The Entrepreneurial Spirit Series: Quincie Hamby

The Entrepreneurial Spirit Series

Quincie Hamby

Do all entrepreneurs love what they do? Not sure.

I do know Quincie Hamby, jewelry designer and retail jewelry gallery owner, loves what she does. All of it. She loves the design, making her own clasps, finding the right stones, crystals, shells, pearls, botanical products and gems, and shopping for all the products that go into her designs. “I dream color and therefore color combinations.”

Talk about her passion. It’s in color.

Quincie shows her jewelry in her retail jewelry gallery in Tallahassee, Florida, in her on line web business, in selected galleries in Hawaii and Florida, and travels the United States doing private shows. She continually works on growing her business with her dedication of beautiful and excellently crafted products. “I compete with the current market values and I also excel at my reputation for customer service.”

Quincie tells me she received degrees in anthropology and archeology. “I love the people I encounter during my travels, especially the ones that trade the product I incorporate into my designs. The jewelry industry is more than just the stories about DeBeers diamonds and South Africa. I thrill at receiving the African Batik beads and knowing the meaning of the motifs on the beads, the carved beads from the Mali coast, handmade free-trade products coming from Ecuador and the Philippines. I buy this clam shell from Hong Kong which is processed there, but it actually grown in the Mississippi River. I have to buy an import/export license to bring them back into the country. I find that process fascinating!   I guess what I’m saying my passion is culture and culture’s responses to trade and business and the players involved.”

There’s that passion again when she talks about jewelry, designs, and the part she gets to play.

Her passion drives her…in fact it’s a driving force of energy that knows no bounds, according to Quincie. She can sit down, lose track of time and space while working, and experience great moments of joy. “Granted sometimes my energy is not up to par, but when I’m in the creating zone…nothing is impossible.”

Her zest for working is Quincie’s basic driving force…at times coupled with the desire to make money and pay her bills. But first and foremost that driving force is the need to create.

Is she afraid of risk? “No, that’s not one of my problems. I act and love a fast moving pace. I opened a small shop without a business plan and a financial buffer. Now, tell me how many people would do that and still have survived.” That was 20 years ago.

Would she have done something different in the beginning? “I wouldn’t have dispersed my energy in so many directions. I would have concentrated on what my successes were and worked towards improving them.”

Quincie does feel she has achieved success. After all, her business is still growing…even in this economy. She makes a living doing what she loves. And she realizes the small things are important. “You wake up one day and say to yourself…I’ve created something wonderful.” And that equates to success for Quincie. Success is also happiness. “Happy in what you do for a livelihood. I can say that because I’m happy with the niche that I’ve found. I see so many people struggling with what they’re going to do with their lives, but they don’t take the necessary risk to succeed. They worry only about the failure. Or, they refuse to put necessary energy into their work in order to persevere.”

Even after all she has achieved, Quincie does not see herself as an expert in all aspects. She says she has a lot to learn. But she also says she sees herself as an expert in certain aspects of her craft. “But there’s so much I would still like to accomplish with my craft.”

Profit is important…it creates growth. “Without profit I’m not able to stretch my craft and try new things.” And what would she tell people just starting out?

“I don’t know. I think that you either have a tenacity to work hard, or have a delusion that it will all work out. Remember, working for your self is much more difficult than working for someone else.  Also, you have to have a passion for what you do because sometimes, that’s the only saving grace at the end of the day. Just thinking a business is going to be lucrative isn’t enough to sustain the soul.”

Soul. Does it equate to the Entrepreneurial Spirit for Quincie? She certainly enjoys creating a business. That part is very clear. “I wish that I could do everything for myself, but my business has become too large, so I have to hire out jobs that I’m not good at; web designing, accounting, etc. Even though I love all those jobs, too. I see myself as the whirling dervish.”

Entrepreneurial Spirit or whirling dervish? For Quincie I think they go hand in hand.

Learn more about Quincie and her jewelry business at www.quinciehamby.com.


This series of articles was commissioned by Upward Trend and written by Wendy VanHatten, a nationally published author, editor, and writing coach.