ONE YEAR OF KAHANI
You may be thinking, this isn't your anniversary....yes, that is correct but honestly, the first year of building a business goes by so fast that you don't even realize when the anniversary sneaks up on you! So we thought we would celebrate one whole CALENDAR year of the business at the end of this year.
We definitely had quite the year but the journey has been incredible. Starting with our vision board. To be completely transparent, this was the first time I created one but I found that it really worked. I'll be making another one this year, but I am proud to say that we accomplished everything we wanted to this year. Some of our goals were:
Tell beautiful stories
Grow our team to a full time capacity
Travel for work
Expand the client industries we work in
Coordinate client events
Create a more corporate / structured environment
Network more
Create a better work life balance
Recapping the year, overall we interacted with over 50 South Asian brands, tripled our revenue, got accepted into an accelerator, traveled as a team, grew our team almost double, created some really strong agency partnerships, worked with a ton of creatives, booked really cool events for the community next year and executed on some epic projects. Of course, I want to focus on the good but I want this to be an authentic journey so it also comes with acknowledging some of the challenges some of which were - firing an employee who ghosted us, multiple clients not respecting boundaries, having one of our lowest months recently, and we still have one unpaid invoice from a client who has blocked our emails and will not pay. All of these have provided a really great learning experiences and we hope to use them to grow in 2023!
Month by Month Recap:
This year started with our website launch in January. We started working on this with Emma and Steph from ESM Creative in August of 2021 and we are so happy with the way this turned out. Emma and Steph were a breeze to work with and we highly recommend them for any projects you may have. A special mention also to Katy Bellotte who created our branding back in 2021 and to Manali Photography who shot the branding images back in 2021.
NOTE: any website or branding project takes time, and you should take your time with it. My first company, Anis Collections went through 4 rebrands over the course of 4 years just because I was not confident about the branding the first few times. When you take your time, you end up with a project you really love, and that's how I feel about both the Kahani branding and now the Anis Collections branding. Also, hiring someone for website copy makes your life a lot easier. We did not hire someone since we internally took care of it but I often recommend this service to clients!
In January we also began our partnership with Amber Sabri + Azhar PR. Quite honestly one of my best decisions ever for the business. We have grown so much together over the last year and I couldn't have done it on my own. We are opposites but it helps us balance each other out when it comes to running our businesses. Finally we hired Srilekha on our team as a content writer intern! Since then Srilekha has grown so much and now is a Junior Account Manager. I could not imagine Kahani running without her, so another great decision here! In terms of travel, I spent the week after New Year's in NYC with some new friends to recharge and hit the ground running. It was a nice little break after the holiday crazy to work and see some friends. I had a few work meetings balanced with some fun with friends!
Come February, we worked with another agency partner, ZKCaptures to complete a rebrand of our client Khajana Boutique! We love how regal and elevated this branding turned out. Working with Zenab has also been so fun, and we love the magic we are able to bring to clients together. Zenab and I have known each other for a variety of years through mutual friends but this was the year we really were able to work together and I am so grateful!
A major milestone in February was also that I got featured in Teen Vogue! A major milestone that I truly could not believe. Teen Vogue was a magazine I grew up reading and the fact that I was in it was surreal.
February was also a huge travel month for me. I went to Hawaii with my family, where I worked from 4am - 10am and then spent the day sightseeing (would not recommend this) and then from there I went to LA for a couple meetings, Chicago for a few meetings as well and finally NYC for a couple things as well.
Then we get to March, where we had two major client wins! Firstly, our client Couplr had a nationwide launch of their app which was super exciting since they were only in Chicago when we first started working together. This kicked off a nationwide influencer gifting campaign where we put together over 250 couples date night boxes to send to influencers. We also executed a fashion show in Miami with Riya Collective x Anisha and the rest of the Family Karma cast. Our team flew out to Miami for a few days and helped put together 200 goodie bags, and coordinated the show.
We also worked with Zenab again to rebrand Sunrais Health, a wellness coaching client focused on women in their mid-life. This branding is so unique and we love the way it turned out. Finally we hired Bhavya on our team this month to be a Graphic Design intern. We have since promoted her to being a Junior Account Manager as well and we are so happy to have her on the team! Finally we also launched our first e-book this month geared toward small brand who may not be able to afford agency services. This e-book functions as both a knowledge hub and a workbook filled with exercises on how to improve the marketing of your brand. We cover social media, emails, website, branding and more. You can purchase it here.
