Today we’d like to introduce you to Paul Radice.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
My business started in 2012 as a side hustle, a way to make a little extra money from home to supplement my 9-5 job. At first I wasn’t focused on lighting specifically, just vintage in general (finding antiques to resell, restorations, repurposing items into lamps or clocks, etc), at the time my wife and I were also renovating our new home (a 1920’s bungalow in New Jersey), and that’s when vintage lighting became my obsession. From there, I focused on lighting specifically, and by the end of that year we had a blossoming online business through Ebay, Etsy, and our newly launched webpage snakeheadvintage.com. By the end of 2012 our first son was born, and after my 2 weeks paternity leave from my day job was up, I decided I wasn’t going back: I was going to commit 100% to making Snake Head Vintage my full time job, and through ups and downs over the past 14 years we have been successful in at least that mission!
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?
It has not always been a smooth road, my education is not in business nor lighting, so a lot of the ins and outs of running a business (funding, accounting, taxes, sourcing, and day to day operations) had to be learned on the fly. Some mistakes were learned the hard way, like owing back taxes early on due to not setting aside enough income to cover them, over-purchasing inventory on interest-free credit cards and then not being able to recoup the money fast enough, interest and fees adding up. The other struggle was never being sure what the next week, month or year may hold in terms of sales and income, never assume the current trajectory will hold! After 2 to 3 years of intense exponential growth, increased competition in our market mixed with changing trends caused our sales to drop drastically, it took a good 4-5 years to fully rebound from that, eventually getting to a place where we enjoy steady sales and mostly predictable income, enough to keep the doors open, the shelves stocked and our family of five afloat.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Our business centers around vintage style lighting and electrical, we specialize in sourcing one of a kind parts and hardware for customers to make their own creations from scratch or in their DIY restoration projects. We also do a lot of custom work ourselves, from crafting ready to use light fixtures, made to order electrical assemblies, and cords and pendant sets made exactly to the customers specifications. We’ve shipped our products all over the world and they can be found installed anywhere from homes, restaurants, bars and coffee shops, hotels, and even used in many TV shows and movies. I like to think what sets us apart is the one-on-one attention we give to each customer and every project, I answer every phone call and reply to every email and message personally, working through the entire project start to finish, no matter how big or small. This allows us to give first class service to everyone from the DIY lighting novices to the interior design experts to the electrical engineers, and everyone in between. We try to operate like a small old time mom and pop store, but with modern service and technology behind us to scale up our reach.
How do you think about luck?
I know I’m very lucky, but I try not to think too much about it, good or bad it’s not something I can control so I try to focus on just doing the work and making the best of whatever comes from it. It’s hard to know where personal effort ends and luck takes over, my hope is to have a good balance of both. I know for sure the luckiest thing in my life is having met the love of my life (my wife Domenique) so early on in my life, without her most of the good in my life would not have been possible, and definitely not as enjoyable!
Pricing:
- Cordset for rewiring lamps or small electronics $15
- Complete pendant light setup starting at $60
- Edison bulbs starting at $6
- Metal enamel shades starting at $30
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.snakeheadvintage.com/
- Instagram: https://instagram.com/snakeheadvintage/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SnakeHeadVintage
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/SnakeHeadVntg
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/user/snakeheadvintage
- Other: https://www.pinterest.com/snakeheadvntg/
