How an Etsy seller turned her sewing side hustle into a full-fledged company, hired 7 employees, opened a store, and grew sales by 30% in 2020

• Heather Parker learned to sew in 2007, and began sewing bow ties for her foster dogs to help them get noticed at adoption events.
• In 2010, a friend told her about Etsy and suggested she sell her pet accessories on the platform for handmade goods.
• A decade later, Parker has grown her company from a side hustle to a company called Crew Lala that employs 7 people and has its own brick and mortar store in Charleston, South Carolina.
• Parker told Business Insider how she grew Crew Lala and offered insights on how to use the Etsy platform to launch your business idea.

Heather Parker was on a walk with her husband and foster dog before heading to her corporate job one morning in 2010.

“I said, ‘You know, I just really don’t feel very fulfilled with what I’m doing. I feel like there’s something out there that would bring me more passion,'” Parker recalled

Parker had started sewing a couple of years before that as a hobby, but she didn’t know it could be anything more than that. She was also a regular foster parent for rescue dogs, and had recently combined her two passions: she sewed bow ties for her foster dogs ahead of adoption events to get them noticed and adopted more quickly – and it worked.