In April is when things started to become a little bit rocky. We already knew ahead of time but Hajar, our lead graphic designer now, was going on a leave of absence to finish school and take a break after graduation before she came back full time. This month we also did have to fire one of our part time employees for being unresponsive and not completing client work. This was such a hard decision for me because of the emotional aspect that comes with firing - I had so many people look at the email I had sent prior to sending it. But ultimately, it was the right decision for the company. You have to know when to make those hard calls as a boss. Around the same time this happened, we had my first full time employee also resign which was really hard for me. I really didn't think we would survive this, but I think this month really made me work harder to improve our process both internally and externally. On a more positive note, we worked on an stunning shoot with Khajana Boutique, Rahul Rana Photography and Jyoti Chand!
NOTE: I am not a micromanager as a boss. I like to give my team their tasks and allow them time to work, however when clients tell me work isn't getting done, that's when I have to step in and I do not enjoy that. Early on this year I was very lenient with employees, almost too much so because I knew what it was like to have terrible bosses and so the last thing I wanted was to be that. What I ended up realizing was that too much flexibility is also a bad thing, and some structure is needed for an organization to function. I think this year we were really able to find our structure through these learning experiences.
Due to Ramadan, the only travel that happened this month for me was NYC, where I attended a few events and meetings and came home.
In May we had a couple really exciting milestones which included me purchasing an OFFICE!! This was a huge one for me and something actually on my vision board that was super exciting. We also travelled to NYC to conduct a retreat for Ammu Beauty which was two days. Over the course of the two days, we strategized her entire 2022 + Q1 2023 of marketing, product launches, PR and more. We also facilitated a Mother's Day collaboration between Ammu Beauty x Shaz and Kiks!
In terms of travel, besides going to NYC for work, I went to Tulum to celebrate my friend's 30th birthday. We had so much fun just relaxing and unplugging right before kicking off the summer and it was a huge group of us which made it even better.
Throughout building Kahani, I have definitely met some amazing people who have become family. This is how I feel about Sagar and Pooja, two of the founders of Couplr, who have become my mentors, friends, family and more than just clients. In June we had the opportunity to go to Cabo to attend their wedding. Not only did I get to attend their wedding, but they also asked me to create their outfits through Anis Collections. I cannot even put into words how much they have helped me build this company and how supportive they have been throughout it, definitely means the world!
We also did a photoshoot for Ammu Beauty during this time which was super special around weddings and bridal skincare. This was my second time working with Some Shelly Photography and boy is she a pleasure to work with. She is the fastest shooter and editor and her images are just stunning! Highly recommend working with her. The shoot was part of the strategy we created during their retreat. In terms of travel, June was a month of weddings, so I attended one of my best friend's weddings in Detroit, went to Cabo for another wedding and helped my family prep for my uncles wedding.
July is my birthday month and technically our one year anniversary month since we launched the IG officially on July 15th, 2021, but we were so busy that we did not have time to celebrate then. Hajar was technically my first W-2 employee and she started on July 5th, 2022 after the long weekend! Our graphics and emails have never looked better, Hajar truly makes them look next level and we are so lucky to have her. This month we also did another shoot for Ammu Beauty and worked with one of my favorite models ever, Slesha Patel. I first worked with Slesha on a Khajana Boutique shoot and have not been able to stop working with her since. She's literally so easy to work with and such a sweetheart, another person I am lucky to work with and call one of my close friends.
This month I celebrated my birthday in LA with friends and family and also celebrated with Swati in NYC, my creative director, because she is a July baby as well! We had a mini-Miami reunion in NYC and it was so nice to spend time with everyone.
In August, we booked our biggest client load till date, which was really exciting. We started the month off with working with Zenab again to create the branding for Sagrada Studios, an interior design firm. The same week also, Swati started her role full time as my second W-2 employee!
With both of these, I went on my first ever fully off-grid vacation on a national park trip with my family to Montana. This was by far the scariest thing I did since starting either of my companies because I had never gone on a 10 day trip where I did not have access to internet. I was able to trust my team and I left knowing they would take care of things and they did which was so nice to come back to. We also relaunched our blog which was super exciting and completed another project with Zenab which was the Myna Yoga website!
