Mar 24, 2008

She Was Stunning, and successfulBy Daryl-Lynn CarlsonFinancialPost.com

Sometimes a commercial endeavour takes off before it is even formally a business. That’s what happened to Sarah Khallad, a Calgary photography student whose pictorial magnets are sold as novelty items at nearly 100 retail outlets across Canada.

“I had no idea I was going to own a business,” Ms. Khallad says.

Her concept started out as a multimedia project during her second year of photography studies at the Alberta College of Art and Design. Ms. Khallad had photographed female friends to depict phrases she had written to describe their strengths.

She combined the photos and phrases with the medium of metal – the metal being magnets – and won an award for her effort. The endorsement prompted her to make more and for the next couple of years she tested their reception at the art school’s “show and sale” forum. She repeatedly sold out.

Her business, She Was Stunning, began to take shape. A popular gift shop in a trendy area of Calgary agreed to buy batches of magnets on consignment, motivating Ms. Khallad to find more opportunities. But it was a slog. “I was making them myself. I used a straight edge and a ruler for about the first year and a half that I was selling them and it was a disaster,” she says of the labour involved.

By sheer coincidence, she approached Twisted Goods, owned by CYBF alumni Shashi Behl (whose business was featured a few weeks ago). “I wanted to be in that store because I loved it, so I made an appointment with the manager,” she says. “About a week later Shashi called and said she wanted everything I had.

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