How to Find Your Niche | Side Hustle Saturday Vol. 1
In case you missed it, I launched an indie beauty e-commerce store on Monday! Launching CVTD Beauty was the culmination of months and months of dreaming, planning, praying, doubting, worrying and questioning. And probably the start of more months doing the same lol.Since I got so much feedback from people who were interested in my new business venture, I decided to start this series where I'll focus on the behind-the-scenes of CVTD Beauty. As I mentioned on Monday, I've been thinking of how to get more involved in the beauty industry for years now. I've considered leaving the law behind to work with a brand in some other (more creative & non-legal) capacity. I've applied to roles in the legal department of beauty brands and retailers. Hell, I've even toyed with the idea of starting my own practice where I'd be a lawyer for big beauty influencers where I'd represent them on their big branding deals.Although I'm sure any of those paths would've been awesome (especially that job in Sephora's legal department), none of them felt truly right. I've always wanted to have my own company and loved the idea of creating a business that would not only speak to one of my passions, but also add something awesome to the lives of its customers, employees and community.
“Chase your passion, not your pension.” —Denis Waitley
The only way to make this happen was to start my own business in the beauty industry. My first thought was starting my own cosmetics line. While it's still a dream of mine, it just wasn't something that I was able to do at the level that I wanted. That meant that a beauty store was the best fit for me.
Once I knew that I wanted to open up some kind of beauty store, I had to figure out my niche.
Finding your niche for a business requires the same type of thought process that it takes to start a blog really. It's about figuring out what you like enough to work on day and night, and then figuring out how to put your own twist on it. I'm lucky that I'd already started a blog, so I knew what my passion was. If you're searching for a way to start a side project, start there. Start with who you like to follow on Instagram, the books you like to read, the things you could talk about for hours on end. Those are your passions.
“Passion is energy. Feel the power that comes from focusing on what excites you.” —Oprah Winfrey
As much as I love Sephora, I knew that there was no point in trying to duplicate that model. First off, I didn't have the money to stock dozens of different brands right away. Also, since this was going to be something I'd be mostly doing on my own, I wanted things to be small, but scalable.The more I thought about it, I realized that there really aren't many (if any) places where you can shop lots of different indie brands. So that's how I found my niche for CVTD Beauty.
Now it's your turn to share. What's your passion? What excites you?