Everything on this web site is designed and *hand made* by us: Patrick & Kathy Murillo of Phoenix, Arizona. We were born in this magical desertland and have lived here all our lives. We have no plans to move, but we love to travel all over the world.
It's a long story how we got into doing all of this. When we first got married, we were a perky Rasta-bohemian couple living in Tucson for our honeymoon. We had a baby on the way.
One day we realized our dollar dance stash had come to its end. We had to pay an electric bill so we made painted watercolor paper earrings to (hopefully) sell to one of the owners of those trendy boutiques on 5th Ave. We went from store to store peddling our wares with no luck. I cried and Patrick told me to get my act together and be positive. Finally, one shop owner said "Yes, I love your stuff!" and she happened to be a national sales rep. She wanted samples to take to her booths at the New York and Los Angeles gift shows. We said "Sure!" and then quickly moved back home to Phoenix to research on what gift shows were.
Within a month or so, we had more than 300 orders to fill. We had zero start-up funds so we used our rent money. BAD idea, but we were thrown into it so fast, we didn't have time to do any planning or critical thinking. 50 flower pots here. Two dozen magnets there. Phone calls with orders at all hours of the night (Internet wasn't around). Packing boxes daily for the UPS man who came every day at 4 p.m. sharp. Accounting was a nightmare - Net30 payments didn't come in like they should have. We got a Dunn and Bradstreet number and still to this day don't know what that is. Our Christmas orders were delivered by Fed Ex to store owners a week before the holiday. They not only accepted them, they ordered another round of merchandise. The baby was teething - and worse, crawling!
Broke but happy, we kept up with this makeshift manufacturing cycle until it almost killed us! It was two years into it all and we had another baby on the way. I remember working on a huge order for Bloomingdale's and throwing a jar of Gerber baby food at the wall as hard as I could because I couldn't handle making, varnishing, packing and shipping orders in our tiny one-bedroom house with two little babies. Weren't we supposed to be rich by now? One Christmas during that time, we were so poor - we literally had $50. to buy gifts for 10 people (for our short list, everyone else got art). I actually bought my beautiful, kind-hearted mom a small white porcelin GRAVY LADLE for her gift!
What was I thinking??
One afternoon an order came in from Santa Fe Perfume for 10,000 of Patrick's handpainted lizard flower pots. When he painted the first one for the gift show sample, the design looked like a gecko. After all the orders, they now looked like baby dinosaurs. This big order made me giddy at the thought of green in our bank account; Patrick's face turned green at the thought of painting all those stinkin' lizards. We declined, dropped our reps (actually they dropped us because we were horrible with keeping up with everything!).
I got a PT job at the local newspaper in the tearsheet room. Patrick continued to fill the orders that would not stop. Things calmed down and we set up a website for our art and rented a bigger house. I eventually worked my way up the ladder at the paper, got my BA degree in Business Mgmt (to learn from my previous mistakes) and became a features reporter. Patrick ran his Latin reggae band, The RastaFarmers, and filled the orders from the web site. I got offered a craft column at work which led me to launch my Crafty Chica web site and that led to writing a whole bunch of nationally published crafty books!
Things have changed tremendously these days! We bought a great four-bedroom house years back, converted our living room into a large functional enclosed art studio. We ship/deliver a dozen or so of wholesale and retail orders out a week from our home. No reps! We are busy, but keep things at the pace we can handle. We recently scored a licsensing deal with Lowe's Home Improvement Stores and we designed two lines of Hispanic-themed products for them. We teach all kinds of art workshops throughout the year. I just signed on with Harper Collins for my next book and Patrick has built a recording studio in the extra room. He released one CD already and we'll have his others on sale here soon! Our kids are 19 (DeAngelo) and 16 (Maya) We have five Chihuahuas: Ozzy, Bianca, ChaCha, Bootsie and Captain Kirk.
We love the story of our climb to semi-success. The good and yes - even the bad. One great thing is that from the very start, we got gobs of national press that showcased our talent. We built a huge loyal customer base that we still see today. That's what got us through those rough times. We knew we had something special that made people happy. Never once did we even think of giving up our art. We love it too much. Our goal now is to inspire other people to express themselves through art.
We wouldn't change any of our past.
Well, except the gravy ladle gift for my mom.
What was I thinking??
Update as of spring 2007: We were featured on NPR's Weekend Edition. Our web stats went crazy! Patrick and I decided we would give our artsy life 12 months to go to the next level or bow out gracefully and get regular people "9-5" type of jobs. We had no idea what that next level was, but we knew we had to think about our two kids and their college education. Living and doing the daily financial hustle as an artist is hard. Fun, but hard. We told ourselves - and the universe - that we were ready to do whatever we needed to go full thorttle in our art careers.
One month later I was apporached by Duncan Enterprises about launching a Crafty Chica product line. I said "YES!" and two months later they offered me a full-time dream job designing the line. I left the Arizona Republic, a job I adored and loved for so many years, but I still write my weekly craft column.
I also signed on with Potter Craft for my seventh title, a sewing book!
There was another reason to celebrate this year. In 2004 for National Novel Writing Month, I wrote a novel called "Love Shine". That book went up for sale to book editors in July and after considering offers from three different publishers, I ended up with a two-book deal with Grand Central Publishing.
OK, next crazy thing?
Lifetime TV signed me on to host my own webisode series! It's called "Crafting With the Chica" and I demo all kinds of crafty ideas!
One more...
Target and Borders contacted me last summer to sell my handmade goodies. Borders wanted my purses and I couldn't meet the demand, but the Target one worked out real swell!
So here is our advice to any other struggling artists out there. Stay true to who you are. Keep it fresh, come up with new designs as much as you can, work every press angle you can and polish u p your web site. Think positive, do not think/worry about failing. Why waste your energy on that?
UPDATE 2010: Our Crafty Chica product line is in full swing! My sewing book came out last year and I'm waiting to hear about my next craft book. My novel, now title WAKING UP IN TH ELAND OF GLITTER, comes out on March 1st, 2010. We are still making our crafts!
Los Mestizos: Chicano Pop Art
Phoenix, AZ
(623) 847-3750
info@craftychica.com
info@craftychica.com