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Emalee Hudson | Episode 447
Emalee Hudson is the woman behind soft Earth ceramics! Emalee started working with clay in college and hasn’t looked back since. For Emalee, simplicity is beauty, and she tries to reflect that in the pieces that she makes. Emalee loves getting her work out of her studio and into the hands of people.
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One of the things I noticed on your Instagram feed was how well your pictures were taken. How important is good photography for a good Instagram feed?
I think it’s really important to have good photos so you an accurately represent the thing that you are trying to sell, whether it is pots or the space you are having workshops in.
One of the things that you have in your bio is you say ceramics crafted with care. Tell me about the care portion of ceramics. How important is care for creating great ceramics?
What I have learned through everything I have done with ceramics is that you have to care. You have to care from the beginning. If you don’t care about wedging your clay it is not going to line you up for the best way to throw it. If you don’t care about each little process, because there are so many processes with ceramics, that when you care about the way you do things and the energy you put in it really makes a difference for the next step and it all comes together to make a piece or a product or even just a feeling that is super genuine. I think that is the most important part about ceramics that I am making at least. It gives you a feeling, not just looking at it, you know. It is cool to know that someone put so much thought and love into something and you are holding it now. You are connecting with someone even though you may not know them and you may have never met them but I feel like you can truly feel the care that a vessel is crafted with.
How important has social media been for the growth of your business?
I definitely think it has been a really important aspect of the growth of my business. Just because it gives you a platform. It has given me a platform, not just to show off the products that I am making but the process and everything that goes into it. Kind of like the previous question you asked me about care, you can say, this is made with care all you want but it really gives you an opportunity to open up and let people in and see what my studio is like and see all my smelly little animals running around here. They can see what is going on in the studio but then they can go to the link to my Etsy if they want more of a catalog and see the pieces that I make.
Why Etsy?
Honestly, I started on Etsy and everyone is always like, Oh, why Etsy, you should go ahead and make your own website. Well that is a lot harder then some people realize. Also, I have actually found that Etsy has some really great tools and some really great marketing tips and things like that. You can look at your statistics. They give you all your stats for the month and you can see where you have gotten the most traffic from. Honestly month after month the traffic comes from words in my Etsy listing. Like white speckled plates, someone searches for that, it is still within Etsy, it is not within Instagram. They have a base of people who are looking for handmade things. It kind of narrows down your target market a little bit.
You have really good reviews on Etsy. How important are the reviews for your Etsy account?
I think you reviews are super important because it verifies that I am not just saying that these are good pots made with love. I try to write a note to every one of my customers who buys a pot from me. It is just a thank you for the order note. I try to make sure my appreciation for them is reciprocated back for buying a pot from me because obviously it is a two way street. I think that establishing relationship with your customers is super important too.
How important is repeat business for you as a potter?
It is very important. Every month I have more and more repeat visitors message me. I love it because they make a point to say they have purchase from me before and it makes me really happy because it’s establishing a connection. It is not just a customer, it is a person. It is all of us realizing that we are all people.
How much do you love your kiln?
Oh, my goodness! I love my kiln so much. It is the one thing in my studio that I cannot live without. It is a Skutt, which is literally the best brand I have ever gotten. I am not saying this to sound like an advertisement but I have friends who have started their own little home studios around here and they are always calling with me questions, Oh my gosh, my kiln is doing this, why? And I say, I don’t know, my kiln has never done that before. It has just worked for me from the first time I’ve used it. It is just very reliable and a really great piece of equipment for sure.
Book
Mold Making for Ceramics by Donald E. Frith
Contact:
Instagram: @softearth.ceramics