Today we’d like to introduce you to Rosalynne Love.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Rosalynne. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
I was blessed to have an idyllic childhood growing up – we lived in southern California and as a homeschooler living in a place that had just about everything within a few hours’ drive, I got to experience many things first hand. My parents have always been avid travelers, so whenever we were learning about something in history, I wouldn’t just read about it, I would visit it or experience it on some level. If for some reason it was too far or expensive to do, then I would hear my parents sharing their knowledge of such a place or thing. My dad was a Pastor and we group up with people from all walks of life in our home – from missionaries to broken families, to friends visiting for the weekend. Hearing and living life with so many different people, really gave me a broad view. I truly felt like the world was my oyster!
So fast forward, I graduated high school early and studied abroad in France. I spent a semester learning the language better and more about the culture. I came home from that experience convinced that I was meant to travel, learn more foreign languages and go live on the road exploring the world.
Well, God had different plans.
Long story short, I met my wonderful husband, Daniel and through his precious persistence, I married him and moved to Louisiana. I transferred to his University, where the French program wasn’t exactly thriving. Feeling troubled as to what was next in my story and thanks to a lot of friends speaking into my life, I felt called to change majors and switch to graphic design.
This decision significantly impacted the trajectory of my life. You see, if it wasn’t for the change of majors, I wouldn’t have accidentally started my company.
My business story really started during my senior year of design school, during an elective screen printing class. Our assignment was to design anything we wanted and then screen print (or silk screen) it on a t-shirt. At the time, I was just getting into hand lettering and I’ve always been an avid connoisseur of inspirational quotes, so I decided to letter the phrase, “Work Hard, Stay Humble” and print it in sparkly gold ink.
If you don’t know much about screen printing, then, I’ll just say it’s a very time consuming and tedious process. So, when my first print run came out and looked amazing, I was beyond excited! I was so enthused that I immediately posted an image on Instagram of the first few shirts, hot off the press. Not a few minutes later, my phone started blowing up with requests from friends and followers that wanted to purchase the shirt. I remember thinking to myself, “WHAT?! This is crazy!” I thought it was too good to be true – I couldn’t believe that people actually wanted to purchase something that I had made! I talked to my husband about it and his suggestion was, “Heck yes, let people buy the shirts. I’d love to recoup some of the costs of all these supplies.” I snapped a few more photos, posted them on Instagram and Etsy and unintentionally, my business was born.
At the time, I sold through everything I printed and so, I printed another round and then another. I figured while I was at it, I should come out with a whole line of lettered phrases and sell them as part of a Spring Collection. A local craft show was coming up, so I decided to apply for the show and sell my apparel in person there. During all of this, I had some friends pull together an entire spring-inspired photoshoot (it was very Free People-esque) to help really nail my branding aesthetic and make the apparel come to life. Everything happened so quickly, but it all felt like an absolute dream come true!
This whole time though, I was just doing this as part of a fun, side project. I had no idea or intentions of turning it into something more.
Fast forward a couple months to the end of my senior year: I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do after college, and what jobs I wanted to start applying for. With extremely limited options for designers in our area, and through lots of prayers, I felt that God called me to start my business full time. To be perfectly candid, this idea terrified me! I didn’t feel qualified, nor did I know anything about how to start or run a business. But something in my gut told me to go for it. After all, I was already basically doing it… so why couldn’t I continue pursuing this, but full time? So with lots of prayer and support from my sweet husband and friends, Rosalynne Love was officially born! Then, as they say, the rest is history.
Overall, has it been relatively smooth? If not, what were some of the struggles along the way?
Believe it or not, I think one of my favorite things about being a business owner is learning how to tackle the struggles I face. There are a lot of ups and downs, and many, many failures. Before I had a business, I thought the failure was something that was deafening – I would feel defined by my failure, and let it become a strong part of my identity. When you view failure in this way, it sticks with you and completely holds you back from your greatest potential.
However, over the years of being an entrepreneur, I now view failure differently. I find that failure is not this terrible trait that defines my character, but it’s a great learning tool to help refine my knowledge and experience. Failure creates these moments that humble me and help me step back and ask questions. Basically, I’ve learned how to take my failure and use it to help me move forward. Hence the phrase, “fail forward.” So I think failure is such a great learning tool for not only business but also life.
Please tell us about Rosalynne Love.
Hello friends! I’m the creative entrepreneur behind Rosalynne Love. You can usually find me lettering something encouraging, designing new products to add to the shop, or screen printing apparel to wrap, ship and send off to your home. Usually, I’m doing all of this while drinking a delicious cup of black coffee or a lavender almond milk latte (I’m legit borderline obsessed)!
I am a currently pursuing how to make my shop as fair trade as possible. My apparel is ethically produced, lettered by hand, and screen printed with love. I believe that every day we have the opportunity to create change in the world. Purchasing apparel from my shop means you’re empowering a Southern, small-town couple to live their dream. You’re helping create jobs and change the industry standard to produce more ethically-made products; products locally made in the United States. You’re changing the lives of children around the world that we sponsor through this shop. Finally? You’re purchasing a t-shirt that will be one of the softest, most comfortable and flattering shirts you will ever own.
I’m so thankful to be a steward of this business, and the gifts and talents God has blessed me with. It is my hope that through my products and story, I can encourage you wherever you are in life, to know that you are worthy and able to pursue your passions and your calling!
If you had to go back in time and start over, would you have done anything differently?
As cliché as it might sound, I don’t believe in regrets. I think our experiences help shape and educate us to become more refined versions of ourselves.
However, if I had to choose a moment – I would say that I could have avoided some growing pains I had early on due to the lack of experience I had in business. You see, something unique in my story is that I didn’t have any professional work experience when I started my company. I just jumped straight into the entrepreneurial life straight out of college; while in college, actually. I think God knew that I needed to take that leap of faith to get my company going, but it definitely was a difficult way to start. I didn’t even understand basic things like taxes, calculating my return on investment or how to organize my time. I was working by myself, for myself, so I didn’t have any mentors or even colleagues to bounce ideas off of. My poor husband has been asked more questions about things he knows nothing about, nor probably cares to know about, but he always did his best to answer them and encourage me as I tried to figure everything out.
So, all this to say: if you have the opportunity to pursue your passions on the side, while having a full-time gig that covers the bills and gives you the opportunity to learn from someone else, lean into that! Yes, it’s hard to juggle two jobs. There’s a lot of late nights and you’ll lose the ability to binge watch pretty much anything on Netflix (which isn’t a bad thing). No, this doesn’t make figuring out your business any easier, but it helps surround you in community of people to help encourage you and learn with you. I feel like that overlap just helps make the leap to full time a much smoother transition. By the time, you feel confident to go full time, you’ll have a good head on your shoulders. Hopefully you have consistent revenue and your business has a solid foundation on which to stand.
However, even as I say all this, I know my story couldn’t have been written any other way. Knowing my personality, I’m glad my story happened the way it happened. That’s what I needed to do at the time and I’m so thankful I listened to that intuition! I’ve learned so many incredible lessons since becoming an entrepreneur and I’m excited to keep learning as I continue in this journey.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.rosalynnelove.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/rosalynnelove/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/rosalynnelove/
- Twitter: YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCelgMNs8XTFQ3oHQeQu9CAQ?view_as=subscriber
- Other: https://www.pinterest.com/rosalynnelove/
Image Credit:
Plant Lady, Lisa Nicholle of Brad Hart Co.
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