Finding Your Way and Falling Into Entrepreneurship

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In this episode, guest Nichole Starkman shares her inspiring story of how she followed her journey to starting a new business in a foreign country — and how the path to entrepreneurship often isn’t obvious or linear, but relies on trusting yourself and moving forward in the face of discomfort or fear.

Nichole Starkman is a Minnesota native living with her partner Antti in his homeland of Turku, Finland. With her business Americana Cakes and Sweets, she brings delicious, custom-made American-style cakes and desserts to Turku.

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The episode:

Katrina Widener: Hi, everyone, it's Katrina, and I'm really excited today because I have Nichole Starkman with me on the podcast. She is one of my best friends and we actually lived together for a little while in college as well. Nichole is the owner of Americana Cakes and Sweets and she is based in Finland, which is really amazing and I got to go and visit her almost two years ago, which feels insane.

Nichole Starkman: It's really crazy. Yeah. Actually more than two years ago.

Katrina Widener: Yeah. Pandemic time is a weird time.

Nichole Starkman: In my mind it's almost like the last year didn't even exist. I have caught myself many times saying last year, when I really mean two years ago, like pre COVID. I don't know, in my memory just last year doesn't exist.

Katrina Widener: Oh, I one hundred percent am right there with you. Anyway, do you want to really quickly tell us what you do and what Americana Cakes and Sweets is all about. Although I'm sure people can get an idea.

Nichole Starkman: It's pretty self-explanatory from the name, which is what I was going for when I named my business. I think I have mentioned to you Katrina that when I was thinking of a name it is not really what I would have picked if I was based in the US but like Katrina mentioned, I now live in Finland.

I'm originally from Minnesota. And being in Finland, I wanted people to know right away when they heard about my business that they knew it was an American-style bakery. I do cakes and sweets and other things. That's how the name came to be for that. But yeah, like Katrina said, we've been really good friends for more than 10 years now.

And so I think sometimes certain parts of this podcast might be a little funny to get through because we can see each other on video. And I think it's interesting to see each other in like a professional setting because us knowing each other in a professional capacity is something that's new.

But I think it is really interesting the way that our paths have been really similar. We both went to Drake University in Des Moines and we both majored in journalism, double majored in journalism and history, which is like the most random, double major. So it's also strange that we happened to both have that. We both went on to work in corporate settings and then. Decided that wasn't for us and then went on to start our own businesses. We have both had really similar and really random career paths, so I don't know if maybe that sort of personality or that sort of destiny in our lives has been what has made us such good friends.

But I always think it's funny. I do have to say though, that we had talked before -- like many years ago -- about starting a bakery bookstore together. And I have held up my end of that bargain, so I'm just waiting for you to move to Finland so we can like really go into business together like we always talked about. Just saying, I'm pulling my weight.

Katrina Widener: You're right. You're right. I completely forgot about that and I'm still on board. I can do coaching remotely. Sorry guys if I randomly move to Finland to open a bakery bookstore. But I do agree with what you're saying. I think that first of all, we do have a lot of random similarities. We both even worked at Meredith Corporation in different roles. We're both from Minnesota originally, even though we met in Iowa, just a lot of really random things, but I think that also it's really helpful maybe to even just touch base on the fact that we both are like had these random backgrounds and yet have both found entrepreneurship and both started out, not really knowing exactly what we wanted and then finding our way and moving through life and naturally just getting to the place where we needed to go.

Like, when we were in Iowa together, Nichole would make me food all of the time. It was beautiful. So for me, I'm like, yeah, Nichole starting a bakery is excellent.

Nichole Starkman: I think it's funny that you say that because for me, I have always really had this interest in baking. I love cooking for people. I love making people happy. And actually freshman year in college in the dorms, everyone called me mom because I took care of everyone and I baked everyone a cake for their birthdays. And that's just something that's always been very much part of me and what I do. And I know you talk a lot about Enneagrams and things like that and I'm a type two. I like to do things for other people and feeding people is really my love language and how I show people that I care about them.

So in retrospect, it does seem like a really obvious career choice. And I just want to say too that I actually don't have any formal background in baking, I haven't gone to like pastry school or culinary school or anything like that. I had five different majors throughout college, trying to figure out what it was that I really wanted to do, because I thought that I needed to do something more practical than opening a bakery.

And something maybe more steady or stable, which I think is something that a lot of people can relate to. These hobbies or passions are not necessarily something that you view as a possible career path. So I didn't for a long time and people would always say to me like, oh, you should start a bakery or you should open a business doing cakes.

