052 | Building a team and leveraging systems with Lichia Liu, Gotamago

Lichia Liu is the founder and creative director of Gotamago, a stationery & gifts brand based in Toronto, Canada. A self-taught illustrator, Lichia took a detour from her urban design career in 2013 to start Gotamago when she realized that she needed more authenticity, autonomy and artistic exploration in her work. Besides running Gotamago and being a mom, Lichia is a musician, an urban sketcher, a member of a Japanese Taiko drumming group, and a foster dog parent.

On today’s episode we’re talking about how Lichia left her day job to pursue her passion, how she involves her team in building systems to automate and streamline her business and why she thinks it is important to jump before you feel ready.

ON TODAY’S EPISODE:

What Lichia was doing before she started Gotamango & how that lead her to start her business 
The first time she was reached out to by a retailer who wanted to carry her line & what her reaction was 
When she decided to leave her full time job
 Where Lichia gains inspiration for her work 
How she makes time for designing while trying to balance the rest of Gotamago 
How becoming a mom has changed her routines and schedules within her business 
Lichia’s team & the systems she has in place that allow her to step back and prioritize her family 
The types of canned email responses that she has written
How her team grew slowly over time 
Some of the challenges that she faces being a Canadian exhibitor at U.S. based shows 
How preparing for her second National Stationery Show is different from preparing for her first
 The advice she would give to someone who is just starting out in a product based business 
What’s coming up for Gotamago

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KEY TAKE-AWAYS

“I was working on weekends and I thought, what am I doing? I really need to be grabbing this creative force that I have inside of me and giving it a chance.” – Lichia Liu

“It’s just such a different feeling when you know that strangers who don’t know you at all are really liking your products, it gave me a lot of confidence.” – Lichia Liu

“Everything I’ve done is pretty much a reflection of what I’ve been going through in my life.” – Lichia Liu

“I was kind of a workaholic before I had my baby.” – Lichia Liu

“Leading up to the baby being born, I really took time to start to systemize everything and delegate it out.” – Lichia Liu

“Because I feel so much emotional attachment to my products that I’m not the best person to be dealing with things when things go wrong.” – Lichia Liu

“The first lesson I learned was that when you take your stuff across the border you have to have all your forms filled. So make sure you get your forms filled.” – Lichia Liu

“If I had waited until I thought it was perfect, I would have spent way more time on getting it to what I thought people wanted rather than actually making a good product that people actually will want.” – Lichia Liu

CONNECT WITH LICHIA LIU

WWebsite: Gotamago | Facebook: @shopgotamago | Instagram: @go.tamago | Twitter: @shopgotamago

Connect with Katie Hunt

Katie Hunt is a business strategist, podcaster, mentor and mama to four. She helps product based businesses build profitable, sustainable companies through her conferences, courses and coaching programs.

Website: prooftoproduct.com | Instagram: @prooftoproduct