In this conversation, Laura-Jean Bernhardson shares her experience as an entrepreneur in the fashion industry, from starting a knitwear business to opening multiple retail stores. You will learn about the benefits of building systems, mindset shifts that will help you grow with creativity and confidence, and ways to make your brand memorable. You will also hear about Laura-Jean’s pivot from retail brick and mortar to business coaching. Get ready to learn how to run your fashion retail business the right way—through Laura’s lessons from decades in the industry.
About Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Laura-Jean Bernhardson has been an entrepreneur since 1994, starting with a handmade knitwear business that she grew into a seven-figure fashion design and retail company. Her boutiques, Fresh Collective, were known for carrying small batch artisanal clothing and accessories by local designers, including her own lines, Fresh Baked Goods, and Palette. But Laura-Jean didn't stop at fashion. She also co-founded a licensed daycare business that she ran successfully for over a decade. Over the years, her passion for mentoring other women entrepreneurs evolved into a full-time coaching business. Now, she helps founders grow businesses with heart, passion, and profit without burning out. And she's also on a mission to build a life that feels fun, flowy, and creatively fulfilling.
Contact info
Website: https://laura-jean.ca/
Email: laurajean@laura-jean.ca
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/laurajeanbizcoach/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/laurajean.bernhardson/
Takeaways
- Use creative, low-cost branding to stand out with unique details and memorable experiences.
- Scale with systems by documenting processes, delegating decisions, and removing bottlenecks.
- Turn setbacks into wins by staying flexible and pivoting quickly.
- Collaborate strategically to share resources, cut costs, and create complementary products.
- Know your ideal customer through market research and tailor everything to their needs.
- Treat business like design by bringing creativity into sales, marketing, and operations.
- Hire expert help early to avoid mistakes and speed up growth.
- Push past fears to sell with confidence and connect authentically.
Interview themes
How can creative, low-cost branding make you stand out?
Laura-Jean believes you don’t need a massive marketing budget to get noticed—you need a memorable brand experience. From playful “knitting queen” branding to custom Shrinky Dink buttons, she shares how small, unique details made her products unforgettable. These touches not only set her apart from competitors but created talking points that customers shared, driving organic word-of-mouth growth.
Why are systems the key to scaling without burnout?
For years, Laura-Jean ran her fashion retail business with everything in her head—approving every purchase, making every decision. It wasn’t until she embraced systems that she was able to scale to seven figures. By documenting processes, delegating authority, and creating clear roles, she freed herself from being the bottleneck. She credits this shift with not only growing revenue, but also giving her more freedom to focus on strategy instead of constant firefighting.
How do you turn setbacks into growth opportunities?
Retail brought plenty of challenges—slow seasons, unexpected weather events, even losing leases. Laura-Jean learned to see each obstacle as a chance to adapt. Whether it was shifting her business model, phasing out what wasn’t working, or bringing in new product lines, her willingness to pivot quickly kept the business resilient. She explains how staying flexible allowed her to navigate decades of industry change.
What are the benefits of strategic collaboration?
Early in her career, Laura-Jean joined forces with fellow designer Kingi Carpenter to open a shared retail space. This partnership evolved into a collective model where designers contributed rent and staffing in exchange for selling space. The approach lowered overhead, created a built-in community, and offered customers a diverse mix of products. Laura-Jean shares how the right collaborations can spark creativity, reduce costs, and strengthen your market position.
Why is knowing your ideal customer non-negotiable?
Laura-Jean admits she didn’t always get this right—her early designs reflected her personal style, not the needs of her paying customers. Over time, she learned to research her audience, understand their lifestyle, and design pieces they’d actually wear. She explains how market research helped her adjust sizing, color palettes, and price points to match what her customers valued most.
How can you bring creativity into every part of business?
While she started as a designer, Laura-Jean discovered that applying her creativity to marketing, merchandising, and sales made her business stronger. She reframed entrepreneurship as an art form—where every customer interaction, product display, and email campaign was a design project in its own right. This mindset not only made the work more enjoyable but also led to more original and impactful business strategies.
When should you invest in expert help?
Laura-Jean’s turning point came when she hired her first coach after reading The E-Myth. She quickly saw how outside expertise could shortcut trial-and-error and help her build a more sustainable business. Today, she encourages founders to bring in expert help earlier—whether it’s for marketing, operations, or financial planning—so they can avoid costly mistakes and accelerate growth.
How do you push past fear to grow your business?
Selling didn’t come naturally to Laura-Jean. Over time, she learned that selling was simply about building relationships and showing genuine enthusiasm for her work. She explains how confronting personal hangups—whether it’s fear of rejection or perfectionism—opens the door to authentic connection and stronger sales.
Chapters
00:00 The Journey of Entrepreneurship Begins
04:57 Building a Fashion Brand and Store
09:49 Marketing Strategies in a Pre-Digital Era
14:51 Navigating Retail Challenges
19:58 The Importance of Systems in Business
23:07 Transitioning to Coaching
30:26 Key Strategies for Growth
50:18 Advice for Aspiring Entrepreneurs
Transcript
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Like anyone can start a business, it's so fantastic. And yeah, it is great and anybody can start a business, but don't expect it to be easy, I guess. Don't expect it to challenge your sense of yourself. I think that would be the most important thing. If you can deal with yourself and your blocks and hangups, then you can learn all the rest of the stuff. You just have to be able to be ready to embark on the journey.
Glynis Tao
Welcome to Chase Your Dreams, a podcast for fashion entrepreneurs who want to build a purposeful and profitable clothing business so they can make a living doing what they love. I'm your host, Glynis Tao, an apparel business consultant and SEO specialist with 20 years apparel industry experience. I'm also a mom to a wonderfully energetic little boy named Chase.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson has been an entrepreneur since 1994, starting with a handmade knitwear business that she grew into a seven-figure fashion design and retail company. Her boutiques, Fresh Collective, were known for carrying small batch artisanal clothing and accessories by local designers, including her own lines, Fresh Baked Goods, and Palette. But Laura-Jean didn't stop at fashion. She also co-founded a licensed daycare business that she ran successfully for over a decade.
