All About Tansy, the only Black Women owned Nursery in LA County – Celebrating Women of Color Business Owners

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX Studios, it’s time for Women In Motion. Brought to you by WBEC-West. Join forces. Succeed together. Now, here’s your host.

Lee Kantor: Lee Kantor here, another episode of Women In Motion and this is going to be a good one. But before we get started, it’s important to recognize our sponsor, WBEC-West. Without them, we couldn’t be sharing these important stories. Today on Women In Motion, we have Shawna Christian with Tansy. Welcome.

Shawna Christian: Hi everybody. Thanks for having me.

Lee Kantor: I am so excited to learn what you’re up to. Tell us a little bit about Tansy.

Shawna Christian: So, Tansy is a plant nursery. It is also home décor accent shop. We have items from all around the world. It’s insanely colorful. It evokes so much emotion and joy. It’s my baby.

Lee Kantor: So, what’s your back story? Have you always been involved in this kind of business?

Shawna Christian: You know, after dedicating 24 years to the management of a very successful outsource IT firm, I had a very close friend passed away suddenly, and it just made me realize that it was time for a change. That as much as I loved my old job, my old business, it was just time to move on. I was in that later part of my life. My kids were grown. And I, for the last 10 to 15 years, had really become obsessed with plants and home décor and just, essentially, making your home a sanctuary. Your home is your safe space, and I learned that very early on, and it was one of those things that I just got really good at.

Lee Kantor: Now, can you talk about kind of the decision to change careers. Like you had a passion, obviously, you were enjoying it in your own life. Can you go through kind of the thought process and maybe how you came to actually taking action on this and not just keeping it in the background? Like a lot of people do with their dreams, they’re like, “Oh, yeah. I’ll get to it whenever.” But can you walk us through what it took to go from, “Yeah, I’m going to do this” to actually doing this.

Shawna Christian: Yeah, definitely. So, it was a few things happening. It was the realization that, you know, life is just so short. The person who I actually spoke about that passed away suddenly, he was on the brink of changing his life. He was about to live his lifelong dream about a couple of weeks away from it before he passed away suddenly. So, that was a pretty big impetus for me.

Shawna Christian: I had been with this company for 24 years. It afforded me an amazing life. I made a very good salary. It’s very comfortable. I had helped build it from the ground up. It was just amazing. And once I turned 50, I realized that if I didn’t change up what I was doing now, I was never going to do it. I didn’t want to die there, so to speak. I had all these ideas of other things I had wanted to do.

Shawna Christian: And I have to say, I do feel like I had a little bit of a leg up because I had run a company for so long, I feel like I had already had the skills to be able to do this specifically. And once you get over the fear, which I think is the biggest piece that stops you from doing things, it’s kind of like all – what is it? – move ahead. Everybody go. Let’s do this.

Shawna Christian: It was definitely a very quick transition for me, unfortunately. I would have liked to have it been a little bit slower, because it feels like I did think it through, but I didn’t think it through deep enough, if that makes any sense. It was one of those things where I said, “Oh. This would be very neat to do. Let me see if I can sit down and write a business plan.” I wrote the business plan. Then, I was thinking, “Hmm. I wonder if I can get a small business loan off this business plan?” And I applied for a small business loan and got approved. And then, two weeks later, we found a space in Burbank to renovate and to do. It all happened so quickly, I almost didn’t even have time to scare myself out of it.

Lee Kantor: Did you go through kind of a pros and cons or playing out “Okay. What’s the worst thing that can happen?” Like did you get into that side of it as well?

Shawna Christian: Yeah. Oh, definitely. Definitely. And honestly, you know, writing down the pros and cons list as I was talking about fear, the biggest thing for me was what is the worst possible scenario that can happen from me doing this. And, really, I’m not going to be homeless. I have an amazing support group around me that would always help me if ever need be. I will always have clothes on my back. I will always be able to get food.

Shawna Christian: Really, the biggest fear was, “Oh. It might not work. I might have to owe some people money. Maybe I have to claim bankruptcy.” But, really, when it came down to it, the pros and cons, the list of pros, even when you first write it down, it could be the same amount, or you could even have more cons than pros per se. But then once you do it, the amount of pros that come up just from living in that life just supersedes it. It is hands down I would never go back.

