Phillis and Margaret | Sis’ Ceramic Shop

What a pleasure to get to know this mother/daughter team!  Margaret and Phillis welcomed me into their shop, which holds so many personal stories.  The intention of creating a space that people could come and be creative together naturally developed into a safe space to connect and feel and be around family.  Margaret and Phillis take so much pride in holding space for others, knowing the value the shop has brought to their own family.  I could feel the passion and commitment from both Margaret and Phillis beyond just words - it was strong and deep and personal.  This is what makes Sis' Ceramic Shop different and special, and allows them to reach across generations within their own family and so many others.  Creativity and Calm come together here!

When was your business founded and what inspired its development?
Phillis:  The business started in January of 1988.  That’s when I opened the doors here.  I started doing hobby ceramics when I was pregnant with my oldest daughter, Margaret (now business partner at the shop!).  And then at some point, I decided that would be a fun little job to do.  Margaret’s father didn't really want me out in the workforce, and preferred me to be at home with the kids. He worked trick work, so it worked into our family schedule.  I thought a little artsy job would keep me busy… and it kept me very busy.  We started out renting just the front of the current shop.  We opened when Margaret was just 10 months old.  Eventually, we expanded and purchased the whole building, so we could use the front and back.  COVID really challenged us to keep the business going and our tenants upstairs were miserable, and really everybody was miserable during that time.  I actually said, “maybe we should just sell everything and be done”.  But my daughter said to me, “No, Mom, I grew up in the ceramic shop, and I want my kids to grow up in the ceramic shop”.  And now that I have grandbabies, I think we're going to be here for forever!  I can't say that we have a strong business plan other than it really revolves around family - family comes first. Everybody's family comes first. If somebody comes in and they've got family coming they want to share this experience with, we do our best to make those moments possible.  My own children grew up here running around, and now my grandchildren are here being raised running around, and it brings me great joy. 

How does your business support mental health and wellness in our local community?
Margaret:  I think we've had a bit of a change over the years in how people have engaged with ceramics.  It has gone from being a weekly routine and has evolved into people coming weekly and also those that come every few months or want to bring a group of people.  I’ve noticed with a lot of our customers that come every week, it's more about the connections than it is about the ceramics.  People seem to be accumulating less stuff, so someone may just sit and talk about their day without completing their project, but it’s okay because the human connection is so important.  People create long term friendships - we have one woman who has been coming for over thirty years! We try to very much be teachers, and take a lot of pride in the fact that we go to a lot of educational workshops and maintain our technical skills to try to keep up with best products and how to use things in different ways. We may ask what someone’s vision is, and we may encourage them to be creative and not be tied to how something “should” look.  I think that gives people more freedom and opportunity to just do whatever they want to do.  In what feels like a super rushed world that we live in every day, people seem to need space to just sit and relax and connect.  There's no pressure here - we don't have to upsell you.  We want you to do what you want to do, and find meaning in the whole experience.  We try to be flexible, so people don’t feel like they have to keep up with a group or class, and they can come back another time to finish so that it’s their own creation and not the result of rushing to finish.  

What makes your business different from others that may offer similar service?
Margaret:  I think there's a few things that make us different. One is that we started as a traditional studio. We still pour our own molds, and that gives us a little bit more flexibility, and that allows us to customize in some ways.  A lot of paint-your-own pottery shops these days have very specific hours, and they've got a rotation of employees, you have a limited amount of colors, and they want to upsell products.  And here you'll see we have hundreds of colors and many different pieces, and I like to have choices.  Those other pottery shops may not have employees that can teach the way that we do - likely, people are using technique books for ideas, but we can demonstrate and actually teach many techniques.  
Phillis:  We do pull out some of the old techniques, like marbelizing, which we helped my grandkids learn to do for a pumpkin project.  When someone comes up with a vision or idea, we'll go dig in a corner someplace and pull out some sample piece of something we did, and we'll try to make it whatever you need.
Margaret:  And we've watched the trends come back around, like a lace design - and we’ve been using lace doilies for thirty years here. 
Phillis:  We have a larger variety of pieces to choose from than some of the other stores, and also cater to people who want to take things home and work on them. 
Margaret:  We’ve also been doing more parties - birthdays, bachelorette, kids, adults - and we can host here with whatever the groups wants, but also we have taken the projects to people’s homes or event space, so they can include the painting experience.

How does your own journey or life experience shape how you show up in your work?
Phillis:  Starting as a hobby, and growing the shop into a business has created so much meaning for me.  Being able to raise my kids here, and teach them about building a business and working hard, has allowed me to enjoy doing this, and it’s not work to me - it’s fun and relaxing.  

Business ownership can be stressful - how do you take care of your own mental health and wellness?
Margaret:  I think over the years, we've had our ups and downs, and this shop has always been our safe space.  This is my version of home, where I get to have my family come and customers have become family here. We might be located in the city, but here it is safe and where people come to relax and unwind.  We both have our day jobs where we have to be very particular and professional and politically correct all day long, and we can come here and let loose on whatever shenanigans was taking place in the day.  The way we set things up here is like a Sunday dinner table that’s family style.  Mom (Phillis) fell on the ice back in February and broke her elbow, so we were closed for the last couple of months.  And customers offered to bring food and step up to do different things to help out. 

If people were to take away a feeling or message after experiencing your business, what would you want that to be? 
Both: Joy
Phillis: The most important thing to us has always been family.  If customers feel like they find family and connection here, then we’re doing exactly what we intended. 
Margaret:  I know people find peace here, and that’s what really matters.

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