And I would always just laugh and say oh, maybe someday, but never really actually think that I would do that. And then now here I am. It's really interesting how life works out that way. And for me, it wasn't really something that I even set out to do. But living in a different country now I was going to say forced me, but I think I would say instead it opened up the opportunity for me to finally take that leap because I was working for a company here in Finland and there was some restructuring within the company and my position ended up getting eliminated. And it wasn't something that I was passionate about before, so I wasn't sad in the sense that I was losing my job there, but I was scared about losing that stability and losing a job and a paycheck.

And I had started to do some baking on the side which that was a fluke in itself. I would post some pictures sometimes of the cakes that I made just for our family on Facebook. And I had people start asking me if they could buy them. And I thought if you want to, sure. I couldn't believe that someone actually wanted to give me money for my cakes.

So when I ended up losing my job I thought, okay you know what? This is now the opportunity where if I'm going to do this, I might as well jump in now. So it's been about, it was November of 2018. So it's been about two and a half years since I have started this full time baking business.

And I am so happy now, and I could never see myself going back to working for someone else or working in any kind of office setting or anything like that ever again.

Katrina Widener: I really like that you mentioned that like it maybe from the outside would seem super obvious, but like it wasn't something that you naturally landed on or naturally felt would be really obvious.

And of course my Human Design mind is oh, she's a projector. And she waited for the invitation which go listen to that podcast if you don't know what the heck I'm talking about. But also just this idea of, I feel like the culture in society, especially in America is so 9-5 focused and so corporate (and obviously this is prevalent in other areas of the world as well) that we don't necessarily automatically think that the things that we're good at or the things that are our strengths are the things that we can do for a living. It's more so okay what is adjacent to the things that I like, or what's something that I'm not going to absolutely hate doing, I guess I'll go do that forty hours a week, as opposed to this is something I actually really love doing.

Nichole Starkman: Yeah, for sure. And I think that yeah, sometimes we don't see those things as a possibility, even for us, because there is this mindset that you have to do something practical, you have to do something that is stable and I have to say that to my parents credit, they never really forced me into this kind of you have to go to school and be a doctor or a lawyer or whatever. They said as long as you can support yourself, we don't really care -- and it's legal -- we don't really care what you do, as long as you're happy. So I feel really lucky that I was raised with that kind of mindset, because I know other people that was not the case for them growing up. But I think it is still the societal norms that tell you you just, you have to get a job in an office or you have to get some kind of steady job where that you'll have a paycheck coming in every week and that sort of thing. So the prospect of doing something else is really scary. And yeah, to be honest I don't know if I would have actually taken the leap to do this if I hadn't been in another country, it just felt like at this point while I might as well take a chance, cause I'm already living this like unforeseen lifestyle as it is. So let's just add another big change to it.

I think too not to get cheesy with quotes from other people, but one thing that I think about a lot is that Jim Carrey did a speech at graduation at some university and he was talking about how he had always wanted to be a comedian, but he didn't really see that as a practical career route for him and his father, I think he worked in insurance or accounting or something like that, and he worked at this job that he really just didn't like, but it was a stable paycheck. And then something happened with the company where he got laid off and lost his job. And the most important takeaway that he had from that was that you can fail at what you don't want to do, so you might as well take a chance doing what you love to do.

And I think thinking of it that way is really a game changer because yeah even if you have this sort of stable job, anything can happen. And as we saw the last year with COVID and everything, a lot of people lost jobs that maybe they thought would have never been possible that they would lose their job or it always seemed like a steady thing. So it's really not worth it to put yourself through that for something that you don't love, because nothing is guaranteed.

Katrina Widener: I had not heard that quote from Jim Carrey beforehand, but I do think it perfectly describes it because so often we talk about stability and security in the entrepreneurship world and looking at it as this thing of, it's so hard to acquire, I want this, I'm going to feel successful when I feel stable, or I'm going to feel successful when I'm secure and all these sorts of things. And really in the corporate world, you're not stable or secure either. So far, you've talked about how your company was restructured and you lost your position. He lost his position, right? I started my own business... I knew I had wanted to start my own business and I was doing it on the side already, but I left and went full time because I essentially was pushed out of my company. And it was that situation where it's if I'm going to make a change, I'm going to make a change. I'm not going to move a lateral shift into something else. I don't like doing.

Nichole Starkman: Exactly. Yeah. And I think that even now might be a good time for people to reevaluate sort of what they want to do because someone at home listening to this might find themselves in the position where this past year they have lost their job or things have changed that now they're reexamining what they want to do with their life.

And if you are thinking about making a leap towards entrepreneurship or making a big life change as far as your career path. I think that now is a good time to do it, even though it seems really scary. But I think sometimes when things seem most unstable, it's what do I have to lose really at this point?

