Earlier this week I saw Johnny Earle, founder of Johnny Cupcakes, speak about how he started his business. Johnny is well-known in Boston because he is from the area, but he has also been written about in national magazines like Inc.

He designs/produces a limited collection of t-shirts, all including a cupcake somewhere in the design, often poking fun at pop-culture symbols. His most well-known store is on Newbury St. in Boston, but he also has a shop in his hometown of Hull, MA, LA and just opened one a couple months ago in London. He’s a down-to-earth guy who admitted he hates speaking in public, but was very open and willing to help other entrepreneurs out. There are 3 main themes he talked about when sharing his own business story:

1. Keep trying – The t-shirt business was not his first business. Before he graduated high school, he had sold a lot of things. He sold lemonade, bought sodas wholesale and sold them on his local beach, sold whoopee cushions to his classmates, sold candy (and made more money than his school store), and sold pins/buttons. When he worked at Newbury Comics, he was wearing a shirt he designed and people kept asking him where he got it. That was the beginning of Johnny Cupcakes. All of his previous “businesses” failed, but he kept trying and learning from mistakes along the way.

2. Be unique – His t-shirts are unique, but that’s not all. His stores look like bakeries, with actual stoves in them. He knew word-of-mouth would be important for his brand longevity, so he built his stores as unique destinations that people would talk about and want to come see for themselves. Before he opened his own store, he attended trade shows to try to get his shirts into other stores to sell. To stand out, he created small pocket-sized lookbooks and spent extra money to foil emboss his logo on the front. Instead of people throwing out his lookbooks when they left the tradeshow, they kept them around on their coffee tables because the lookbooks looked so nice.

3. Take risks – This is what makes an entrepreneur, taking risks. When Johnny started having some success selling his t-shirts on “bathroom” breaks while working at Newbury Comics, he made the decision to quit his full-time job with benefits in order to commit to Johnny Cupcakes. When he opened his LA shop, he was working with a store design company and went all out in creating a destination store with numerous vintage stoves, going a couple hundred thousand dollars over his budget. This was a gigantic risk, but it worked out and has helped make his business a success.

Do you have any stories about how you kept trying, was unique, or took a risk that resulted in success?

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