From T-Shirts to a Published Book: What Cherry’s Journey Teaches Us About Following Where Business Takes You
Sometimes a business doesn’t go where you planned. It goes somewhere better.
Cherry Hills started out making funky t-shirts. She needed a creative outlet alongside home educating her daughter and it gave her exactly that. But the t-shirt market was saturated and something else was quietly forming in the background — a realisation that her real gift wasn’t in printed fabric. It was in helping children and parents navigate the messy, overwhelming, often invisible world of children’s mental health.
Fast forward a few years and Cherry has published a children’s book, created a membership with access to everything she’s ever made for £4.99 a month, has six schools signed up for author visits across East Anglia, and is in conversation with a hypnotherapist about bringing her work into a wellness centre.
She couldn’t have planned this journey if she tried. And that, she says, is exactly the point.
I sat down with Cherry on the podcast this week for one of the most joyful and honest conversations I’ve had on the show. Here’s what her journey taught me — and what I think it might teach you too.
1. Your friends and family are not your customers — and that’s okay
This is one of the most common and most painful lessons in business and Cherry talks about it with such honesty.
The people in your life might love what you do. They might tell you it’s amazing. They might share your posts. But they might never part with a penny — and that is not a reflection of the value of what you offer.
“Your friends and family are not your customers,” Cherry said. “I’ve really had to take myself back to the drawing board and change how I think about this. I can’t let myself constantly think my stuff is worth nothing because no one’s buying it. No, I just haven’t found my customers yet. They’re out there. But I have to find them. And I’m not going to find them in my close friends list.”
If you’ve been measuring the value of your business by how many of your friends have bought from you — stop. Your customers are out there. They just don’t know you exist yet. And that’s a marketing problem, not a product problem.
2. Follow the thread — even when it takes you somewhere unexpected
Cherry didn’t sit down one day and decide to write a children’s book about goblins who represent emotional struggles. She made a t-shirt. Then she made anxiety worksheets for her daughter. Then a friend stole them and told her to sell them. Then she made workbooks. Then guidebooks. Then in-person sessions. Then a membership. Then a book.
Each step led naturally to the next. None of it was planned. All of it made sense in retrospect.
This is how so many of the best businesses grow — not from a five-year plan, but from listening. Listening to what customers ask for. Listening to what lights you up. Listening to the gaps that keep appearing. Following the thread wherever it leads.
If you’re feeling like your business isn’t going where you thought it would — that might not be a bad thing. It might be going exactly where it needs to go.
3. Keep investing in yourself — the more you learn, the more you can help
Cherry is constantly training. She’s just completed her adults mental health qualification and on the very day we recorded this podcast, she started a new course in understanding distressing behaviour in children.
She doesn’t do this because someone told her to. She does it because every new qualification means she can help more people, in more situations, with more confidence.
Whatever your industry, the businesses that keep growing are almost always the ones where the founder keeps learning. Not just about their craft, but about their customers. About the problems they solve. About the world their clients are living in.
You don’t have to go back to college. But stay curious. Read. Listen to podcasts. Ask questions at networking events. Go to workshops. Every bit of knowledge you gain makes you more valuable to the people you serve.
4. Generosity is a business strategy
Cherry told me a story from a recent networking event that I keep thinking about.
She got chatting to a woman called Lucy — a foster parent who also happened to be a bookkeeper. They talked about her foster children. Cherry reached into her bag and gave her some worksheets. Just like that. No expectation. No sales pitch. Just: these might help, have them.
By the time Cherry got home, Lucy had placed an online order for her book.
This is not a fluke. This is what happens when you lead with generosity rather than sales. When you think about what this person needs right now rather than what you can sell them. When you treat every interaction as an opportunity to help rather than to pitch.
People buy from people they like and trust. And they like and trust people who are genuinely, no-strings-attached generous with their knowledge, their time and their resources.
5. Make your offer as accessible as possible
Cherry’s Vault membership gives access to everything she has ever created — every worksheet, every guidebook, every workbook, every resource — for £4.99 a month.
She knows it’s priced too low. She knows it’s why she can’t pay her bills yet. But she also knows that the families who need her resources the most are often the ones who can least afford to spend on them. So she made it as accessible as she possibly could.
One of her members messaged her to say: for the price of one coffee a month, this is giving me everything I need to get my children through primary school and secondary.
That’s the impact. And while Cherry’s pricing will need to evolve as her business grows, the principle behind it is sound: think about the person on the other side of the sale, not just the profit margin. Build an offer that genuinely serves people and the business will follow.
6. You never know who you’re going to meet — and that’s the magic of networking
Cherry travels an hour to come to WIN events. She’s tried networking groups closer to home and none of them felt right. So she keeps making the journey.
Through networking she’s made connections she never would have found any other way. A hypnotherapist interested in bringing her work into his wellness centre. A potential connection with the police. Six schools signed up for author visits. A membership member whose children are working through her goblin worksheets every week.
She said something that really stayed with me: “You don’t ever know where it’s going to take you. I couldn’t have pencilled this journey out if I tried.”
That’s the thing about turning up consistently, showing up genuinely and letting conversations happen naturally. The connections you make at networking events don’t just give you clients. They give you ideas, opportunities, introductions and possibilities that you couldn’t have googled your way to.
You just have to be in the room.
About Cherry
Cherry Hills runs The Alchemist’s Forge, creating mental health and wellbeing resources for children, teenagers and parents. Her book The Forge of Feelings is available now — a beautifully illustrated story about seven goblins who each represent a different emotional struggle, helping children understand and work with their big feelings. Her Vault membership gives access to everything she has ever created for £4.99 a month.
Find Cherry here:
📸 Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the.alchemists.forge
👤 Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100003475841481
📖 Buy the book: https://the-alchemists-forge.sumupstore.com
Want to hear the full conversation?
Listen to my full chat with Cherry on the Women Inspired Networking Conversations podcast, available now on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.
🎙️ Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/0DM7Ooc5nLezg4u91OklYo?si=83acff1303aa4471
📺 YouTube: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLDVCZqf8LiBs92aTeEHZsWrtoNRJEVCXn&si=kfsbmnaQYm0lelUk
Come and find your people:
🌐 www.womeninspirednetwork.com/events
👤 Facebook: Women Inspired Network: Networking For Women In Business
📸 Instagram: @women_inspired_network