Over the years, her passion for mentoring other women entrepreneurs evolved into a full-time coaching business. Now, she helps founders grow businesses with heart, passion, and profit without burning out. And she's also on a mission to build a life that feels fun, flowy, and creatively fulfilling.
Welcome, Laura Jean. It's so nice to have you here today. Thanks for joining me on the podcast.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Thank you so much, it's great to be here.
Glynis Tao
So I have to start with a little personal connection. Before I ever became an SEO and business strategist, I lived in Toronto for over 15 years. I went to fashion school at Ryerson University, which is now known as TMU. And I actually remember shopping at one of your stores, your store in Kensington Market. It's so fun to have this full circle moment with you. And for those who aren't familiar, can you take us back to those early days and what inspired you to open your first store?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
My history is so long that it's hard to know where to start. But I opened my first store in Kensington in 1998. And that was about three and a half years into my knitwear business. So my knitwear business was called Fresh Bake Goods. And I started on $600 that I borrowed from my roommate at the time and $200 worth of yarn that I put on my credit card. And I just started knitting and putting sweaters on consignment at different stores and really building the business one sweater at a time.
So for the first, before I opened the store, I was working on getting in other stores, starting out with consignment, putting them on consignment and then getting wholesale orders. But I'd have my, I'd take my samples and people could choose the yarns they wanted, which was actually really good because they could be like, we've got these dresses coming in, so we'll order sweaters.
Like it opened up a huge range of colors for them and stuff so they could coordinate their boutiques and everything else. But I ended up opening my store in Kensington. I would say there were sort of two reasons that really spurred me into it. One is I was really getting sick of wholesale. So wholesale included a lot of, you know, like just production and then packing boxes and then trying to collect on the, so calling up stores and being like, hi, you owe me $873.
And I didn't like that part. So I decided that if I had a store, then I'd have a home base and I could meet customers one-on-one and sort of get more enjoyment, I guess, out of the creative process and use my materials more wisely and so on. I often had to order more of something to fill an order, even though I had, you know, tons of other things available that I could have been selling off or whatever. So for me, it was a good shift in terms of, I guess, energy, like just my own personal way I wanted to spend my time and yeah, having a home base.
And the second thing that I think sort of pushed me over, although it's like such ancient history, it was 1998, but I had been in a relationship for about three years with a guy and he broke up with me and I just decided like, that's it, I'm gonna open the store. Like it was one of those things I had been wishing for someday, et cetera. And I went out looking for spaces on a Monday and by Thursday I had signed the lease at Kensington.
So I remember peeking in the window and thinking, oh yeah, I can make this work. And it was like a tiny space. The rent was only $650 too, back then, which was incredibly cheap, even for Toronto standards. When I went out looking, I had a budget in mind of $1500, but I found this place $650 inclusive and that became my little Kensington shop for probably about 20 years. I closed it in or 22, I can't do the math, but I closed it at the end of 2019.
Glynis Tao
That's the history. And you didn't just stop at one location. You grew to three retail stores in Toronto. Was that part of a grand plan or did the opportunity just present itself over time?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
I guess over time, I actually, there was a fourth store in there. For a stint, I had a store in, I think about four years. So I opened the Kensington store and then I did a second store in Yorkville within a year, like a year later, along with Peach Berserk. So that was Kingi Carpenter is another Toronto designer. And I had worked for her when I started and she does silkscreen designs on clothing and stuff. We, first I started out working for her and we became friends and it was a great
What do you call it? Like a peek into what it takes to have a business, to run a store, et cetera. And a lot of it scared me actually. I was like, this is expensive and there's a lot to worry about. And, you know, there's hydro bills and all those things, but thinking, you know, seeing her model and seeing that she was able to do it, I thought, well, if she can do it, I can do it. So we were friends and she had her store on Queen street. And I had my store on Kensington and we decided to open a second store together in Yorkville. And we called it Peachy Fresh.
So was half and half, half her stuff and half mine. But no surprise, we were spread very thin with having the second store that we were running. So we sort of thought like, how can we make this work where it's not so much work and expense for us? And we thought, we considered things like approaching, we knew a lot of designers. So we thought, what if we got like a third business partner or whatever?
But somewhere along the line, we kind of came up with this idea of, I don't know, we kind of, we're calling it junior business partners or roommates at the time, but what it evolved into was like a collectively run store where designers could join us and work one day a week in the store and pay a portion of the rent. So we kind of developed, I remember the first designer who moved in, she had a glass case from Ikea and we were like, okay, great, let's put it at the end of the cash desk. And I think we charged her a hundred dollars a month rent.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
And she worked on Tuesdays and it was just like, my God, like one day we don't have to worry about. And I remember handing her over the key and going, good luck, call me if you have any problems. And over time, as more and more of these people joined and so on, it became more of an official thing where it was like, this is now, you know, we started calling it a collective and it became this, you know, there were seven designers and seven days of the week were covered and it was like, this works. So that was kind of the model that I took to Queen Street when I opened Fresh Collective.
Glynis Tao
Okay, so what was the retail landscape like in Toronto when you first started and how did you stand out in such a competitive market?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Well, it's so funny I would say it was a hundred times less competitive than now. It was just such a different time. Like this was pre internet pre you know digital photography social media all that stuff. So how did I stand out? I guess what was great is that I had built up a clientele. So because I had done those three and a half years of doing street markets and the one of a kind show. And I did those still when I had the store too, because those were great outreach. But I do remember like the first couple of days after I opened the store, I started to feel panicked because it was not just people who didn't just flow into your store and spend money. It's like nerve wracking when you open a store.
