Today we’d like to introduce you to Theresa Lendway.
Hi Theresa, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
The idea for our business started when our youngest child went off to college. We were thinking of downsizing our house, but Tom didn’t want to lose his basement workshop, noting that not many apartments or townhomes would have a similar space. So, I told him to go rent one. When we found out there was no rentable woodworking shop in our area, we decided to build one.
When we first opened, we were just going to be a makerspace, just offering classes and memberships. We got into epoxy on a whim, and those classes grew from a few initial art classes into a wide range of classes all the way up to making full-size river tables out of epoxy. When Covid hit and membership slowed down, we evolved into doing commissioned work as well, which is our second business today, Minnesota RiverCrafts, one of several which call White Bear Makerspace their home.
I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle-free, but so far would you say the journey has been a fairly smooth road?
This is not an easy business to run. First, we had to educate the public (and even the insurance company) on what a Makerspace is and what you can do as a member. Second, we attract a very wide demographic of people, so targeting our advertising is hard. Then of course when Covid hit, we no longer could do large events and even today many people seem to be staying home – we’ve never returned to the pre-Covid level of member activity. We’ve also had thousands of dollars’ worth of tools destroyed by accident, like the time a tape measure got caught in the miter saw.
Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
We love trying new things. At White Bear Makerspace, every day is different, everyone is making something unique. We are too – like our magnetic river table live edge cribbage boards. We specialize in woodworking and epoxy, but we are also adding new capabilities like metalworking tools, an artist loft, and a new storefront for members to sell their creations.
What sets us apart is the size and quality of the shop/tools, and our unique ability to combine different technologies to make unique things – like custom CNC engraved epoxy bar tops.
Any advice for finding a mentor or networking in general?
We’ve used dozens of people for advice. Most notable would be Score (run by the SBA), Facebook, and a local small business networking group that we discovered.
Contact Info:
- Email: [email protected]
- Website: www.whitebearmakerspace.com
- Instagram: whitebearmakerspace
- Facebook: www.facebook.com/WBMakerspace
Image Credits
White Bear Makerspace
