Read the Creativity Found Collective origin story

When content creation creates a business

Lots of small business owners know they need to create content to promote their business, but what happens when the story is flipped around, and a good content idea turns into the inspiration for a business?

That’s the origin story of the Creativity Found Collective

Once upon a time a dead-ordinary 50-something year-old started collecting the stories of other ordinary people who had found their creative spark in adulthood. Artists and crafters from around the world would tell Claire (that’s me!) their tales of past disappointments, disparagements and dilemmas, eventually broken by discovering a creative activity that brought them joy and a new-found outlook on life.

Claire knew that these stories could help many more people, so chose podcasting as the perfect medium to communicate these personal journals of hope to the masses (well, quite a few people).

More and more people heard the stories, and more and more people came forward with their own stories, and an audience began to realize that they weren’t alone in feeling that something was missing in their lives, and that learning a new creative activity could be the key to filling that gap.

They had the motivation, but they didn’t have the means.

Claire knew she had to take the next step, and creativityfound.co.uk was born.

Now there was a place for the listeners to go to choose a way to explore their own creativity: a magical, virtual place where painters, printmakers and potters, weavers, embroiderers and kilt-makers, journallers, knitters and crocheters were united by their desire to share their knowledge and skills with adults across the nation with their workshops, online courses and kits.

Those artists and crafters banded together and called themselves the Creativity Found Collective. While they worked alone and were scattered across the land, they now had a place to gather and discuss their small businesses, to share their good times and bad, and help each other to grow and thrive. They knew that the Creativity Found podcast and website were always there for them, working hard in the background to make sure new students could find them and take their first steps on the journey to creative loveliness.

Soon those small business owners grew tired of the admin and the SEO, the social media marketing, email automations and endless other tasks that had to be done to ensure their success but that took them away from the arting and crafting they loved and that had inspired them to start their businesses in the first place. So Claire called on all of the networking powers she had been cultivating over the years to invite more people into the Collective. Website designers, print-on-demand experts and time and energy management coaches joined the merry band of creatives to help them with the background tasks that had hampered them, and soon they re-found their creativity, just like the stories told on the podcast.

And so the story continues in this cyclical manner, as Claire encourages adults everywhere to try a new creative activity, even if they think they might be rubbish, while also showing them the way to do so by introducing them to the Collective, who in turn all help each other to do more of the creative stuff they love.

And that’s where Chapter 1 ends.

Other chapters include:

• The story of the battle between perfection and creation.
• How the definition of creativity was destroyed and re-built.
• Creativity as the hero in the war against burnout and mental ill health.
• . . . and more tales of epic battles, touching realisations, and courageous challenges.

Whatever happens, please be assured that all stories in the Creativity Found lexicon have a happy ending.

Creativity Found Collective

The Creativity Found Collective is a promotional and networking membership for artists and crafters who share their creative skills with grown-ups through workshops, online courses, products or subscriptions. It is also a membership for business-support enterprises who use their expertise to help those artists and crafters to grow their businesses.

We promote their offerings on the website and connect them with a network of like-minded business owners. 

All of this is backed up by the Creativity Found podcast, in which I chat with grown-ups who have found or re-found their creativity later in life.

You can find out more about the Creativity Found Collective membership here.

And don't forget, you can subscribe to the mailing list here.