Lee Kantor: And it’s funny doing the exercise like you did, in which a lot of people do is, you know, kind of imagining or catastrophizing the worst possible scenarios that could happen. A lot of time we don’t spend as much time on what are the best possible outcomes. We focus only on what are the bad things that can happen, but we don’t even anticipate all of the positives that are going to come out of it.

Shawna Christian: Yeah. And, honestly, I couldn’t even have told you most of the positives that have come out of it so far. Like, I couldn’t have told you in the beginning. I really needed to do this and to work through it and to see what basically came out of it, because it’s basically shaped my whole life and it has completely changed the direction of me.

Lee Kantor: Now, talk about those early days when you’re coming from a more established company and a comfortable kind of day-to-day routine, I’m sure, to now this more chaotic, more make some stuff up as we go scenario that you kind of thrust yourself into.

Shawna Christian: Yeah. Robbing Peter to pay Paul, essentially. It’s funny, we like being comfortable as human beings. We like being in something that we know, that there’s not a lot of change, what have you. But with that, there’s definitely no growth. You get to a certain point where if you could do this in your sleep, I don’t know how you stay awake for your normal daily life.

Shawna Christian: It is crazy to own your own business. It’s insane. There are days where I am putting fire after fire after fire out. There are days where I’m wondering sometimes how I’m going to pay payroll. And then, there are other days where we get to see what we’ve accomplished and what we’ve done. And that just makes it all worth it. Do I miss having money and not worrying about money? Definitely. Definitely. But again, I would never go back. It’s only up. It’s only up from here.

Lee Kantor: Yeah. I think what happens to a lot of people who choose this entrepreneurial route is they kind of become unhirable because they get used to “Hey, we’re making things happen and we’re just figuring it out,” and you don’t have kind of the patience for a lot of the bureaucracy or politics that happen in more of a corporate environment.

Shawna Christian: Oh, definitely. Definitely. Your tolerance is definitely not the same. And it’s that thing, too, I think that when you live in every moment and there’s reaction to every moment, that’s how you come across. And being in a corporate environment, that just doesn’t work. You either look unstable, or you look like you’re a maverick, or you look like you’re not really part of the team. But I had a great mentor, the gentleman who owned the company that I worked for, for 24 years, he was an expert at it. He bobbed and weaved like I’ve never seen. And, honestly, it’s something I probably couldn’t have even learned in college. It was definitely a great education.

Lee Kantor: So, why do you think that so many people are afraid to kind of take the leap that you have made? What does it take to overcome that fear?

Shawna Christian: I think a lot of it stems from having very low self-confidence. It’s scary to think that you could basically maybe take away a safety net to do something that you love, but I think it’s more in the idea that you’re not 100 percent sure you believe in what it is you’re doing, whether you’re making art, or you’re coming up with a new invention, or you’re trying to bring a service to people that maybe isn’t around. You have these seeds of self-doubt, like “Why hasn’t somebody done this before?” or “Nobody’s going to want to buy this art of mine, only I like it.”

Shawna Christian: I think until you get over the self-doubt, you’re never going to fully jump, you’re never going to fully leave that life and really extend yourself and try and do something different. I think, unfortunately, it’s human nature, but fear is the driving force behind so many things, so many things. And like you were saying, the fact that you can think of all these cons, but nobody really stops to think of the pros. It’s a mindset. It is totally a mindset.

Shawna Christian: And I can’t say that this is like an automatic switch, like just think positive. It’s not that at all. It’s literally going through the idea of you have to stop worrying what people think about you. You have to be insanely strong and confident in what it is you’re bringing to the masses or to your customers, your clients. Once you’re there and you really, really love what you’re doing, and nobody’s going to tell you different, that fear of doing it, it dissipates. It goes away. It really does.

Lee Kantor: Yeah. The first sale you have to make is to yourself.

Shawna Christian: Yeah, yeah. If you don’t believe in yourself, you are not going to con anybody else to do this for you at all, at all.

