Eleven years is a long time to do anything.
Long enough to get good at it. Long enough to make some spectacular mistakes. Long enough for people looking from the outside to assume you must know exactly what you’re doing.
I do not.
H has been one of the great loves of my life. It has also been messy, risky, expensive and deeply personal work.
So, in honor of eleven years of H IS FOR LOVE, I wrote down eleven things that are actually true about building this business.
The real version.
1. At times, I’ve struggled to show up here because life behind the business was hard.
Sometimes keeping H visible meant showing up when I didn’t really want to be seen.
A brand account doesn’t always have room for the full truth of a person’s life. There have been seasons when I was carrying far more than I could comfortably share, but the business still needed me to speak, make, photograph, write and remain present.
Sometimes I managed that well. Sometimes I disappeared for a while. Both were human.
2.
After eleven years, H knows how to run. There are systems, rhythms and people I trust. It is a real, well-oiled business.
And I still have moments of fear about being responsible for all of it.
I don’t think owning a business ever fully stops feeling risky. You simply become more familiar with the feeling and more willing to keep moving while it is there.
3. I’ve ruined very expensive batches because I zoned out and missed a step during production.
Yes, I cried.
Making products by hand is beautiful, exacting work. It also means that one missed step can turn an entire day (and at times days) of labor and a painful amount of beautiful raw material into a lesson.
I wish I could say this only happened in the beginning. It did not. In fact, as I've become quite comfortable with my abilities, I've ordered packaging for a product I was sure would be perfect (because it was on paper) only to discover the scent profile didn't hit the way an H product absolutely needs to. All of that packaging had to be recycled. Ego back in check.
4.
Some ideas are expensive to learn from.
Beyond packaging, I've invested in compliance, projects, products and possibilities that seemed completely right at the time and never became part of H.
Those choices weren’t all mistakes. Some showed me what H wasn’t, which has often been just as important as discovering what it is.
5. I’m still learning every single day.
There is still plenty of faking it till I make it. But I’ve learned one thing above everything else: whatever is in front of me, I’ll figure it out.
(Side note: an amazing businesswoman/artist/friend named Sylvia gave me this advice right as I was about to launch my website 11 years ago. I confided in her that I had no actual idea how to run a business. In truth I'm an artist, a staunch naturalist, and a total cosmetic chemistry/formulation geek. She said "Every day you'll wake up and have no idea how to do what's on your plate, and, by the end of the day you'll have figured it out." She nailed it.)
Owning a small business has required me to become a formulator, photographer, writer, packer, buyer, problem solver, bookkeeper, marketer and approximately one hundred other things I never planned to be.
I still don’t know everything. I trust myself to find the next answer.
6.
There have been periods when the steady rituals of making, packing orders and caring for this business gave structure to days that felt otherwise impossible.
H asked me to keep showing up. Sometimes that was exactly what I needed.
7. I love my customers more than I know how to express.
Many, many of you have become dear friends. That may be the part of this business I’m proudest of.
My work is built on real relationships. Relationships with farmers, growers, artists, designers, stockists and the people who bring these little jars and bottles into their homes.
What began as a skincare company became a community I never could have planned.
8. Eleven years in, it still keeps me awake at night if someone isn’t happy with their experience with us.
I’ll move mountains to make it right.
That care has not diminished as H has grown. If anything, I feel it more deeply now because I understand exactly what it means when someone chooses to spend their money with a small business like mine.
Your trust matters to me. It always will.
9. There are products I was certain would be huge that nobody cared about.
There are also products I almost didn’t make that became part of the soul of H.
Eleven years has taught me that I cannot always predict what will connect with you. Sometimes the thing I believe will change everything quietly disappears. Sometimes something made almost on instinct becomes beloved.
The products ultimately have relationships with you that are bigger than my plans for them.
10. Some days I walk into the studio and cannot believe this is my job.
Other days I want to lock the door and go home.
Eleven years in, I still have both kinds of days.
I think loving your work can include feeling exhausted by it. Gratitude and frustration can live in the same room. Neither cancels the other out.
11.
This photo was taken by by cutie friend and designer, Kasey.
H began as something deeply personal, and it still is. The things I formulate, the way I photograph them, the ingredients I choose, the words I write and the way your orders are packed all carry some part of me.
There are boundaries I’ve learned to create over the years, but H has never felt like something that exists apart from my life. It has grown alongside me, changed alongside me and, in many ways, become part of who I am.
There have been beautiful years, hard years, expensive mistakes, fear, friendships, growth and a whole lot more figuring-it-out-as-I-go than I’d probably like to admit.
I’m proud of H. I’m grateful for H. And I’m endlessly grateful for the people who have made it possible for me to keep doing this.
Thank you for buying the things I make, telling your friends, sending me notes, trusting us with your skin and letting H become a part of your lives. So many of you have been here for years. Some of you have become dear friends.
What a strange, beautiful thing we’ve made together.
H is for honest.
H is for love. ♡
Love,
Bee