So I literally went out and did posters. I remember going to Kinko's and photocopying posters and put them all over Kensington market. And I'm like, Fresh Baked Goods has a new store in Kensington. And I, you know, it was like that. It was like old fashioned, you know, getting the word out. But I also had collected up phone numbers because that's how we did things. That's how Gen X did things in those days. So I had had phone numbers of people who had ordered sweaters or different things or just wanted to be alerted when there were sales or whatever. When I opened the store, I spent days calling people going, hi, I just wanted to let you know that I've opened a store and you know, blah, blah, blah, and gave them the address and everything. And then we'd also use that phone list for sales and things too.
Glynis Tao
That was all the old school techniques.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Yeah, without the internet at that time, you have to be creative in other ways. It's kind of mind boggling. And I wish, you know, I had some of my early brochures. I wish I had them like right available because they just look hilarious now. But I would literally take pictures with a film camera, develop them at their drugstore like we did in those days, cut them out with scissors and glue them to a piece of paper to make your brochure. And we did have Kinkos. There was color photocopying. So I would take them to Kinkos and photocopy them and then give those out. You know, it's like wild.
Glynis Tao
Mm-hmm. Yeah, and I think I must have picked up one of your brochures or postcards because I saw that post that you made recently. This really brings back memories now.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Yeah, I guess also now that you're mentioning that catalog, I might have it here. Am I going to be lucky enough? Let's see. I think another thing that worked out really well by accident, like you asked, was this all part of a master plan? No, not at all. I knew nothing about business. I didn't even know how to get a job. So I was a fine arts major. I'd studied photography and I moved to Toronto because I went to school in Montreal. I moved to Toronto and I'm like, I had no real intention of like, I'm going to start a job and, you know, start a business in fashion because it was so insane. Like how would I do that? But I had been making things and selling them as a teenager. I had a bikini business in high school and I made jewelry and stuff like that. So it was, I kind of had this like, you can make things and sell them kind of mentality. But another thing that really stood out was the knitting queen.
So that's the cover of the catalog. This is a catalog that fell apart, sadly. So there you can see some of the styles and stuff. But I did this kind of shtick of like, I'm Laura Jean the knitting queen. So you can see I've got a yarn wig and I'm wearing a crown. And then I called the assistants who worked in my shop, and who helped with the production, I called them knitting princesses. And that knitting queen thing became so sticky, like years after I stopped knitting, people would be like, wait, aren't you Laura Jean the knitting queen?
So I think that's you know, I was unexpectedly getting these lessons in business in terms of branding and in terms of making yourself stand out and in terms, yeah, another thing. Now you're making me realize how much that made me stand out. Another thing I did was this at the back of the catalog and I made handmade buttons. So my buttons were shaped like a cat face or a flower or like all of these different things that made it really unique. And in my shop, you could even pick out, I had those little drawers where you store nails and things. I had buttons where people could pick out their buttons. And so that became a sales lesson of mine where I would see someone trying on a sweater and if I told them about the buttons at the right moment, their decision would switch from, should I get this sweater to, which buttons should I pick? So I realized that was another thing that ended up being like, this makes it really unique. And suddenly they're fishing through, trying to find all the blue cats that are gonna make their sweater look perfect.
Or we had letter buttons so they could get their name. So yeah, even though it was a totally different time, the basics still apply. It's the exact same thing of like making your business unique, your unique value proposition, your branding that stands out, that's catchy, that makes people excited. All of that stuff, it's all the same.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, yeah. I think that really is what made you different, unique, and made you stand out at the time because I still remember that show up and those colorful sweaters and it just felt, it was different at the time. It was like, you know, all kind of like the sort of more darker, subdued type of looking things that were out there, but yours just really had color, you know.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
And you you've hit on something when you said what's the state of the fashion industry in general, is that I did notice it creeping in over the years that there was a, when I started, I feel like it was a real, what do call it, like antidote, I guess, to sort of the normal boring mainstream stuff that was out there. But bit by bit, fast fashion came in. So we're talking about the mid-90s when I started, which some people watching this will be like, not even born yet or in kindergarten or something.
But so it's like a really long span of time. And in that time, something happened with like retail laws where more and more, you know, American stores or international stores could come in. So H&M, Old Navy, Zara, like those were all things that didn't exist back in the nineties when I started. I don't know exactly what year they came in, but over the 2000s, it just became more and more and more availability of fast fashion, guess like riskier moves like fast fashion allowed the fashion that was out there to be more different and to be more, you know, I remember when I would start seeing when I first started hearing about H&M and I'd see someone in dress, I'd be like, that's a cute dress thinking that it had to be a vintage find because it was so unique looking. And they'd be like, oh, I got it for like $39 at H&M. And I'd be like, what, what is this H&M place? So I feel like that was one major shift that happened where it was like, then you could get cute things or bright colored things or different looking things more easily. And then that just became more more and more and more.
Glynis Tao
And that just kind of eventually flooded the market with just so much stuff and how we ended up where we are right now. Over consumption, over production. But that's another conversation for another day. But let me just go back to you were running multiple stores, not a small feat. What were some of the biggest operational or financial challenges that you faced during that time?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Well, it's hard to even be able to fit them all into this podcast, but no surprise, the biggest one was cash flow. So Q1 is brutal in retail. So January, February, March should be the time of just hoping that we can get through till whatever comes after March, April and May.
May was typically a good month. Like May and December were the good months for, you know, spring shopping and Christmas. But then weather always became a problem. So I remember one year I was sitting there, like looking at the sales, looking at the numbers and thinking, we have to have a really good Christmas this year. And I'm thinking, okay, well, as long as there isn't like, you know, some crazy ice storm or whatever, it should be fine. We've got two weekends to go. And of course, before Christmas. So there was always that feeling of like, and of course that was the year that there was a gigantic ice storm and power went out and everybody was stranded everywhere. You know, so it was just a total wash. Like both of the weekends were horrible before Christmas and you know, the whole nine yards. So that, I guess like the biggest challenge of retail is the high rent and high expenses. So when I had the collective model, which was what I started on, the advantage was, you know, that it kind of had this steady cushion of keeping the staffing managed and the rent managed.