Lee Kantor: And that comes across. That’s not something you can really fake. People can sense if you’re really all in or not.

Shawna Christian: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Again, it’s just confidence is such a huge thing. I think a lot of people are born with it. I think some people aren’t. I think some people have to learn it. But it has to be a jumping point. If you don’t have the confidence, you will always stop yourself. There will always be something in the back of your head telling you why you’re going to fail or why you shouldn’t be doing this.

Lee Kantor: Now, you mentioned some of the positives that you didn’t kind of anticipate, can you share some of those moments where you were like, “Hey, I am making an impact. My work is important and this thing is working.”

Shawna Christian: I think the biggest thing for me was I never really was a person who sat in the idea of pushing my femininity out into the open, my race. I’ve always felt like I’m Shawna, and I never really defined myself in any manner. It really just wasn’t a thing for me. I’m of mixed race. I was raised in different religious households. I had to adapt pretty much my whole life, which was great, but it made it so I never really thought about what I was or who I am. I just was always just very confident.

Shawna Christian: And doing this has shown me that everybody is different, but it’s the amount of women who I have come across who don’t know how to begin changing their lives. The amount of women who DM me, they email, they call, they come into the shop, and it’s always “Can I take you to lunch? Can I take you to breakfast? I just want to pick your brain. How did you start? What made you want to do this?”

Shawna Christian: And, really, the biggest piece for me was there is this need to not educate, but to help other women find their voice and find their vehicle to basically take control of what it is they’re doing and for them to just become insanely proud of it. And it was something that I didn’t realize that it was a need. It just hadn’t really occurred to me. But it’s the biggest thing in my life right now. And I’d have to go straight down to the fact that I had a great mentor, I think it’s the same thing.

Lee Kantor: And it’s probably one of those things where while you were having that mentorship, it just probably organically occurred during your day-to-day life and you don’t realize how other people are lacking that.

Shawna Christian: Yeah. Yeah, definitely. You don’t. I mean, it’s that idea that when you put your child into, say, an advanced class, most times your child will basically push themselves forward to try and stay in that advanced class as opposed to if you’re going to put a child into a class where kids are like messing around and not doing much, what do you think that child’s going to do? And so, you don’t realize when you’re being mentored or actually people are showing you things on how to do and how to be, I can’t even put a monetary value on it.

Shawna Christian: I’m so grateful that I got 24 years of just the most amazing mentor in the world. And I realized it’s this whole idea of pay it forward. And it’s what I want to do. It’s made something where I have now found my life’s mission from opening this business, where if you had asked me when I first opened the business, this wasn’t even on my radar.

Lee Kantor: Now, for folks who haven’t been to Tansy, can you explain how Tansy is different? Like, you used the word nursery, but it’s a lot more than a nursery. It’s a community. And you’re doing work that goes well beyond buying a plant for the yard. Can you talk about how you’ve kind of reframed what a nursery could be and you’ve created this third place, really?

Shawna Christian: You know, it’s funny, it was this idea that I wanted to sell plants and I wanted to sell things that I would only have in my own house. That was kind of how it started. And it turned into the most insane community. People come to our shop and it’s their field trip for the day. The shop itself, because of all the color and all of the curation that’s been put into this shop, whether it’s stuff for your home or it’s gifts or it is the plant room, it evokes so much emotion from people.

Shawna Christian: We always know when it’s somebody’s first time when they come in. The look on their face, it is something I wish I could bottle. It is amazing to see. The amount of community that we have been able to create, we have workshops, and we have parties, we have pop-ups. We are very supportive of local artists. Half the items in our shop are of local artists. And it has turned into something that is just, again, I could never imagine the vehicle in which this was going to become. It’s just been amazing.

Shawna Christian: We also have what I call the Teen Titan program. We have girls ages 9 through 13 – I have a waiting list every summer at this point – and we pick basically seven girls, and each one gets a day to come in over summer and they get to work four hours one day a week. And they get to learn how to run a business. They get to learn how to help customers. They get to learn about plants.

