Susan Bunting and Phyllis Harbinger

Today in The Lounge, Nick speaks with Susan Bunting from Datacolor and Phyllis Harbinger. Susan speaks at length about Datacolor’s apps and how they help everyone from seasoned designers to homeowners painting their own spaces. Then, Phyllis and Nick discuss how she got in the industry and the importance of being organized in your business to get ahead.

Susan and Datacolor

Datacolor has been helping customers find the accurate color of materials, products and images for about 45 years now! Plus, they work with brands to make sure that the right color is matched in textures and fabrics for different brands. Susan explains that color plays a huge role in many different projects, and finding the right color can be difficult. When paint color is part of your job, time and materials wasted equals money wasted, so you need to get the job done right the first time.

To help, Datacolor offers a tool that helps get the color right the first time — like an easy button for color selection. The ColorReader launched last April and ColorReader Pro launched in February. They both match color on sight if you’re on the job, to make color matching simple. The apps give you the color data such as RGB and saves your previous measurements for walls. It also lets you coordinate colors and share them with other people. The Color Reader Pro is $249 and Color Reader is $99, they are both available for Androids and IOS.

We are offering a Trade Discount for our listeners!! — Follow the link below and use discount code may to receive the 20 % 0ff Datacolor’s ColorReader.

Visit www.colorreader.datacolor.com/may to see what Datacolor can do for you!

Phyllis Harbinger

Phyllis got into interior design because she was unhappy with marketing after about six years, so she talked with her husband and he supported her going back to school. When she started at FIT in New York, she worked part-time and got an internship and had the chance to apply her new lessons when she and her husband bought an apartment. Immediately after, Phyllis started her own business — something she does not recommend now for those of you starting out in the world of interior design because the industry is more competitive and it’s smart to work for someone to know how this business works. Then, about three years after she graduated she started teaching and building her client list — and three years later, she began teaching at FIT! Now, she’s been there for twenty years.

Being Organized in Business

Organization and boundary setting are very important when you’re running a business; Phyllis says that if you can’t get out of your own way, you’re never going to succeed. But when you get organized, your business will run smoothly and you can start setting goals of where you want your business to go from there. Also, be sure to set your boundaries even to your clients. Phyllis sections her days and makes the most of days with clients and students as well as marketing, networking, and consulting — which all fall on different days of the week. She says that you have to be super organized and have a checklist of what you want to get done on certain days because it’s impossible to do everything in a day. Phyllis wants to make sure you not only build your team in your office but also your home. You can’t build your team until you have systems to train your team to deal with the day to day. There are people that can help to gain control of your business and also maintain your life schedule as well.

Phyllis will be speaking at ICFF on May 20. To learn more about Phyllis feel free to email her at info@harbingerdesignconsulting.com, check out her website and, check out her book as well.

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Wrap Up

If you would like to hear more episodes, please visit us on iTunes or on our website at TheChaiseLoungePodcast.com. Lastly, find The Chaise Lounge on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter or post a review on iTunes, you may even hear your review read live on our next podcast. With that said keep dreaming big, and keep designing a great design business. See ya