Today we’d like to introduce you to Sarah Agaton Howes.
Sarah, we appreciate you taking the time to share your story with us today. Where does your story begin?
Since I was a little kid, I have always had a hustle. I used to run a newspaper or haunted houses out of my garage when I was a kid, find lost dogs and would find a way to make a little money even as a young kid. When my kids were small, I was a stay-at-home mom and wanted to make some “snow pants money” so I started beading, sewing, and making for other folks. I often received a lot of panicked phone calls for funeral moccasins for loved ones and after a few years of making I realized what my community really needed was me to teach HOW to make moccasins and do our cultural art. Since then I have been fortunate to teach over 700 people how to make moccasins. I have made tutorials and also the bilingual moccasin pattern book as well as a slew of tips and tricks for youtube and other social media. I am committed to building a community of makers.
I am proud to say I receive a lot fewer funeral moccasin phone calls now. I hope that now there are 700 people who can provide this love and care for their families. Alongside this work, I was contacted by Louie Gong, the founder of Eighth Generation. He was starting the Inspired Natives project, a business capacity project for Native Artists, and “Was I interested?”. Let me tell you I lost my mind. I have always wanted to design and create more but had no idea where to start and I wanted to do business in a way that was in line with my values. I loved seeing how Louie combined community work with “WE” work and how we can all grow and thrive together. Louie mentored me on everything from using Adobe to building a website, to how to take good photos.
Being a part of the Inspired Natives has allowed me to grow into one of the most successful Ojibwe businesses in our area. We have been working together for 9 years and I absolutely love utilizing contemporary ways to continue our art and our stories. We are taking back entrepreneurship, building our own capacity to do business, and also! taking back the wool blanket. For 150 years the wool blanket market was dominated by Pendleton, a nonnative company that made millions of dollars off stolen pseudo-native art. We have changed the game. This has been the thrilling part of this work.
I went from beading at my kitchen table to have a warehouse with staff. I now design for everyone from architecture firms to tribes while still maintaining my family as the center of my life. I feel every day that I wish I could’ve dreamed up such an incredible life. It makes me wonder what else is possible if we can support each other.
Alright, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
Oh, this is a funny question. One of the biggest struggles of being a small native woman-owned business was my own internal dialogue. I didn’t realize how much the messages I had received or the lack of seeing businesses like mine limited my dream scope of what I could do. Louie really held the torch for me and led the way. I cannot say enough about how grateful I am for his mentorship, even when he was hard on me, I could have never gotten here alone. No one does this without support and community. On a practical level, there are ENDLESS challenges being an entrepreneur and this is the game.
Being a rural reservation business there is NO capacity for shipping, warehousing, internet, or other basic best practices that other city-based businesses receive. We have had to not only learn how to run websites, apps, email programs, meta ads, and marketing, but work with postal carriers who don’t want to ship for us and find dry places to keep goods, and it has ALWAYS been a challenge. None of this has to do with art. So I have had from 2-5 staff people working seasonally or ongoing and this is both amazing and challenging! Learning to be a boss has provided many lessons and I have failed and succeeded many, many times.
I am beyond grateful for everything I have learned over the past nine years. I hope life never gets boring.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Heart Berry, or Strawberry, in our language, is “Ode’imin” or literally Heart Berry. This has been a constant in my design work but also in the WAY I run my business and my life. Coming from the heart is a difficult but vital way to stay rooted and I am grateful to my Auntie Roxanne for teaching me this lesson. Heart Berry creates tools for makers to build a community of cultural artists, focused on moccasin making. We design custom art from logos to art installations, working collaboratively with tribes, organizations, and businesses.
We connect our cultural art and stories through contemporary design in home goods, wool blankets, apparel, and accessories. We also coordinate large givebacks, currently, we are coordinating a Protect ICWA initiative where we share information, raise funds, and were able to donate $7,580 to the ICWA Law Center. As a VERY small business, we believe in doing work in line with what would make our grandparents and grandchildren proud.
Where we are in life is often partly because of others. Who/what else deserves credit for how your story turned out?
My husband Jeff has been on the island in this ocean of entrepreneurship. He provided the stability our family needed for me to grow this into what it is today. My amazing teachers, my mama Laurel Sanders and brother Naawakwe Howes who originally taught me sewing and beading. The incredibly late Winnie Laprairie was my first moccasin teacher. And to Wendy Savage who showed me, I had to be smart about it. To Karen Savage who role modeled how to teach moccasin making in a way that I still replicate today.
My mentor Louie Gong saw something in my community work and art and believed in the capacity even when I didn’t believe him. The whole Eighth Generation team is now HUGE, they are incredible and do so much leg work. To my staff from seasonal to my operations manager, I am so grateful I can lean on them. My community here in Fond du Lac has always been my best customer and I am so proud to be part of this community.
I also want to thank the old lady who cried when I told her the story of the blanket I gave her in 2019. She changed me. Mostly, my kids. They are the reason the sun rises in sets in my world and being their mama pushed me to be someone they could envision themselves to be.
Pricing:
- We have products from $13-$299.
- Ojibwe Art for All!
Contact Info:
- Website: heartberry.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/heartberry.co/?hl=en
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/heartberry.co
Image Credits
Nedahness Greene