Katrina Widener: Totally. I think that's really a fair point to make. And honestly, Hello entrepreneurs. You also can make shifts and changes within your businesses. If you're doing offers you don't like, you have services or products or whatever that you don't like doing, you don't have to do them anymore.

Even if it's what's been making you money this whole time. That's one thing that I talk about with clients is just because it's something that brings in a lot of money, if you hate doing it, it's not aligned with you. It's not the right thing for you.

Nichole Starkman: And that's something that I have experienced in my own business, even as well, because I really don't enjoy doing cakes that have a lot of fondant work. I'm not good at it. I haven't spent the amount of time becoming good at it just because it's something that I'm not passionate about. And when I would have people ask for those kinds of cakes before, I would always take them and say okay, yeah, I'll do it.

But then as I did it, I was always regretting it. I was kicking myself as I was making this cake like, oh, I hate doing this. And I thought this is my business. I get to decide what it is and what I want to do, and I don't take those kinds of orders anymore. So I think, yeah, you as an entrepreneur have that freedom to decide what you want your business to look like and how you want it to be. Of course you have to listen to essentially what the market wants as well, but I think if you stay true to yourself and what you uniquely bring to the market, then that will create those sales for you.

Katrina Widener: That's a like really important point too, because so often we started our own businesses because we didn't want to do what everybody else was telling us to do with our time.

We didn't want to like, do what the 9-5 world was saying you had to spend your time doing. I hated being micromanaged. I hated being told what to do. So I started my own business to do what I wanted to do. So then why would I not do what I want to do?

Nichole Starkman: Exactly. And that's, that's a good point too, because I also, I cannot handle being micromanaged. I think that is maybe a common trait among entrepreneurs is that we like to work for ourselves because we find it almost impossible to work for other people. I like to say that I was always a good employee in the sense that I showed up when I needed to, I did what I was supposed to, but I was always a bad employee in the sense that I didn't like working for other people.

I didn't really necessarily go above and beyond for someone else's business or something like that, especially when I was working in a corporate setting and just did what I needed to do. And so I think for me it wasn't that I'm not a hard worker because when I'm working in my own business, I am, but I just don't have that passion and drive to bring that to something that is not mine.

But I think also, one big plus of the path of entrepreneurship is, is it easy? Sometimes, but a lot of times there are hard things too, and uncertainties and doubts and things like that. It's not always easy, but I would not go back to working for someone else, even though there are things that are sometimes unknown and hard and stressful because now I get to create the day-to-day life that I want. Last week, I was able to rearrange my schedule a little bit and I was able to take two days off and have a friend come and just hang out. We've been spending most of the past year at our family house, by the sea, which has been really amazing. And we went boating all day on Thursday, just a random weekday. Everybody else was at work. And we just kept saying to each other like, we feel kind of guilty that like everyone else is at the office and we were just boating, but that's what you get to do as an entrepreneur. I get to say, okay, today I'm taking the day off and I'm going to hang out with my friend because I'm the boss and I can do that.

Katrina Widener: And it is like that like, if you're going to have challenging days and you're going to have good days, do you want to have those challenging days be challenges and something you hate or challenges and something you love?

Nichole Starkman: Right. I mean, I definitely have had times that have been challenging in my own business, but when I was working for someone else, I have had many days where I have gone and sat in my car and cried during my lunch break. So that has not happened as I've been a boss for myself. So even just that, from that standpoint, yeah it's just so much better.

Katrina Widener: Well and it's even like, like there might be times in my business where I feel like stressed or I feel anxious or like, how am I going to make this work or what's the right decision to do. But there have never been times in my business, where I felt demoralized by the people around me, or I felt like I'm going to go I don't even know blind staring at these spreadsheets about things that I don't even care about. They're just like different sort of struggles where it's even if I am at the place where I'm like, okay, like I need to make the shift in my business. It's super stressful. I'm super afraid of it.

I know now and I have the confidence now because I started my business and because I've been doing this that I get to say like, well, I've done this shit beforehand. I've done hard shit beforehand and it's worth it.

Nichole Starkman: Yeah. And I think it really helps knowing that the payoff in the end is going to benefit you and your business. So even if it's hard, it will hopefully benefit your business and you will grow from that. It's not, you're putting all this blood, sweat and tears into someone else's business and just making more money for them, but you're going through hell in the process. So I think that also is something that gets me through when I have some difficult things that pop up and I'm making cakes, so it's not like super stressful things over here or anything like that. I'm not like saving the world or anything, but of course, there are things that come with running a business that are stressful, but yeah, I think it just helps to know that I have to do these hard things now to get the payoff later. And that makes it a lot easier to deal with too.

