you give them?

I think you have to really look at like why you're doing this business, realizing that you're taking a risk day after day. You're leaning out, you know, like you're leaning out for that fruit on the edge of the tree day after day in your business. And if you don't, if you play it too safe, I don't know if you would be successful either. I feel like you have to take some calculated risk. Really just feel like, I really feel in my heart like if I'm buying new equipment or a new process or trying something new, it just has to feel right in that moment. And as you weigh all the options and pros and cons.

I think that's a great analogy and it's so true. It's easy to try to build the business and just stay close to the trunk. where it's safe and you can hang on, but the real fruit's out on the limb and you've gotta go get it. And especially in marketing, whether it's the headaches of dealing in Ad Manager and all the things that can go wrong there, or being uncomfortable and putting yourself out there and building a personal brand and being on camera and all the stuff that I don't think anybody thinks about when they start a business, that that's what they're gonna be doing.

Yeah.

But also becomes part of that whole story. Something that you've done that I love recently, and hopefully is timely when everyone's listening to this podcast, is You're big about giving back. You're big about community, collaborating, supporting one another. And so when I saw you at Summit, I was so excited to see in your booth that you had all kinds of Pink Friday designs.

Yes.

You wanna tell everyone about your Pink Friday designs you've got?

Yes. So we designed this cute little polka dot Pink Friday with a couple different shades of pink on it, little bubble letters, white t-shirt, just really striking and pops. Our idea was working with Samantha before Summit to bring this to Summit for retailers. If you have an event, tees that your staff can wear, we can customize the t-shirts, like really leaning into their store to hit their personality, hit their little taglines about shopping small. It's just really exciting events that you've grown. And it's just our way of, you know, kind of supporting that event and also the other retailers of a cute branded or customized shirt that they can wear themselves or do a little giveaway.

I think it's a good idea. And I've seen some stores that have done it in past years. I love how it looks. So cute, professional. And Pink Friday is really, I mean, it's meant to be a day to tell your story, like your business story. Why did I get into this business? And so I love that you're helping other retailers do that and Just lean into that opportunity. So thank you for, thank you for thinking of that and for doing that for so many.

Yes. I mean, that's just the thing, like you said, telling our story and being vulnerable day after day is kind of the support that you get by telling your story and the growth and just the lessons that you learn by talking about it and what you pick up from other people.

That's exactly right. And we want to be a part of your story and continuing to build back this wild roller coaster you've built. Um, but just to build it all back, uh, the way that you want it, that's more powerful and sustainable than ever before.

Yes. Yeah.

Dana, Dana, let's do a lightning round. Will you be good with a lightning round?

Sure. Let's do it.

All right. Uh, I give you 2 hours back in your day to work on income-generating activity. What do you focus on first?

I would say email marketing and also Facebook ads.

Facebook ads. Okay.

Yes.

Um, what has been, do you think, the unsexiest process in your business that drives the most impact?

Um, well, I think with production, when machines go down, like, I just get in there and I fix the machine. I've rebuilt like some heat presses, rewired them, because like we can't— if sales come in, we can't get behind in production. So it's just, I think that's probably the unsexiest thing is Getting in there, pulling the shell off the heat press, and rewiring that whole machine so it works again.

I was just talking to somebody about this actually on the podcast. We were like, ah, you know, you think you're going to get into like a fashion business and it's going to be so glamorous all the time, but really the money is made when you're sweaty. And it's whether it's rebuilding heat presses or it's shipping out the product or it's moving boxes, like it's the sweaty thing that actually makes it, makes it flow. So that.

Yeah.

Is very fitting. Very, very fitting.

Yeah.

What is one metric that you live by in business and what's one metric that you wish you knew more about but maybe you don't yet?

I would say my average order value. I live by that for both retail, more retail I think because wholesale is a larger average order anyway. But that retail average order, getting a customer to buy more than one item. Is kind of a challenge to me and has a good reward also. And then I would say my most frustrating metric is conversion rate because it just ebbs and flows and changes so much. Yeah, conversion rate is really good. Yeah, and all these bots that just come in and ruin your conversion rate. So if I could figure that one out, that would be awesome.

