The DesignDash Podcast
The DesignDash podcast is a guide to designing a life you love. Co-hosts Laura Umansky and Melissa Grove dive into what it takes for women to feel fulfilled both personally and professionally, to live their lives to the fullest and without compromise. Special guests will share their own journeys, their successes and their challenges, as they pursue life with curiosity and intention.
Episodes
When something goes wrong on a project, do you tell the client — or just fix it?
Every designer and every ops lead hits this moment: a price jumps, a piece gets discontinued, a wall opens up and reveals a mess nobody saw coming. Do you loop the client in immediately, or handle it quietly and move on?
In this episode, Melissa and Laura pull back the curtain on the calls they make behind the scenes every single day, from six-fi...
Callie Blanks shares how renovating fixer-uppers, a background in business and marketing, and a strong point of view shaped her unconventional path into interior design. She also opens up about pricing with confidence, building a business through Instagram, investing in professional photography, and taking the leap to open her own design studio and showroom.
In this episode, Laura and Melissa explore how defining your ideal client or avatar can transform your marketing and project selection. They share practical tips on identifying, refining, and communicating with your perfect audience to grow a more fulfilling and profitable business.
If your inquiries never quite match the work you want to be doing, this is the episode that tells you why, and what to do about it.
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In this episode, Adriana Hoyos shares her inspiring journey from a self-made interior designer in Ecuador to a globally recognized furniture and interior design brand. Discover her unique design philosophy, the importance of legacy, and how family and resilience drive her success.
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In this episode, Anne Golliher, founder of Storied Interiors, shares her unique approach to interior design, focusing on using clients' existing pieces and creating meaningful, personalized spaces. She discusses her journey, business philosophy, and how she connects emotionally with clients while building a profitable business.
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Every discount you've ever given a client told them something you didn't mean to say.
If you lowered your rate, you confirmed it was never fixed. If you passed along a discount without being asked, you told them your margins are bigger than they let on. Clients read pricing behavior like a signal, whether you intend to send one or not.
In this episode, we discuss the two places money moves in a design firm: services and product. Mo...
Cheryl Luckett didn't quit her corporate job on a whim, she engineered her exit. Down to the month.
Recorded live at High Point Market, this episode traces how Cheryl went from a decade-long career as a corporate dietician to founding Dwell by Cheryl, now a nationally recognized design firm with lice...
Most designers are doing marketing backwards, and it's costing them the exact clients they want.
In this episode we're getting brutally specific: the three things that actually bring in new clients right now, and the three things everyone's doing that feel productive but won't move the needle at all.
One of these strategies has turned a single handwritten note into a six-figure renovation years later. Another has closed a client in...
The indecisive client isn't your problem. Your process is.
Most designers diagnose revision chaos as a client personality flaw. The ones running the tightest, most profitable studios know it's a systems failure, and there's a fix.
In ...
Capacity is a ceiling most designers never expect to hit. Until they do.
The inquiry is perfect. The scope is substantial. The client is exactly who you've been optimizing your portfolio to attract. And your studio is already running at full stretch.
We hired two interns this summer. Here's what most firms get completely wrong.
There's a version of the summer intern that costs you time, energy, and patience. And there's a version that quietly transforms your studio, generates revenue, and hands you back your bandwidth.
...It's May. And I need you to do the math with me for a second.
Seven months until December 31st. Seven months to actually make this the year you said it was going to be back in January.
Most de...
Most interior designers know they need help running their business. What they don't know is what that person is called, what they actually do, or how to find them without hiring the wrong one and starting over. Laura Umansky and COO Melissa Grove have lived both sides of this, and in this episode they get into all of it.
If you've ever searched "when should I hire help for my business," "how to scale an interior design firm," or ju...
At some point, every designer running a serious business has to answer this: how much of who you are belongs on your brand?
You've built something. A reputation. A clientele. A body of work that speaks for itself. And now, in a world where staying silent reads as a stance and speaking up can cost you a room you've spent years earning a seat in, you're being asked to decide, over and over again, where you stand.
Do you keep your bra...
As a designer, is there a big benefit to opening a storefront?
Okay, we're just going to say it, we get this question constantly. And honestly? It deserves a real answer. Not the romanticized version. The actual one.
You did everything right. You hired someone. You showed them the ropes. And yet things keep going wrong.
Deadlines missed. Mistakes repeated. Instructions ignored. And the frustration is building.
Why does marketing feel so hard… even for creative people who run successful design businesses?
If you’ve ever stared at Instagram wondering what to post… questioned whether marketing is even working… or felt like you’re supposed to know how to do it all yourself… this episode is for you.
In this episode, we're digging into a question we hear constantly inside the Design Dash community: Why d...
Hiring more designers should mean more profit… right?
That’s what most firm owners assume. More people, more projects, more revenue. Simple math.
Except it’s not simple. And if you’ve ever made a hire thinking it would solve your workload, only to feel like your margins got tighter instead of bigger… you know exactly what we're talking about.
In this episode, we're unpacking one question that keeps c...
Most designers don’t realize they’re undercharging… until the business starts feeling heavier than it should.
In this episode, we ask a simple but uncomfortable question: Are you charging enough for your design time?
What started as a quick discussion turned into a deeper conversation about pricing, confidence, positioning, and why so many designers stay busy but still feel like the numbers never quite work.
We t...
Do you actually want to run a profitable business… or do you just want to be liked?
It’s a tough question. And if you’re a creative business owner, it might hit a little closer to home than you’d like.
Because somewhere along the way, many of us start believing that being a “good” designer means saying yes… cutting our time… absorbing costs… or bending our process so clients...
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