As the chief executive officer of Craft-e-Corner, Dean Duehring tells his team that it is okay to make mistakes as long as you learn from them. “We make it a point to take the time to dig into and evaluate our mistakes to ensure we in fact do learn from them,” he said.
The journey of growth for Craft-e-Corner has been that of continually learning how to adapt and change, said Duehring. While teaching high school economics, Duehring found the value of e-commerce in 2008, selling new items at a fixed price on eBay. Noticing a massive demand for Cricut machines, Duehring contacted Cricut and forged an agreement to sell their products online while using his garage as a warehouse. He earned the trust of Cricut and became the only authorized retailer other than Cricut themselves to sell in the Amazon and Walmart marketplaces.
Within the company’s first year, sales reached $1 million, and his garage space was maxed out. The pandemic caused massive growth for the company in 2020 and 2021. The last three years have been perpetually changing with a move from a 7,000 square-foot warehouse in 2021 to purchasing a 30,000-plus square-foot warehouse. Employees grew to 20+, and sales grew to a peak of over $58 million dollars in a 12-year span.
“Our core mission is to serve others better,” said Duehring. “To do this requires us to rethink and reinvent how we do things. I believe if people continue to learn and grow, then they will continue to be passionate and enthusiastic at work and in life. In addition to being passionate about improving ourselves, we also do things to remind our team that we are serving real people every day.”
The work in e-commerce continues to get more technical, said Duehring. “Craft-e-Corner has always leveraged technology and software to tackle the complex challenges we face,” he said. “Despite this, we continue to look for and implement new software tools in a variety of areas, particularly in forecasting and ordering.”
Hiring for the Christmas rush requires strategic planning, too. “I ask new hires what it feels like to open up a package, and for many, it’s like a mini-Christmas,” he said. “I tell our team that they make hundreds of mini-Christmases happen every day. I tell them I wish I could package that excitement for each order and show them how what they did helped someone feel so excited and happy to open that package.”