But there were other problems with that, of course, where it was like dealing with designers like dropping out or dealing with just the whole thing or even planning product was another thing that became sticky is that we could end up with a whole store full of, let's say, just brown skirts or whatever, or whatever the trend was that year and nothing to go with them necessarily, or just kind of nothing, like no variety. So the limitations of the sort of collective model, what do you say? It's like at a certain point, I don't even remember how many years I operated with that model, probably 10-ish in terms of fresh collective, like the fresh collective brand. But then I started sort of phasing that out and introducing more where we bought clothes. So we started carrying lines like yoga jeans or different Canadian lines, Matt & Nat bags, and then another bag line which I forgot the name, Pixie Mood.
So we started bringing in different products so we could control more the inventory and the selection and really make better customer service, like a better and consistent customer service experience for the customers. So I guess it was kind of like that collective model, I would say was really necessary to get started. And it was great and it was fun and it had all kinds of great things, but we hit limitations and it drove me crazy to have customers come in wanting things that we just didn't have or couldn't make available due to that model. So then that became a shift of like hiring more professional retail managers and putting in systems and buying stock and continuing some consignment, some different models with different people, but just kind of mixing it up more.
Glynis Tao
So maybe to go with that question, what worked for you, would you say, what really helped you to grow, scale that business and be able to have this longevity for over 20 years in retail? It's not easy, right?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
It's not.
Glynis Tao
Yeah. Maybe what you could tell us is sort of.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Yeah I say like one particular thing worked because I feel like there are so many things worked at the time. You know, like the collective model worked to get it started and got me connected with all these designers and brought a whole bunch of energy and you know, all that stuff. So that worked amazingly. I guess nothing works perfectly, right? And then, but what really allowed it to grow was putting systems in and really for me, it was a big shift between sort of my small business and a company. And so when the systems, and that took like a long time, you know, building those systems and documenting them and training people on them and having them really just flow throughout the whole business. But it allowed me to not be the bottleneck anymore.
So people didn't have to come to me and be like, prior to that, my small business, everything lived in my head. So it was like, can we buy this fabric for the, you know, for the clothing line? Sure. Can we do, you know, we need a new stapler for Kensington. Okay, I'll add it to my list or go buy one. I've approved it or whatever. It just was way, it was all me. And I, of course at the time, didn't really know how to do and how to make it anything else.
But then I read the book, the E-Myth, the E-Myth Revisited, subtitled Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What to Do About It. And that book talks about really building your small business into a company. Like it described me perfectly as the sort of frantic business owner who was running around doing everything. If I got hit by a bus, the business was gone. The step of adding the systems and creating all of that stuff, including an org chart, different positions, we really created a company flow to it where people had their jobs and it was understood what they could make decisions on or not. We had meetings to review the things, you know, all that stuff. So that made it run a lot smoother. If there was one thing that made a difference, that made a difference. I couldn't have got to a seven figure business without that.
Glynis Tao
Okay. And so did you have help with, you know, putting the system together or was it just sort of this moment after you read the book, the E-Myth, and then you got the idea to like, my gosh, you know, I can't be doing everything myself. I'm going to have to put a system in place. Like, did you hire anybody, like a consultant or anybody to help you with that?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Yep, I did, actually, well, after I read the E-Myth book, then I did hire a coach from E-Myth worldwide, like they have a program. So I did that for about six months and I cried most of the time through it because I was like, I think I was 17 years into my business at that point. And I just felt like, God, I've been doing things so chaotically and I could have, I could have like, there was a better way and I just didn't know about it.
And so it really just felt like, my God, this sort of, yeah, just, guess regret that I didn't do it sooner. So then I really understood the value of coaching and expertise and so on. And so over time I've hired different coaches for different reasons or different, or I take a course on like, you know, marketing or, know, whatever. I'm always looking to build something that's like, whether it's self-improvement for myself to be a better entrepreneur, or it's something to build into the business or whatever. There's just kind of always room for expert help, basically. I just saw the difference of like, can struggle through things on my own, or I can hire someone who knows how to do this. And then I know how to do it. It's just night and day.
Glynis Tao
Saves you a whole lot of time and headaches in the end, right? So looking back, is there one lesson from retail ownership that you think that every entrepreneur should hear or know about?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Well, I don't know if there's one exactly. Since we're talking about systems, I would definitely say systems. And I would definitely say remaining flexible, like always being able to, you know, deal with the shifting circumstances, whatever that is, if the industry is changing or weather or any of those things. I think a big misconception about retail is that you just sit in the store and wait for customers to come. And it's just not that at all.
The key to succeeding is being constantly busy and working on making sure those customers come in. So whether it's while you're there, you're sending out emails to your customer base and letting them know their favorite brand just came in or whatever, right? You just have to figure out how to make the most of your time and drive the business forward. You just cannot be passive.
Glynis Tao
Okay. So from that, I got the importance of these three things, having systems in place, being flexible, having flexibility to pivot or evolve depending on what is happening in the economic or political landscape. And then also being able to stay top of mind to your customers and communicating with them through various channels, emails, I guess.
So let's just talk about your pivot to coaching now. What inspired you to transition from having a retail store to being a fashion or a business coach now?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
I feel like it's funny because I resisted the business part in the early days and I felt like I'm not a business person. I just want to do my creative stuff. And I would dream. I'm sure every, every creative person dreams about somebody like a business minded person who's just going to take control of the business side. And then you can just do your creative fun stuff or whatever. So that was sort of my dream for a long time that some businessy person would rescue me. And all that time I was learning about business because I had to to survive.
