One Step at a Time: Interview with Traveling Muralist and Small Business Marketer, Rebecca Lorenz
This week’s interview is with Rebecca Lorenz, a traveling muralist who designs hand-painted murals for small businesses, homes, and community spaces. In addition to her mural work, Becca is a digital marketer who supports businesses in growing through storytelling and brand building.
Covid gave her an opening to explore a lifelong interest in art and an opportunity to dive into the work she’d seen other muralists do on Instagram. She began painting at night after finishing her day job. Eventually, that hobby turned into her own muraling business. Today she’s living in West Texas, expanding her business, and exploring a new interest in pottery!
The interview covers:
Her path from teaching in Minneapolis to starting her mural work in wine country CA
How she got her small business off the ground
What she’s learned from life on the road
Her relationship to uncertainty
Her tips for staying creatively inspired
How she thinks about making money and following a dream
What’s next for her
Note: The following interview has been lightly edited for clarity and length. While every effort has been made to preserve the integrity of the conversation, please be aware that the quotes may not be verbatim but reflect the essence of the dialogue.
What are you up to in life right now?
Work wise, I’m up to a few different things! I very recently moved to West Texas where my brother and sister-in-law are based, to help with their small outfitter business, Hidden Dagger Adventures. As they guide groups on the Rio Grande River and through Big Bend National Park, I’m working behind-the-scenes to market their business and set up collaborations with other brands.
I’m also happy to be working remotely for a small ranching business in Northern California, Five Marys Ranch. That was my previous in-person job for the last 3 years, and it’s great to still be connected with them and their brand. I work on my laptop to create their weekly newsletters and write content for their blog, as well as manage some of their social media accounts.
As far as my own business goes, I’m in the beginning stages! I spend a lot of time on outreach - cold emailing small businesses, schools, and communities about designing and installing a mural in their space. When I do get a mural project, I’m able to travel and spend a few days painting, now that my other work obligations are remote and more flexible than going into the office 5 days a week.
Hobby-wise, I just took a 12-week beginner’s pottery class and LOVED it. I live in a super small town now (300 people) with no pottery studio, so I’m on the search for someone in a neighboring area who has a kiln that I can rent time from. I also just started playing sand volleyball a couple of times a week - it’s so fun, and it’s quickly moved up to the top of the list when it comes to workouts.
What was your path to becoming a traveling muralist?
About 5 years ago, I was working in Minneapolis as an elementary reading teacher. I decided I wanted to leave the city and move to Northern Wisconsin to teach… unfortunately after several interviews, I wasn’t hired anywhere! The school year started, and I was scouring the internet to find a job.
During my search, I came across a company called Adventure Nannies and long story short, I accepted a job as a private travel nanny for a family that was based in Wine Country, California. About 10 months into the job, COVID hit, so the traveling stopped and we spent all of our time on the family ranch. At that time, I had always had an interest in art and wanted to try my hand at painting on a large scale. I was following mural artists on Instagram (@Pandr has been a big inspiration for me) and wanted to do what they were doing! We set up a huge plywood canvas in one of their barns, and after nannying during the day, I would spend my evenings in the barn painting.
A few months later, I left that job and accepted a position in far Northern California at a small ranching business, Five Marys Ranch. This job turned out to be really pivotal and important for me. I had never worked in the entrepreneurial world before, but my boss, Mary, trusted me to dive in and take on new projects with her. I learned invaluable business lessons and skills there. I thought it was so interesting and fun to connect with other brands, create valuable content, and have a direct impact on watching a small business grow.
Becoming so invested in the small business world took me down a path of really wanting to pursue this type of work for myself. I built a website on Squarespace and donated a mural to the local high school, as well as asked family and friends if I could paint a wall in their homes. I would then photograph those and add them to my online portfolio… no one had to know that those weren’t paying jobs! :) I took a few webinars from muralists on social media (@homsweethom, @pandr, @laceydoes, @rosemontlane) which really gave me the information I was looking for about how to do outreach, and most importantly, what to charge for different projects.
You’ve lived all over the country and the world. What have you learned about yourself from life on the road?