September we started with working with Zenab again, to do a rebrand for LลชVIH which also turned out fabulous. LลชVIH is a luxury ayurvedic skincare brand and we are so excited to be a part of their journey. We also really hit the ground running with our social media - especially our IG and TikTok.
One of my biggest accomplishments this year was being invited to be a part of the Forbes Business Council which was surreal. I also got to attend some really cool events, I went to the DDLJ musical in San Diego, attended a Women in Business Expo among my religious community in Chicago with Zenab and went to the second annual Single to Shaadiretreat. Finally, I also met my mentor Scout Sobel in person and there's nothing like in person connections honestly.
I started October off in LA where I attended Create and Cultivate's wellness conference. Again, going back to in person events, this was such a fun experience and I got to meet Deepti Vempati and Dr. Deepika Chopra as well, as I listened to Miranda Kerr speak.
Some other exciting things that happened in October include us signing to have a booth and SXSW the Creative Industries Expo. We also launched our newsletter both client facing and a general bi-weekly newsletter. This was the first year we decided to send holiday cards to all our contacts that have helped us in our journey building this company. I didn't want to do a generic holiday card, so we worked with our client and my long term friend, Lakshmi Sarkar who created custom art which we finalized this month.
For the lows, honestly this month was the lowest month in terms of revenue that we have ever had. Slow season is something that happens in every business but this was my first one and I felt like I was letting myself and my team down. Along with that we had a client not pay us for our work for the first time which was really hard to deal with and is something we are still dealing with it.
NOTE: I thought it was important to share these experiences because looking back I'd want to see the lows as well as the highs. Also both of these were incredible learning experiences that prompted me to implement changes in the business for the better.
In terms of travel, we celebrated Amber's birthday in NYC and I also celebrated my best friend's bachelorette party in Charlottesville, VA! I was the Maid of Honor and this is something I worked on planning pretty much all year.
Things in November were still slow, but we attended Event's By C's 10 year anniversary party, which is a huge accomplishment for any business. A huge accomplishment for us in November was to restructure our HR policies and we completed a HR employee manual, established official training documents and a company calendar. Our client Sagrada Studios also completed their website and it was launched before the holiday break!
Finally December, we completed one of our all year influencer marketing campaigns for Couplr! We sent out 255 packages to influencers that consisted of a date night kit with branded t-shirts, wine glasses, and more! We also launched LลชVIH products available for pre-orders, after we onboarded a class of 100 product testers and completed packaging. We also sent our holiday cards, which I hand-wrote each and every one, both for Kahani clients and friends as well as Anis Collections.
I had some really fun events that we also attended this month, I got to connect with Neha Singh, one of the co-founders of SALUTE and attended the lunch in NYC with Kinjil Mathur, CMO of Squarespace. We use Squarespace daily, for our own website and other clients sites as well so this was really inspiring! I also went to Sagar and Pooja's annual Ugly Sweater Party which was so much fun after being at their wedding!
Finally we ended the year with our first ever performance reviews, essential to any business to get feedback from their employees. Finally, we got accepted into the EO Accelerator and this was a great note to end off 2022! In terms of next week, we are taking some much needed relaxation to celebrate the holiday season with our families and recharge for 2023. What will I be doing next week? In terms of business admin I'll be :
Reorganizing my office
Doing my taxes LOL
Setting up for the New Year
Designing 2023 collections for Anis Collections
And personally I'll be:
Reorganizing my closet
Making my vision boards
Spending some much needed time with my friends and family
In terms of lessons learnt this year, I'll leave you all with a few -
Your company is only as good as your team, I literally cannot stand by this one enough. Quality is better than quantity when it comes to this, and keeping a lean team that works well together is better than keeping a larger team.
Hiring only makes your life easier when you are organized - we worked a lot on putting policies together this year and it made a world of a difference in everyone's lives including mine. People think hiring someone will immediately make their workload lighter but it first makes your workload a lot higher and then will drastically reduce it once you've trained your employee.
Highs and lows come in every business, during a slow season keep your head up and do not get discouraged. Things will get better.
Structure is not a bad thing - people do thrive on structure so having policies, routine and a system is worth it.
It's important to take time off as a CEO, mental health days, sick time and vacations are just as important to you as a founder as they are to your employees.
If you made it this far, thank you to everyone who has been a part of our journey this year. We really appreciate all of the support and we cannot wait to continue to grow in 2023. Have a wonderful holiday season and Happy New Year!