Also very early on, I got into a women's entrepreneurship program, which was really helpful too. So like, yeah, for sure over time, it was like always learning, always trying to find some new, you know, new stuff to, you know, roll into the business and make it stronger. Okay, so pre pandemic 2019, I actually had five brick and mortar business locations. So I had three locations of my fashion boutiques. And then I had the daycare, which was a co-ownership with the woman who founded it. And I got into that because my son was, just very briefly, I got into that because my son was one of the first clients there, one of the first kids. The woman who started it started it for her own kids. And then she was running it as a side project because she had a full-time job. She was finding it hard to get it up and going. And I was one of the parents. So I was like, she was talking, you know, we got to know each other and stuff. And she was like, yeah, I'm really struggling, blah, blah. And I'm like, I think I could help you.
So we talked about it and I became her partner. So we just did, we did it 50-50 and I took everything I had learned from, you know, retail stores and branding and fashion business, all that stuff, and poured it into the daycare. That was a really good lesson in realizing how transferable the skills are. And I kind of got, at that moment, I kind of got, this is my trade. Like I have a trade where I know how businesses are structured, small businesses, and I know the personalities and I know the pitfalls.
And I started to really kind of look at where I can guide people. And I would get calls from people going like, I love your stores. You know, can you, I want to open something like that somewhere, you know, wherever, San Francisco, Nova Scotia, like these different people would reach out to me. And I remember the first time I said, actually, yes, I can help you. Definitely. I do, I do that, you know, as a thing or whatever. Obviously I worded it better, but I said, you know, and I charge $85 an hour. And she goes, that's fine.
And at that time I just thought, this is insane. I might've said I charge $2 million now, you know? I just couldn't believe what she was like, that's fine. And so I met with her and she just picked my brain. I gave her advice, whatever. Like it wasn't any kind of formal coaching situation, but I was like, I'm getting paid for this. And I really had a love for, know, anytime one of my friends or whatever would be like thinking of opening a business, I'd be all over them like, I'll help you.
I just loved it. I love teaching. I love passing on what I know. I loved just the whole thing. I would get so excited. And I was doing that a lot with the designers who were joining me because I wanted them to stick around and pay their rent and continue in that collective concept. If their stuff wasn't selling, they would just be like, you know, I'm going to drop out and they'd give their one month's notice and leave.
Two things combined, I just loved it. I love giving advice. I love meddling in other people's business. And so it was really fun for me to say, I think if you made some smaller earrings or you had something at a different price point, just all of the different kinds of strategy for them of product development, branding, know, everything. So then I started, so then I kind of made it an official part of the stores where I had monthly meetings and then I had one-on-one business coaching sessions with them. So that started around like early 2000s. And I was doing it as part of the Fresh Collective package. If you join us, you get this sort of, so it kind of became like a little bit of an incubator, like an incubator for fashion designer entrepreneurs, I guess you could say, in a retail environment.
So I don't remember what year it was I started expanding beyond that. But, you know, a good 10, 13 years ago or something, I was like I think I could just help others, I had helped other kinds of businesses through my friends or, you know, just ad hoc, whatever. But to make it official and be like, I'm hanging out a shingle, this is it, I'm a business coach now. And I put it out there and started networking and just building up a clientele and hosting events and talking to people. And I had it in the back of my mind that it was like, this is the next thing for me because retail is like seven days a week, you know?
It was great when I was in my twenties and thirties, but for now going into the future, I want less overhead. I want to not worry about, you know, the window smashing in the middle of the night at the store. Like all of that stuff. It's just, you know, this is such a freer and easier kind of thing. So back to 2019, I had five brick and mortar businesses, three boutiques, the daycare, and another business that was in startup mode, which was going to be like a wellness place like with, you know, different practitioners and whatever. And it all just went kaboom.
In 2020, well, we lost the lease on the daycare and can't just move a daycare. And then with Fresh Collective just kind of honestly in a decline, it was just 2017 was a good year. 2018 was like 2019 was like, and I was like 2020 has to be a turnaround year or I'm out. And we all know what happened to 2020. So I just pulled the plug in like, I'm not saying I just pulled the plug. It was stressful. It was hard emotionally, but you know, had everything, all five places were closed. And I remember picking things out of my Google calendar going like that life is over. Like all of these pre-scheduled events that I had that were all about living that workaholic lifestyle just disappeared from my calendar. And I'm like, wow, now what do I create? So that's kind of what brought me here.
Glynis Tao
Yeah. Wow. Thank you for sharing that. And yeah, we all know what happened in 2020 and we just want to forget about it. Put all of that behind us as if it never happened. It had affected so many businesses and some, you know, rose from it and just thrived and came out stronger. And unfortunately, yeah, we also lost some businesses along the way which was really sad and unfortunate. And yeah, being at retail is like just hearing the stories on the news of like this retailer closing down, that retail closing down.
It's really heartbreaking. so, but fortunate for you that with the two decades of experience that you have and you built a name for yourself and you know, you mentioned that people were coming to you asking for advice and we're just like, yeah, they'll pay you $85 an hour, no problem. You could have charged more, but yeah, that must've been so validating and it's been like that, I guess, and helped you to transition to coaching now, which is great. And I think it's, it kind of almost like our two stories just kind of have very similar stories and our paths. You know, how I went from a clothing brand having a product-based business to now doing digital marketing, being a service provider now, and, you know, using my knowledge and expertise that I have to help people with that. And so it sounds like, you know, how you have that passion to help others.
Many fashion entrepreneurs dream of scaling. What key decisions or strategies allowed you to grow your fashion retail business to seven figures.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
I mean, I feel like it's the same. It's the same that we talked about with the systems. You know, really, it's, it's something systems are something I resisted to, like when I first heard about them, because of course, I went into having my own business, because I'm like, I need to be a free butterfly, you know, I need to do my fun, cute things. And so I wanted my life to be fun and cute.