My first travel experiences were in college when I studied abroad in Australia and India. In Australia, I went over alone as part of an exchange program and lived in a house with other students from all over - locals in Australia, as well as Japan, Norway, and Germany. In India, I traveled with a professor and 10 other students, and we were there for a month visiting different types of schools all over the country - from wealthy boarding schools to village classrooms in the Himalayan Mountains.
When I was 24, I spent the year living with my parents, substitute teaching, and working at Lululemon so I could save up enough money to spend the year teaching English in Thailand. I lived in a southern city called Trang, and was the only English speaker in the apartment building where I lived. Each week, I rotated through 7 Kindergarten classes (35 students in each class) and 5 second grade classrooms (45 kids in each).
Soon after I started, I bought a microphone and would use that while I was teaching so the students could hear me over everyone - ha! Everyday after school I would go to the street market and purchase my dinner and breakfast for the next day. I had a few food carts that I ended up being a regular at - it was nice when they would recognize me and start making my order before I even had to try and say it in Thai :) While I was there, I was wide-eyed and taking everything in, trying to navigate my way through the day. Looking back, it was such a year of independence and confidence building within myself.
It can be really isolating and lonely living somewhere new, but I now truly know that I have the capability to grow relationships and build communities in different places. I can trust myself and take comfort in the fact that I can be anywhere and make it work.
How do you approach uncertainty and the unknown?
I often feel uncertain about areas of my life, so it’s not an unfamiliar feeling to me ;) I really do believe that if I stay open to opportunities, take steps to move forward, and continue to try and better myself, things will happen when and where they are supposed to. When I’m feeling overwhelmed in my head thinking of the future, I find that when I talk to my friends about it, everything seems more manageable and the worries aren’t so BIG.
Specific to painting, sometimes I feel clueless about how other artists are connecting with companies, closing deals, etc. But, if you take time to look for resources - you’ll find them! Artists are making money now sharing how they run their businesses, so they are ready and willing to share.
I heard some great advice recently that when we are scared of the unknown, we just need to make aspects of our business more ‘known.’ For example, if I know that 300 cold emails equals one client… then I will send 300 cold emails and not be worried 6 months down the road when I don’t have any clients.
What do you do to stay inspired creatively?
When I need some inspiration, my go-to is usually to hop on Pinterest or go through the screenshots I have on my phone. Sometimes that works great, but sometimes I get inspiration overload and feel too frozen to actually create anything… does anyone relate to this?!
A goal for 2024 is to make more things with my hands, so I’m working on just making SOMETHING - painting, pottery, quilts, bread, etc. I find that sometimes it’s hard for me to start a project without being hard on myself about what the outcome is. Getting out of my head and using my hands really does lead to other better ideas if I’m patient enough! :)
A lot of people get stopped from following a dream or doing something unconventional by the fear of - “How will I make money?” What advice would you give them?
‘Start before you’re ready’ is pretty standard advice that I hear, and I would say take comfort in the fact that you can start in small ways. You can chip away at your unconventional dreams while still supporting yourself financially in a not so ‘dream job.’
Those jobs are always an opportunity to meet interesting people and learn important skills that you can carry with you to whatever comes next. I think it’s really important to build relationships, keep those connections, and not burn bridges. When you find that your time is better invested elsewhere, leave that job gracefully - you never know how those past connections will arise in the future. They very well may come back in your life in the form of a new opportunity that can grow your brand and make you money!
I would also give the advice to stay curious. Follow interesting people online who are in the area of work that you would like to be involved in. Purchase classes from them, ask questions, and take advantage of all the free resources the internet provides (hello, YouTube!). People are already making money doing what you want to do, and there are so many resources to figure out how they do it! Don’t be fooled - you may have to be doing work on the side… not everything people post online is their full-time job!
What’s next for you?
Be intentional about building my mural business - share on social media, cold email clients, design ahead of time (build my inspiration bank!), continue working at Hidden Daggers through the season, perfect my volleyball hitting form so my rotator cuff is pain-free, finish my first quilt, sell my pottery at an art fair, regularly invest in a roth IRA, visit Austin, TX,etc. etc. etc. :)