You and everybody else, the bots are like the most annoying thing ever. I totally agree. What do you think is your CEO strength?

I think just showing up, doing the work. I come into the warehouse every day, 9 to 3, and just show up for my team, my staff, and just here, even if I don't talk to them, if they're in the back working, just being here and showing up and just continually working on the business.

Yeah, I think like when I think about you, I think about tenacity. Like you have a lot of tenacity and grit and perseverance, and I think that's what separates a lot of people. Like people, I think business ownership looks glamorous, but the successful business owners are the ones that move beyond the glamorous part and they have the grit and the tenacity to get through the hardest parts that most people would crumble by.

Yes.

That's you. You are amazing at that for sure.

Thank you.

What is, what is a money mindset that you've had to unlearn?

I think for so long I would just look at sales and not look at the bottom line, the margins. It was just that top dollar of sales.

Yeah.

So just learning all of the financial aspects of the business, the operational costs. That was probably the biggest change that I've had in the last 3 years.

I blame Jane for that. I mean, because that's what it was. It was, you were just like volume, volume sales, but you probably came into Retail Bootcamp and were like, like we probably like slapped you in the face a little bit because you, I mean, you can do the same amount of profit with a lot lower amount of sales.

A lot less work. Yes.

And a lot less work. Yeah, a lot less shipping, a lot less staff, a lot less overhead. I think that's a misconception. I think we often think like bigger is better, but it's really not. It's better is better. Like you can take home the same and do less work if you just like, you fix your view of these numbers. But they are such a mindset to begin with. So I really love that you said that for sure. Oh my gosh, Dana, I really appreciate you just being vulnerable and sharing your story. And, um, I hope you get tons of messages after this, both of support, but I know you're going to get messages of other people who have gone through some hard times too. I just think that, man, it's, it's the hard times— like, opportunity is what you make it in those challenges that we go through. And you're somebody who has really made something of that, of the situation that you were in. So I have one last question for you, and it's kind of the big question.

Okay.

After everything you've gone through, let's like fast forward down the road 20, 30 years, and you're sitting on the front porch and you're with your family, you're with your friends, and you're just looking back on this life that you've lived, the businesses you've built, this rollercoaster journey you've been on. What's the thing that you really want people to remember most about you and the person you are and how you live throughout this journey?

I think just no matter what you go through and what happens to you, That you just have to continue. You have to put yourself in the right mindset to not let it get you down. And then also just get up, get ready, do the work, no matter how messy it is, no matter how much you just want to cry that day, just continually working on it. And I know that Jeff, in one of our meetings, said you just have to get 1% better each day.

Yeah.

And that has stuck with me that I don't have to do all the things on one day, that I just need to take one step forward, 1% better, one additional order. And, you know, that will help me continue, like, my why and my purpose. And I think it's just the people. If I reflect back in 20 to 30 years, the people that I've met and been able to, that have supported me, and then also that I've been able to support through this journey and what I've learned.

Yeah. Oh, that's a great message. So good. Well, on behalf of our entire team at The Hub and the entire Boutique of Black team and Jeff and Sarah and I and everybody, we're just so thankful that we got to be a small part of your journey and got to witness the woman that you are as you walk through all of this. So keep going, keep inspiring other people with your words too, Dana, and thank you so much for being on the podcast today.

Thank you. Thank you so much. That means so much to me.

Hey guys, thanks so much for listening to this week's episode. If you found it helpful, please share it with a friend or feel free to subscribe. And I would always love it if you would leave a rating and review. Hey, if you want more tools, education, and just support, head on over to theboutiquehub.com. Or if you have feedback or episode ideas, DM me personally, AJ Alderson, on Instagram. Thanks so much for being here and listening to this week's episode.

I'll see you next week.