But there was this, you know, the hard side of running a business that was so, like, I don't want to say it was bad or anything, but it was just so chaotic. It was just not a business that, you know, was set up by a person in their twenties who knew nothing about business. And so my perception of what business was, like business, was, you know, that it was a, I'm thinking of like American Psycho, like Christian Bale in American Psycho, like that stereotype or Wall Street or these movies that like these eighties movies, like late eighties when it was really the culture was like, yuppies and get ahead and make money and like greed is good or whatever, like all that stuff. So I feel like that was kind of there on me because it was only a few years later. And that was sort of my impression of what business was. It was cutthroat. It was unethical. It was, you mean like all that stuff. Well, there I am thinking like, I don't want anything to do with that stuff. I just want to make my own cute stuff and sell it.
But I realized that, and I also thought it was very male, like a male thing. When I pictured a business, a smart business person, I pictured a man in a suit or with a briefcase or whatever, like just stuff that didn't even enter my world. There was a shift where when, guess, no, bit by bit I started to have successes, of course, as we do. And I started to feel like I'm getting good at this business thing. Like I think I'm getting good at this.
And so of course that gave me confidence to continue and learn more and try new things and whatever. There was, shoot, I lost my train of thought. I know what it was. This was the decision shift that really changed for me. Cause I had this image, you I went to school for fine arts and whatever, and I'm a, it was a sensitive, I'm still a sensitive person, but I've got a lot of a tougher skin now, but I was, I thought I was sort of like a wimpy sensitive person, you know, like just not cut out for this business stuff and whatever.
And there was a moment where I thought, what if I shifted my creativity to the business? Like, what if I treated the business as an art and something that could, you know, move people and connect with people and make a difference for people and really kind of put that same creative energy into driving sales and making the experience amazing for customers and doing all those things. And that really helped me shift and see that it was something I was capable of, that it was valuable, that it could be done in a way that wasn't ruthless and cutthroat and all those things. And so that really helped me to make it my own. And different things happened along the way, like for whatever reason I would, I mean, got, another thing was media in those days getting, you'd send out press releases because that would be a way to amplify your business. So I was in the Toronto Star and I was getting known for what I was doing and stuff, I would often get asked to do things about being an entrepreneur, know, different things like that.
I just remembered this, you probably don't even know this. I just, I've got my little box of pictures because I've been going through. So I co-hosted a TV show, I found this little framed picture in all my stuff. In the mid 90s, I think it was maybe 96, it was on TVO, TV Ontario, like, I guess it's kind of like PBS or something, but it was an educational show on how to have a business and run it. And it was co-hosted with Kingi Carpenter from Peach Berserk. So that was one of our wacky girl boss things we did together. And yeah, so we hosted the show and we went and interviewed people about different business models and what's working for them and blah, blah, blah.
So yeah, mean, all of that stuff kind of added up where it was like, I think I'm kind of getting good at this business thing.
Glynis Tao
I feel like you guys are just sort of ahead of this curve. I feel people are opening up a little bit more and looking to collaborate. They're more open to the idea of collaboration, sharing, but I really felt that back then in the 90s, early 2000s, everything was kind of quite really close, and people didn't want to share their trade secrets.
It seems just so serious or something. And then I felt like the two of you, I could see how you guys totally hit it off when you met because Kingi's brand is just so colorful, you know, yours as well. And these two sort of young entrepreneurs coming out with all this colorful hair and kind of like, hey, we're talking business and everything. It's just really, it's probably stood out. Yeah. Amongst like, and then you guys are, yeah, really, I think, sort of ahead of what was actually going on, you know, in that.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Well, think also we were just, none of this was strategic decisions of like, oh, we should do a collaboration. was like, we were broke and it was just way more fun to do things together. So collaborations were just kind of natural and her store was the first store I started selling my sweaters at. You know, I remember I liked that I brought in five and then I'd phone her every day on the landline, cause that's how we communicated in those days. I'm like, did you sell yet?
And finally, one day she called me like three days into it or whatever, and she was like, the green and purple one, so. So I mean, for me, it was definitely just the feeling of, you know, girl, girl bossing together. And so it was just more fun to do things together and stuff. And I guess maybe you don't know about this either, but when I, so when I first arrived in Toronto, I took her silkscreen workshop. That was how I got like infiltrated her world. And I just loved it. I was like, this is amazing. I was, I still screened my own stuff and whatever. But then, her place is still like this. If anybody wants to go hang out at Kingi’s place, she just had it. We called it the cult because everybody just floated there. So everybody in our little gang would show up and we'd go out for beers that night or whatever. And you know, was just this casual thing where what, whatever we'd either work for free in our spare time or work on our own projects or just hang out or whatever and it was just fun.
But so it was yes, the collaboration part. So it was just natural. It was like a natural collaboration to be, you know, figuring out things to do together or whatever, because we were right there and we had no money. So we just had to come up with creative ideas and do them. So we would send out press releases together and we were on City Line and our clothes went together really well. So that was another win where it went like a silkscreen dress of hers and then a cute little cardigan of mine over and it was amazing. But yeah, it really, that ended up being such a strong part of how I like to do business because it's just way more fun to do it with people you like and have fun doing it and stuff. So my first Toronto business, even before I started the sweaters, I did Shrinky Dink earrings based on Kingi's silkscreen designs. Did you know about that?
Glynis Tao
I love those. Yes, I think I had a little package of Smurfs ones. Yeah, color them and then you cut them out and you put them in the oven and then they shrink into this kind of hard plastic. You got it. Yeah, turn into earrings or whatever.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
So that's what my buttons were made out of. That was sort of my secret sauce with the sweaters to have the custom made buttons all made out of Shrinky Dink. And then I did like a resin coating. I did so much product testing to get them durable and machine washable and everything. But prior to that, the Shrinky Dink, when I was working at Kingi's and I was really new there, I'd been there like a month or whatever. And I'm thinking it'd be so cool if we could do earrings or other accessories with her designs on them. And it just was like this flashback of doing Shrinky Dink, probably with Smurfs on it back in the 80s with my friend and her little sisters. And I was like, I wonder if that stuff still exists.
