Koryn Campbell: Owner Of Plant The Studio

An interview with Koryn Campbell, owner of Plant The Studio. Koryn Campbell is the owner of Plant The Studio, a small business that specializes in selling uncommon and rare houseplants. Plant the Studio sells plants online through their website and on Etsy, along with a physical store in Brooklyn, New York. Koryn sells rare and hard to find tropical plants that she imports from outside of the United States. She has grown this business from just herself selling plants on Instagram to a successful small business with 22,000+ online sales and a successful physical shop. Koryn and I were friends back in undergrad and we keep in touch via social media. The interview took place over Zoom. I started the interview by asking Koryn why she wanted to

She did this for around 3 months and used the profit to create a website. From here, she was able to drive more traffic to her Instagram and get more sales. Throughout this time she kept importing plants from Thailand and Ecuador. After one year she opened an Esty shop. This was an important shift for her business since she could reach way more people with an Etsy shop. Koryn admitted she finally felt like a legitimate business once she opened the Etsy shop, since it seems more official versus just selling plants on an Instagram account. Koryn continued to sell plants on her Etsy for the next three years. During this time she continued to look at plant trends so that she would know which imported plants would sell for the most in the US. Koryn mentioned that during this time it was important for her to turn her small business into a brand, create a business Instagram and invest more money into her website during this time. After three years of doing Plant The Studio as a hobby, Koryn decided to quit her full time job and make her small business her new full time job. It was not a difficult decision for her to make, as Koryn was not connected to her past

I ended the interview by asking Koryn about the future of Plant Studio. Koryn told me that she had big plans to scale up her business, but she did not want to do anything until 2025. She stays busy with the online shop and the physical store. Koryn did mention that in the future she would like to open more physical stores in New York and maybe in other major cities. This year, Koryn wants to focus on maintaining the business while planning out the next steps. She also mentioned that she wants to keep her business small intentionally, as she created Plant The Studio as an alternative to big box plant stores. The last thing Koryn mentioned was that she enjoys being an entrepreneur and believes it was the best career move she could have made. After the interview, I did a bit of digging to better understand the houseplant business.I found out that big box plant stores include popular home improvement stores, such as Home Depot, as well as garden centers and nurseries. These places get their plants from commercial growers and have little control over the inventory that is available to