Creative teacher finds clothing niche

COEUR d’ALENE – Jodi Crisp isn’t your average business owner.

In a day’s work, her entrepreneurial duties include answering calls, filling out forms and devising fashion blueprints while also heeding the more motherly calls of being a work-at-home mother of two.

In the basement of the family’s unassuming Coeur d’Alene home, Crisp, a former elementary school teacher for five years, has been operating her children’s clothing company, Roslyn’s Closet, for almost a year.

She has watched not only her and husband Michael’s young children, Roslyn and Brennan, develop but also the homegrown business she started from scratch. Her clothing line now is carried in eight boutiques and also is widely available at several online sites.

It has been a noteworthy start for a mother who had just wanted to find unusual clothing to match her children’s distinctive personalities.

“I feel like we are very limited in getting stylish clothes for kids,” she said. “I wanted my kids’ clothing to stand out from the crowd and also say something about who they were.”

Crisp’s business enterprise was the result of a bout of home-based restlessness. As a self-described doodler who reveled in the creativity of an elementary school classroom, Crisp decided she needed an occupational outlet that would match her new motherhood lifestyle.

“I realized that I really wanted to be home with the children. That was the beginning of something stirring in me to stay at home,” she said. “I wanted something that was completely my own that I could build however I wanted.”

After meeting other work-at-home mothers through an online community, the teacher-turned-entrepreneur set up a modest workstation in the basement of her home, thus offsetting some of the start-up costs that burden many new businesses.

With a room equipped as a do-it-yourself assembly line, a high-quality cotton distributor on board, a network of friends and family members by her side and inspiration from her own kids’ childhood, the 29-year-old put her one-woman show’s production plans into action.

A nightly routine has since transpired: When the kids go to bed, mom goes to work.

“I wanted her to be as successful as she wanted to be,” said husband Michael, who works at a publishing company in town and encouraged his wife from the beginning. “And she’s done that really well. …

“You want the best. I’m just excited for her to do what she wants to do. With the freedom it allows, it’s a job she can do from anywhere,” he said.

Heidi Frazier, a childhood friend of Jodi Crisp’s, also encouraged her creative enterprise.

“She’s always been artistic and extremely creative, and I think she found a niche she could run with,” Frazier said. “Jodi absolutely loves what she does.”

To help move the first fashion lines out the family door, Crisp took advantage of today’s wired world by offering her custom children’s clothing through her own Web site, which was built by her father in North Carolina, as well as on www.etsy.com, an online retailer featuring handmade items.

Though Crisp has set up booths at various street fairs and other local events to showcase her creations, the online community has proved to be the biggest source of business.

“That has actually been incredible for me,” Crisp said. “It just sort of snowballed. It keeps getting better every month.”

On the local level, the fashion designer was encouraged to mail some samples, including best sellers such as her whimsical T-shirts and hats featuring phrases such as “Big Sister,” “Little Brother” and “iPood,” to Coeur d’Alene’s Sweetpea Home Interiors.

“We just fell in love” with Crisp’s children’s clothing, said store manager Kate Vaughan.

“We try to carry a lot of local products – it’s nice to offer those things,” Vaughan said, adding that Roslyn’s Closet items are restocked every other month. “I think the local market has really embraced her.”

Prices average from $16 to $18, and Crisp says the quality and distinctiveness of each hand-designed outfit separate her clothes from the cookie-cutter fashions mass-produced for big-box retailers.

“I have not seen anything else like it out there. I try to keep my designs timeless and sweet,” she said.

As for her around-the-clock schedule, Crisp says she feels as if she has found the sweet spot between motherhood and business owner.

“I feel really fulfilled now with what I’m doing,” she said. “I’m very thankful, I feel like I’ve got the best of both worlds.”