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Staging Sips

Staging Sips

By: Lori Fischer
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The live-workshop style business podcast helping Real Estate Staging CEO's redefine success and chase big, beautiful dreams. With mini implementation plans, expert interviews, and behind-the-scenes of my own business learning curves...you will be able to roll up your sleeves, dive in and stage the heck out of your business!2022 Economics Marketing Marketing & Sales
Episodes
  • MVP: Why Staging Business Growth Starts With You

    MVP: Why Staging Business Growth Starts With You
    Oct 10 2026
    The real driver behind staging business growth. When you want to focus on staging business growth, it's easy to look outward. More clients. More inventory. More bookings. More revenue. Those things can certainly signal growth. But they aren't the whole story. Because if your business is growing faster than your capacity to lead it, growth can start to feel less like success and more like something chasing you. You may have more clients but less time. More revenue but more pressure. A bigger team but more decisions landing on your desk. At some point, you have to stop asking, "How can I do more?" and start asking, "What needs to change so I can lead the business I want?" Your business can only grow as far as your leadership, systems, decision-making, and personal capacity can support it. What worked when your staging business was smaller may not work as you take on more clients, manage a team, or pursue bigger financial goals. Maybe you used to do everything yourself because you had to. Maybe saying yes to every opportunity helped you get established. Maybe working longer hours was necessary for a season. But growth requires you to grow, too. That might mean becoming more comfortable delegating, setting stronger boundaries, making decisions with confidence, or letting go of responsibilities that no longer belong on your plate. Don't measure growth by numbers alone. It's natural to measure business growth by revenue, clients, inventory, or team size. But what about your energy? Your confidence? Your ability to step away from the business without worrying that everything will fall apart? Those are measures of growth, too. A business that produces more revenue but leaves you exhausted and overwhelmed isn't necessarily moving in the direction you want. The goal isn't simply to build a bigger staging business, but to build one that supports the life you actually want. There is no single formula for a successful staging business. One owner may want a large team and multiple markets. Another may want a small, highly profitable business with plenty of time away from work. Neither is wrong. The important thing is that your growth reflects what you want, not what you think a successful staging business is supposed to look like. So before setting your next growth goal, ask yourself: What would make my business feel better, not just bigger? Maybe it's more revenue. Maybe it's fewer clients. Maybe it's a team you can trust. Maybe it's finally taking a real vacation without checking your phone every hour. Whatever your answer is, let it guide your next move. Because the strongest businesses aren't built by endlessly asking, "What more can I do?" They're built by asking, "What needs to change so I can lead this business well?" Your staging business doesn't just need to grow. You need room to grow with it. And when you do, growth can become something you lead—not something that leads you. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN FROM THIS EPISODE: Why external growth isn't the only measure of business successThe difference between growing your business and growing your capacityWhy your definition of success may need to evolveHow to create a business that supports the life you want RESOURCES: Apply for Private Coaching: www.rethinkhomeinteriors.com/privatecoachingappEnroll in Staging Business School Accelerate Track: www.rethinkhomeinteriors.com/accelerateJoin the Staging Business School Growth Track Waitlist: www.rethinkhomeinteriors.com/growthFollow the Staging Business School on Instagram: www.instagram.com/stagingbusinessschoolFollow Lori on Instagram: www.instagram.com/rethinkhome If you want to learn how to streamline your operations so you can grow with less stress and burnout in your staging business, enrollment is open for Staging Business School Accelerate Track. I'd love to see you in the classroom! ENJOY THE SHOW? Leave a 5-star review on Apple Podcasts so that more Staging CEO's find it. Also, include links to your socials so that more Staging CEOs can find you.Follow over on Spotify, Stitcher, Amazon Music, or Audible.
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    17 mins
  • The 30-Day Challenge Every Staging Business Owner Should Take

    The 30-Day Challenge Every Staging Business Owner Should Take
    Oct 3 2026

    Could Your Staging Business Run Without You for 30 Days?

    What would happen if you disappeared from your staging business for 30 days—and your team couldn't call, text, email, or send a carrier pigeon to get your help?

    In this episode of Staging Sips, Lori shares a powerful story from an Accelerate client whose operations manager went on vacation and, instead of handing everything back to the owner, trained another team member to step in and confidently take over.

    That's the kind of delegation that creates real freedom in a business.

    Lori breaks down why hiring the right people is only part of the equation, how we can unintentionally train capable team members to depend on us, and why letting go often requires just as much development from the business owner as it does from the team.

    You'll also hear about the 30-Day Challenge, a simple exercise to uncover exactly where your staging business still depends on you—and where your team may be capable of far more than you've allowed them to prove.

