Exploring Life & Business with Chinwe Oparaji of The SMILE Market

Today we’d like to introduce you to Chinwe Oparaji

Hi Chinwe, can you start by introducing yourself? We’d love to learn more about how you got to where you are today?
So The SMILE Market at its inception was my Etsy shop; I sold handmade greeting cards. When I got to university, however, I noticed this common anxiety makers have about selling their work, particularly at in-person events: there may not be enough people at the event, the audience may not like your craft, you could lose money… artists are faced with so much uncertainty to sell their work, I believe unnecessarily so. This is oftentimes a hindrance from even attempting to do something further with their craft.

I studied Computer Science & Graphic Design in university, and since then I’ve been using both to create a space where makers can be assured if an event that they pay for will be worth it when they go.

Lastly as I have grown deeper in my Catholic faith, I have noticed the lack of spaces where art can live up to its divine mission. That’s why our current mission at The SMILE Market is not only to support artists and their craftsmanship, but also to encourage a culture of virtue.

I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
Haha, no; not at al has it been a smooth road.

The “how” in our mission to support artists has been changing over time. For instance, we used to host our own popup craft market events and an online boutique store for some time before pivoting—after much research, as well as talking to our community (literally, I would do group zoom calls with strangers and ask people entering stores if they’d be willing to give feedback on our ideas), we realized that it’s more important for artists to get the most value from the few markets they choose, rather than add more options to the already saturated market scene. That’s what we’re currently working on, a platform that actually helps market hosts and the artists that attend their events get the data they need to make better events for all participating.

Besides this, making decisions to support virtue and faith aspect of the business has led to a lot of rejection from potential partners. Some simply see on our website mention of a specific religion and no longer wish to work with us. This can be expected in our culture today, but which is all the more important for us to build our product in a way to support any artist, but on the foundation of our Faith.

Great, so let’s talk business. Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
The SMILE Market is an alternative marketplace, building an online service for creatives to get recommendations, reviews, and organized data about the art markets where their work will most likely sell, based on their specific craft. We also work with to event hosts to curate artists to make smaller, yet successful events.

Our founder is a creative, spending years making and selling prints as well as going to countless art, craft, and farmer’s markets across the US. She is very motivated to support artists as she is one herself, and relations with our partners have been nothing short or useful and enjoyable!

This application is not open to the general public yet, but we are looking for artists and market hosts to join fill our waitlist for the initial release, where they work closely with us (and get some extra TSM perks as well)!

Are there any important lessons you’ve learned that you can share with us?
1. Be true to yourself and your values; even if it doesn’t make sense at first, it’s better to voice your goals, get feedback, and reiterate.
2. Diligence is key. To be cliche, it’s a marathon not a sprint.
3. The people that you work most intimately with should be aligned with you and your values.

Pricing:

• TBD for pricing but onboarding 10 artists and market hosts to be a part of our BETA release, please email us for more info if you are interested.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://thesmilemarket.co
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thesmilemarket/

Image Credits
Julia Gridley
Caden Jazdzyk