Shawna Christian: And the biggest piece for me is this idea that ages 9 through 13, that is like the most uncomfortable age for a girl. You don’t know your voice, you don’t know your body, everything is like pins and needles. And you get these girls in there and the first day they’re there, you can barely hear what they’re saying because they’re just so guarded and just don’t know how to talk. And then, you get to the end of summer and we have people coming in the door and they’re like, “Hi. Welcome to Tansy. Can I help you find something? Here, let me walk you over. So, tell me, how well do you know plants?” It is amazing. It is amazing.

Shawna Christian: And so, this whole business has turned into something I could just never have forecasted.

Lee Kantor: Yeah. That wasn’t in the business plan, I’m sure.

Shawna Christian: Not at all.

Lee Kantor: And that’s the beauty of entrepreneurship, you can adjust to the new information you’re getting as it’s happening. That didn’t have to go to a committee and a board to make a decision.

Shawna Christian: Right. No, I didn’t have to get approval for it. It’s very nice to feel like you get to make your own decisions, as scary as it might be sometimes.

Lee Kantor: Now, why was it important for you to become part of the WBEC-West community?

Shawna Christian: So, I hadn’t realized what a community it was. Initially, when I had first opened my business, a friend of mine, a mentor of mine had said this is something you might want to look into. And it’s one of the only women I know who is just, you know, years ahead of me when it comes to business, and everything she says I listen to. And so, I looked into it, I started down the path and I kind of gave up halfway. It was a lot. COVID hit. We were bobbing and weaving trying to kind of figure out how we were going to stay open. And it was a lot of paperwork. And I kind of gave it up.

Shawna Christian: Well, fast forward, I have this master plan of something that we have in the works that involves women, and it involves women around the country. And my friend, one of my mentors had basically said, “Hey, you might want to try this again. I think it would be really good.” And so, I finally had time. I did my research and I was blown away. I was blown away at the amount of female support that WBEC gives. I had no idea. I had no idea.

Shawna Christian: It was one of those things where I had been trying to do what they do on a large scale. For me, trying to do it on this really, really small scale for women that I’m meeting, not even realizing that this network that WBEC offers, it’s life changing. It’s life changing. And I am so proud and excited to be part of it.

Lee Kantor: So, what do you need more of? How can we help you?

Shawna Christian: What do I need more of? I would like to have more group specific to industries. I would love to be able to have those groups where I can find where it’s great to have a retail group, but I would love to find a retail group that’s, say, in the top five biggest cities in America. Because it’s a major difference being the only Black female-owned nursery in all of Los Angeles County than it is for me to talk to somebody who they’re in retail and they might be selling candles and they have places in, like, Oklahoma and Florida or what have you. I like the idea of having just more defined meet and greets, if that makes any sense.

Lee Kantor: Right. With people that are kind of doing work maybe similar, maybe not exact, but tangentially connected to your kind of mission and vision.

Shawna Christian: Yeah, exactly. They don’t have to be into plants per se. But maybe they are – I don’t know. Maybe it is plants.

Lee Kantor: Who’s your ideal customer? Are they right now people in and around Burbank, in Los Angeles County? Can people order your things online?

Shawna Christian: Yeah, definitely. So, our demographic, it’s a good 70 percent women from ages, like literally, one, because we have children’s stuff as well, to 100 years old. We definitely are very well-established and liked within the LGBTQ community as well. We have a website, it’s shoptansy.com. We can ship all over the world. We don’t ship plants right now. It’s something we’re actually going to start doing. But we have our social media as well, it’s ShopTansyLA for Los Angeles. We did open a second location in Seattle last year, and so that’s ShopTansySEA. Our demographic is definitely highly female, but we cater to anybody who has a love of plants and color, honestly.

Lee Kantor: And that website is shoptansy, S-H-O-P-T-A-N-S-Y,.com.

Shawna Christian: You got it.

Lee Kantor: Well, Shawna, thank you so much for sharing your story today. You’re doing such important work and we appreciate you.

Shawna Christian: Thank you so much. And thank you again so much for even thinking of me and having me. I’m so excited to hear this.

Lee Kantor: All right. This is Lee Kantor. We’ll see you all next time on Women In Motion.