by Found Natural Goods Founder and Curator, Jacqueline Smith
Last year, the first episode of Chef's Table blew me away––like most. As someone who LOVES food but doesn't watch TV doesn't own a TV and has a hard time conversating on pop culture, music, actors names, or the latest app, snapchat, etc.–– to my surprise, I'm sold. After episode one, I even made a Facebook post on the series and set to watch the rest in an immediate fashion. Totally out of character for me.
So, I'm really fucking inspired by this show, and at the same time, I'm launching Found Natural Goods online. It's my project, not client work, risky as ever, total time sucker, all about things that I love in life, things that make my days a little bit more lovely, and I actually want to do it. But, my way.
In that fashion, alongside my defiant personality, I launch Found Natural Goods with a home page named "preface" and a blog titled "pastime." I'm stoked. But friends immediately say, "Hey, you know maybe you should do it like everyone else so people know how to use your site. It's kind of confusing." I ignored them.
I'm watching Massimo Bottura name his dishes like I'm naming my products! There's an avant-garde approach I'm taking and I'm hoping it translates and customers can feel the difference of shopping on my site versus a commercial one. Instead of "Stamped Round Brass Tag" I'm beside myself in pure joy entitling my hand-stamp round brass tags as "The Law of Attraction in Brass." It's The Five Ages of Parmigiano Reggiano! I'm working on my own project and having fun. In my mind, I have arrived.
A year later, today, I'm not killing it like I'd envisioned, wanted, hoped to. I've been totally absorbed by client work, my many, many, outdoor hobbies, dating, family, my sports modeling career, traveling whenever possible, and maintaining that balance I've blogged about before. I'm still excited by Found Natural Goods and it has become sustainable already. But now instead of being pumped to do things differently, I'm now pumped to track all this recent backend work I've been doing –– what I should have done from the start. I'm now adhering to the book. I'm doing what I tell clients to do in the first meeting.
I'm on the computer a lot more these days; entering metadata, naming products with accordance to their keywords and winning word combinations, and creating business profiles on sites that apparently matter. But, it's worth it. I believe in Found Natural Goods. This is my take two. It's a much smarter approach to running an online store. I want Found Natural Goods to reach a greater community than I could ever imagine, and I think this is how I'm going to achieve it.
But come round three, I'm going back to the product names that make me smile inside even with their shit SEO rankings. Until then, I am keeping The Law of Attraction in Brass as is. She's still live.
Cheers to trying, trying again, again, and yet again!