Nobody told me this when I started. Or maybe they did and I wasn't listening. That tracks.
Here's the glamorous reality of running a small puzzle company: my office is a kitchen counter. My workshop is a garage. My shipping department is also me. My marketing team? Still me. My customer service? You already know.
It's a whole operation.
The Math Nobody Talks About
Let me paint you a picture.
I often spend 40+ hours designing a single puzzle. Then there are materials — quality wood, organza bags, tissue paper, beautifully designed boxes, because I refuse to cut corners on the experience of receiving one of these. And don't get me started on the art licensing, which, as previously discussed in another post, occasionally makes my eye twitch.
Then I price it fairly, because a real human (Me, Myself and I) makes it, and someone on the internet tells me $85 is too much for a puzzle.
I'm fine. I'm totally fine. It's fine.
The Kitchen Counter Chronicles
My "office" has hosted as many or more important business decisions as it has hosted Tuesday night dinners, and these two things have happened simultaneously more than once.
There's something deeply humbling about being on a vendor call while also wondering if you remembered to take something out of the freezer for dinner. Very grounding. Keeps the ego in check.
The garage workshop (which could not fit a car if my life depended on it) is actually my favorite place in the world, which I did not expect. There's something about being surrounded by the smell of fresh-cut wood and the sound of the laser doing its thing that feels like proof that this is real, that something is actually being made.
It IS real. It's just also very small, very whimsical, and very much funded by a day job that actually pays the bills.
The Day Job. Yes, There Is a Day Job.
Liminal Puzzle Co is a labor of love built in the margins of a full life. Evenings. Weekends. Days Off. The occasional lunch break where I'm supposed to be resting but I'm actually problem-solving a piece placement issue in my head.
Is this sustainable? Ask me in two years. I'll have better data.
What I can tell you is that every puzzle that ships was made because I genuinely believed it was worth making. Not because a focus group approved it. Not because an algorithm told me it would sell. Because I held it in my hands and thought: yes. This one.
Why I Do It Anyway
Small brands making beautiful things in garages and on kitchen counters are the reason the world isn't entirely beige.
I'm not trying to be the biggest puzzle company. I'm trying to be the one people remember. The one that made them stop and look at a piece of art. The one that hid a tiny owl in the corner just to make them smile.
The kitchen counter will do for now.
Watch this space.
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