As most of us wish, we would like 2025 to be the year where there is an end to conflict both at home and abroad, and for people to feel safe wherever they live. However, these sentiments are outside of our gift, so we must concentrate on what is possible for a pottery business here in the heart of Cheshire.
Like the storms that we’re currently experiencing, 2025 has come in with lots of bluster and upheaval. Everything seems to have come at once. Our second studio, opened last October is now starting to feel its feet and we have four or five artists and crafters beginning to use the lovely space to deliver some pretty wonderful activities.
We have appointed Sarah from Hey Pear (heypear.co.uk) to put together our whole ‘brand’. It was obvious that we needed professional expertise here, as although gamely self-taught and constantly scrambling up new learning curves, Lisa was slowly starting to sink beneath the waves of managing the studios’ social media, and branding strategy, and our trusty website was in increasing need of a new look to reflect Cheshire Clay Studios ever expanding portfolio of services and activities. Like a knight riding to the rescue, Sarah is beginning to knock the Instagram dragon into shape and we are looking forward to showing a much more cohesive and professional face to the world by spring.
The other dragon that we have no way of slaying is the dreaded VAT registration. This aspect of running a growing business has probably been one of our biggest headaches and it’s taken a lot of soul searching for Liz and Lisa to decide to attack this barrier as it approaches at the end of January. We’ve again appointed VAT specialists to help us with the registration to avoid any potential pitfalls, and at the same time we’ve appointed new accountants who will help us set up and manage the new bookkeeping software required by HMRC to do our quarterly VAT returns.
We’ve learned at first hand why so many creative businesses choose to lurk under the VAT threshold, but if we want Cheshire Clay Studios to fulfil our dream of becoming a creative hub for our region – and pay the two directors a living wage – then we really had no option but to increase our turnover. It does seem a tad unfair though that our major local competitor is the local FE college which is exempt from VAT while offering almost identical services.
Still, onwards and upwards and we really hope that our insistence on Quality, Quality, Quality and Innovation, Innovation, Innovation is going to stand us in good stead as we move forward through the year.