And I went to Lewiscraft on my bike and got some and did prototypes and brought them to her and said, I got really nervous when I showed them. So I'm like 22. And I'm like, oh, I was thinking we could make some jewelry with your prints. And then I pulled out my little prototypes. And she was like, oh my God. And I thought for a second that she was gonna go, these are my designs, how dare you? But she was like, these are amazing. I can't believe I'm seeing my drawing, she had little cocktail glasses and little like glamour gals and all these cute things. And she was like, I can't believe I'm seeing this. So that was my first thing and I made jewelry for her business for I don't know how like 10 years or something. So it's great. You just don't ever know, right? You get some ideas and then yeah, do it.
Glynis Tao
Absolutely. I think you were just kind of following your passion and you just had that in you and you're just doing what you loved, right? And having fun along the way and it so happened to be a business.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Yeah, I often will follow a curiosity. Like it becomes sort of an obsession where it's like, hmm, I wonder if I could make this out of that. And yeah, some of them go in the garbage. Some of them are bad prototypes and they never go anywhere. And some of them evolve into a business that lasts for decades.
Glynis Tao
So for someone who's listening today and is running a fashion brand or retail store, boutique, it wants to grow, where should they start?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Well, that's a tough question to answer because it's like, I don't know where they're at. You know what I mean? If they're starting from scratch, I can answer that. But if they're already running a business, then that's a little bit of a tricky one because you've got to see what's kind of where the gap is.
If you're starting out, in fact, I started, I do have a story for you. Earlier I said, I don't think I have a story like that. I have a really great success story. This is a client who was not in fashion at all, but like a service provider. So let's, don't want to give more identifying details because it might identify her or whatever. And I'm always protective of my client's privacy, of course. But so she signed up for a six month package with me. And the first thing I said was market research. I said, you have to figure out who you're serving and what their needs are, what keeps them up at night, what words they're using, everything.
And she went for it and she came back with all this information and we started building from there. So we were like, okay, so looking at these different types of people, which ones do you think are the best to, you know, go like treat as a target market, et cetera. And then from there we built and we used the words that they said in there in the market research to start creating the marketing that was going to talk directly to them. So it was things like overwhelmed and don't know where to start. Perfect. That's what we heard on those calls.
So it's just what I love about it. What I love about hindsight, like for me hindsight is 2020. I never did any market research. Are you kidding? In fact, I thought I knew better. I wanted to make the cute things that I thought were great. And then my first market research was realizing that I'm in my 20s. I'm not now in my 20s, but at the time I was in my 20s, the sweaters that I wanted to make were really bright, really cropped, really wild, know, bright. The first one that sold was lime green and purple stripes and it was cropped.
But I did start to realize that the women who are gonna spend money on this are not me. They're not, I'm broke. They're the version of me that went into a corporate job and makes money and they've been at it for 10 years and they want funky stuff to express their creativity and they've got the money to spend on it. So I had to shift my mindset and start learning what these women in there are probably in their mid thirties. What size are they? What do they like?
Do they want really short crop things? No, most of them don't. They want a sweater they can wear to work and it still looks cute. So that was my market research only dealing with why my stuff wasn't selling as well as I wanted it to.
But to love, nothing I love more than a client who comes to me from the beginning because we don't have to dismantle mistakes. We get to start fresh and start with market research, start figuring out what all of the good stuff. What are your competitors doing? What's going to make you stand out? Why are you different? Who are your clients? What's going on with them? How can you even start building a community of clients before, maybe before you even make one thing? Or if you've made a few prototypes, how can you get them out to the people to test them? So it's all about minimum viable product and doing things just smart and smooth, man. Smart and smooth. That's it's all about.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, okay, so I guess you would say your ideal client would be someone who's starting out and you are helping them from the very beginning to get the foundations in place and doing the things that you didn't even know about when you started your business.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Exactly, exactly. That I only learned about afterwards. Everything I learned after, like I was like, I guess that was, I remember we shifted the entire business model and everyone was freaking out and whatever. Then we learned after that, I was reading some article and I learned the term change management. And I'm like, change management would have been good here because we did it with no change. We didn't manage the change at all. We just made changes and freaked everyone out.
So yes, for me, my ideal client is someone, I go a lot on vibes. Obviously there are some businesses, if someone wants to start an airline, I'm not your coach, you know? But if you're like a service provider or a fashion maker, a jewelry designer, a photographer, and you want to set up the business structure and strategy and really pinpoint your ideal clients, it just gets me so excited because it's like, we just get the waste out of the way right away. We start from you know, start from square one and just build it all nice.
Yeah, a very ideal client for me is someone leaving corporate. Like someone, a woman in her mid thirties, let's say, who's leaving corporate, she's got a lot of skills and experience, she's ready to go for it. She's an action taker and she digs my vibe. That's pretty much my ideal client.
Glynis Tao
I just think that, you know, knowing who your ideal client is, is very important. No matter what stage of business you're in, I have some clients who have been in business for a number of years and still are not clear. Both their ideal customer, avatar, or buyer personas yet, they're still a little unclear. So I'm like, yeah, you got to go back and really think about this because it's important and it really affects everything that you do in your messaging and your marketing.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Mm-hmm. Yeah. And also, like, that's what I'll work on with people as well is I feel like that kind of work is hard to do in your own head. And it's hard to, it's, well, a lot. Let's just be honest. A lot of the work we do that has to do with sort of the visioning and creation of the business and whatever is very hard to do in your own head because you have no perspective on it. So for one thing, you're like dealing with all your failures. And so you're carrying that with you where we all have failures.
So when you work with an outside person, they can pull out the strengths and help you put aside the weaknesses that you're worried about, et cetera. And I can, like, when I work with a client, I'll help them define their ideal client. So, and it does take a while. Even in coaching, it took me ages and it'll change again because that's what happens as things change. Right. But I think an important part of understanding who your ideal client is, is also like who makes you the happiest and who has you perform at your best.