    LEARN MORE ABOUT STAGING BUSINESS SCHOOL HERE

    WHAT YOU'LL LEARN FROM THIS EPISODE:

    • Why delegation doesn't end when you hand off a task
    • How owners accidentally become the backup plan for everything
    • Why your team needs opportunities to make decisions without you
    • The mindset work behind truly letting go
    • How systems like Harlowe can help information live in the business instead of in the owner's head
    • The 30-Day Challenge you can use with your own staging business

    Because the goal isn't absence.

    It's optionality.

    The ability to work in your business because you want to be there—not because everything stops when you're not.

    RESOURCES:

    • Share your wins and your questions! 1-800-305-7050
    • Join the Harlowe Inner Circle Waitlist here: https://waitlist.harloweco.com
    • Apply for Private Coaching: www.rethinkhomeinteriors.com/privatecoachingapp
    • Enroll in Staging Business School Accelerate Track: www.rethinkhomeinteriors.com/accelerate
    • Follow Harlowe on Instagram: www.instagram.com/meetharlowe
    • Follow the Staging Business School on Instagram: www.instagram.com/stagingbusinessschool

    If you want to learn how to market and grow your stagin
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    26 mins
  • How My Mom Built a Business That Lasted 50 Years

    How My Mom Built a Business That Lasted 50 Years
    Sep 26 2026
    What does it take to build a business that lasts 50 years? For this episode, I'm sitting down with someone who has shaped so much of the way I think about business: my mom, Gina Hutchinson. Fifty years ago, she started what would become the Red Stars baton twirling program. She wasn't setting out to become an entrepreneur. She was a schoolteacher who agreed to coach a high school majorette team, started giving 50-cent baton lessons after school, and eventually found herself with a growing business of her own. Over the next five decades, that business evolved in ways she never could have predicted. Her teams competed nationally, traveled around the world, performed in places like Spain and the Soviet Union, and created opportunities for generations of young women. And along the way, she learned a whole lot about running a business. You Don't Have to Have It All Figured Out When my mom started teaching baton, there was no grand business plan. In fact, she says pretty clearly in this episode that she had no intention of starting a business. One opportunity simply led to another. She took on the majorette team. Parents started asking for lessons. Someone offered her space above a furniture store. She suddenly had rent to pay, which meant she had to start thinking about pricing, expenses, and what it actually meant to run a business. Sometimes we think we need to know exactly what the business will become before we begin. Her story is a pretty great reminder that you can start with what you know, pay attention to what's working, and allow the business to evolve from there. Sometimes You Have to Jump Out on a Limb One of the things I've always admired about my mom is her willingness to ask, How could this work? That willingness took her teams from New Hampshire to national competitions at Notre Dame and eventually around the world. She didn't always know what would happen when she said yes. She hadn't competed herself when she first brought her team to a competition. She had never been to nationals when she decided to take a group there. And when an opportunity came along to take the Red Stars to Spain, she had no idea whether the families would even agree to go. She explored the possibility anyway. As she says in this episode, sometimes you have to "jump out on a limb." Sometimes the limb holds. Sometimes it doesn't. Either way, you learn something. Build Your Business Around a Standard One of the biggest reasons the Red Stars have lasted for 50 years is that my mom has always been clear about what the team represents. Talent mattered. Winning mattered. But how the kids behaved, how they treated one another, how they represented the team, and the kind of people they became mattered, too. Over time, those expectations became the standard of the business. And that standard helped her make some difficult decisions. There have been students, parents, and even team situations over the years that simply weren't the right fit. Walking away sometimes meant taking a financial hit. But protecting the culture and the long-term health of the business mattered more. That's a lesson that applies to any business. Sometimes keeping the wrong client, employee, or opportunity costs far more than letting it go. Find People You Can Trust For years, my mom did everything herself. Eventually, she built a team of coaches who understood her expectations because many of them had actually grown up in the Red Stars program themselves. That became incredibly important in 2025 when a major health issue unexpectedly took her completely out of the business. Her staff had to step in and run it without her. And they did. The business kept going because she had spent years teaching them the standard, giving them responsibility, supporting them, and building a team she could trust. For any business owner who has ever thought, My clients only want me or Nobody will do it the way I do it, there's an important lesson here. Your team needs the opportunity to learn how to carry the business with you. Build Something That Can Evolve My mom will be the first person to tell you that the business she runs today isn't the business she imagined 50 years ago. It evolved. She learned. She adjusted. She took opportunities she hadn't planned for. She figured out what she was uniquely good at. She brought in people who could help. She made difficult decisions when something no longer fit. And after 50 years, she's still thinking about what comes next. That's probably one of my favorite lessons from this entire conversation. You don't need to know exactly what your business will look like five, ten, or fifty years from now. You need to keep paying attention, keep learning, and be willing to let it evolve. WHAT YOU'LL LEARN FROM THIS EPISODE: How my mom turned 50-cent baton lessons into a business that has lasted 50 years Why you don't have to have everything figured out before you start How taking risks created opportunities she never could have planned ...
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    58 mins
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