Katrina Widener: Definitely. Okay. So last question, before we sign off. If you had one piece of advice that you would give the entrepreneurs listening to this, what would that be?

Nichole Starkman: I think that if you are still considering entrepreneurship or you're just testing it out, I would say, just go for it. I think one of the biggest things, and I know Katrina you've talked about this a lot, is that everyone has this sort of imposter syndrome that is very common in business. And there are still times when even I have that and I've been doing this for a couple of years now, but I think that the biggest thing is that everyone is still figuring it out. And so if it seems that you're surrounded by all these entrepreneurs who are just like crushing it and they know everything and they're just, doing great, yeah, they probably know their shit and they have some experience with what they're doing, but everybody is still trying to figure it out.

So I think don't be intimidated by the fact that you feel like you're not in a place where you're ready to start, because if you wait for that, you're never going to start because I don't think anyone is really ever ready. And I think even now I find myself some days where I'm like, okay, I really need to catch up with my business because I feel like I don't have everything in order.

And I've been in business for two and a half years. So if I was still waiting to feel ready to have a business, I wouldn't have a business. So I think that's the biggest thing.

Katrina Widener: That's like the perfect advice too, because oftentimes, you look at that person who's been in business for two years, five years, 10 years, 20 years. And you're like, oh, they know exactly what they're doing like they have it all figured out, they're intimidating, like I'm not where they are. Who am I to be doing this? Who am I to think I could run my own business or own my own business.

And really the idea is it's not about knowing. Like, there's a book Business Brilliant. And I maybe even have mentioned this on the podcast beforehand, but they compare what the middle-class in America believes about money versus what self-made millionaires believe about money. And self-made millionaires are like, when it gets hard, you just keep going, where the middle-class is like, when it gets hard, you try something different. And like that subtle shift of thinking where it's no, when something hard comes up, I'm just going to shift things and evolve and keep going. I'm going to keep coming up against this fear, or I'm going to keep coming up against this anxiety and I'm going to keep going. And that's the real difference. That's how people get their "big breaks".

Nichole Starkman: I think if most people knew what it takes to run a business and to be successful, people wouldn't start businesses at all because it's not easy. And sometimes going into it a little bit, like a little bit ignorant is maybe even a good thing, because I think you go into this sort of with rose colored glasses where you're like, oh, I'm going to be an entrepreneur.

This is going to be great. But if you go into it thinking like, okay, this is going to be a lot of hard work and then you're not going to want to do it. You just have to push through that. But I think that, and this is not me being humble or anything like that, but I literally do not have anything that makes me special that anyone else couldn't do to be an entrepreneur.

Katrina is looking at me funny, but I just mean that in the sense that yes, I have the ability to bake and make cakes and things like that but just from being able to run and start a business, I don't have anything that anyone else who has the desire to start a business doesn't have. It doesn't take some super set of skills or something that you're born with to be able to become a great entrepreneur. I think it's something that if you have the desire to do it, then you can develop that over time. So also I would say, don't let that hold you back. If you feel like, oh, I'm really, I'm not a business person, or I don't have what it takes to be a business person. If you're already thinking about wanting to do it, you already have what it takes to be a business person.

Katrina Widener: I 100% agree. I've been doing this business for four years. And if you had asked me five years ago, if I would ever start a business, my answer had been hell no, like nuh uh. It's not oh, I don't have the confidence to do this, or I'm not a leader, or blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Those are all things that your brain is telling you to stay small, not truth and the reality.

Well, Thank you so much, Nicole, for coming on. This has been a lot of fun and I love all of the little tidbits that you're giving people. Cause I'm like, Ooh, that's powerful. Ooh, that's powerful.

Nichole Starkman: Yeah. I think you have known me long enough and to be honest, I think anyone that knows me for more than five minutes knows that I can just talk and talk. So I feel like I have just scratched the surface of what I was even meaning to say, but I hope that at least some of it made enough sense to help somebody.

Katrina Widener: I'm sure it did. And maybe this is why we've been such good friends for so long. Cause we could just talk forever. Okay. So where can everybody find you after the podcast?

Nichole Starkman: Yeah, so I am most active on Instagram at @AmericanaCakesTurku T U R K U. That's the city that I live in in Finland. And I'm also on Facebook as Americana Cakes and Sweets. So that's probably the easiest and AmericanaCakes.com.

Katrina Widener: Thank you so much for coming.

Nichole Starkman: Thank you.