So for me, part of my focus on my ideal client being an action taker, being a, liking my vibe, as kind of vague as a description as that is, when I'm working with someone, it's like you and me chatting. It's like, you know, there's like a quickness to the way we talk and we're excited and there's like a high energy and stuff like that. And when I'm working with someone who's like that, it allows me to be like that. And then we get to get into this creative magic zone where we are creating magic together for their business, which is just wild and fun and where I want to be.
And I've worked with clients who aren't such a great fit and I can definitely help them and, you know, go through the steps that it takes to make a business. It's not like I dislike that or whatever. It's great, fine work and it's fun to help different kinds of people succeed. No problem. But I like the magic zone. I like it when I get to work with someone for a long period, like six months and we really get each other and I really get their personality and I'll start to go, I hear that imposter syndrome sneaking in or whatever, you know, like I know where they go to hide. I know where they think that they're, you know, gonna fail or whatever. And I get to just be with that and help them get through it. And it's just so fun and exciting for me.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, there's just so many benefits to working with somebody because, know, oftentimes if you're an entrepreneur or a solo entrepreneur, you're just kind of like left with your own thoughts and what you're saying to yourself, what's going on in your mind, but having that sort of outside perspective to help guide you and sort of like get you through some of the hurdles that you have. And oftentimes, lot of the times actually it's yourself that's holding yourself back and you're like you don't want to do certain things because it makes you feel uncomfortable like that's what I find with myself I'm like I'm gonna avoid doing you know I gotta go do some PR here but let me go find do something else and I never end up doing it.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
It's 100%. It's funny, somebody once was talking to me about my business or whatever. She was like, three stores and whatever. And she goes, wow, you must have had to really fight to get where you are. Which, like, honestly, just struck me kind of odd to begin with was like, fight. But my first thought was only myself, only myself did I have to fight because I had so many thoughts like selling like in the early days, you know, 95 or whatever I would still work at Kingi's part-time. I think I worked two days a week or whatever. And so I'd be silk screening fabric and she'd be like, those people are looking at your sweaters. And I'd be like, well, I don't want to talk to them. Of course she wants the artist, the designer, the maker to go talk to the customers and tell them why it's special. And they're going to be like, we got to meet the designer. And I'm just thinking like, I can't even deal with this. What am I going to say to those people? And so I would just make her do it. But she started forcing me to go talk to people because it was like, you got to learn to sell or you're not going to succeed in business.
And now, my God, am I good at selling? It's just so natural. You know, it was all my hangups. It was, I had hangups about selling that weren't true. All selling is, is, you know, relationships and conversation and pointing out the, you know, it's, it's just not what I thought it was. It's not pushing crap on people they don't want. It's not that at all. It's just being friendly and great and going, yes, the purple is awesome. Why don't you try the pink one too? Look at this. And then when the time is right.
You can also change the buttons. Hmm. You want me to change the buttons for you? It just takes a few minutes to sew them on. And they're like, buttons.
Glynis Tao
There you go. See you're natural, but I guess you took you a while. Amazing. Okay, so before we go, I guess I just want to ask you one last question. If you had to boil it down to one or two pieces of advice that you would want to give to an aspiring fashion entrepreneur in 2025, what would it be?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
I guess I would say it's fresh in my mind, but it is a huge piece of it is to get out of your own way. You know, get over your fears, get over your hangups, get help if you need it. It's also, it's a thing like running a business is a separate thing as is being a dentist and knowing how to fill a cavity or being a veterinarian or an accountant or whatever. There's something about being in business that's sort of presented or being an entrepreneur that's sort of presented as easy.
Like anyone can start a business. It's so fantastic. And yeah, it is great and anybody can start a business, but don't expect it to be easy, I guess. Expect it to challenge your sense of yourself. I think that would be the most important thing. If you can deal with yourself and your blocks and hangups, then you can learn all the rest of the stuff. You just have to be able to be ready to embark on the journey.
Glynis Tao
Do you have anything you'd like to share with the audience or perhaps anything that you are working on currently?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Yeah, I have lots of things I'm working on. I know it would be smarter from a business perspective to focus on one thing, but I'm of course brewing up tons of things. But I think most relevant to this audience would be I host two events a month for free that help entrepreneurs. So the first one is the Ladies Creative Collaboration Society virtual meetup. And that's the second Thursday of each month at noon Toronto time. And then the other one is Business Power Hour.
And so that's really incredible. They're both really incredible. The virtual meetup, you need to meet people. So that's a great one for entrepreneurs starting out, growing, whatever. The second one is business power hour, which is all about strategy. So it's a live Q and A free where people can show up and say, like, I'm trying to figure out this problem in my business that's got me stuck. My marketing just doesn't seem to be working. We talk it through and they get live coaching in the moment.
A recent one, I think it was the June one, I really liked this quote there, right at the end I was like, well, we were finishing up. And one of the guests was like, what'd she say? She's like, that's great, I gotta get going, because I've got so much to do this afternoon now, because she had had so many breakthroughs of things she was not able to figure out in her business. So she was like, I gotta get to work. I always promise people will leave business power hour unstuck, inspired, and ready for action in your business.
So I really invite people to come out to Business Power Hour. It's a taste of coaching too. So it's a great chance to see what coaching could offer you in a mini sort of free sample kind of way.
Glynis Tao
That's great. That sounds amazing. Where can people find you if they want to get in touch with you?
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Well, they can always go to my website, which is laura-jean.ca and that's my coaching website. And if you have any questions or what, people can just contact me. There's a form there and yeah, that would be fantastic.
Glynis Tao
Thank you, Laura-Jean, for sharing your story with us. It's been so inspiring to hear how you've built multiple purpose-driven businesses with heart, creativity, and a deep commitment to helping others succeed.
Laura-Jean Bernhardson
Well, thanks for having me. It's been so great. Really fun chatting.