De Greer Yindimincarlie is an award-winning Aboriginal artist, film and music producer as well as an entrepreneur running two distinct businesses: Yindi Artz and XcessFIT.
In a conversation with NITV Radio, she explained the differences between her two businesses and the distinct paths undertaken to steer them through the pandemic.
“Yindi Artz is more a product-based creative business where I get to do a whole slew of different things like graphic design and film making and making music and designing textiles and making jewellery and a whole gamut of different creative outlets.”
On the other hand, XcessFIT is a garment and fashion-based business specialising in plus-size sports and activewear.
For De Greer Yindimincarlie 2020 will go down in history as the year that everybody stayed in their pyjamas because of the pandemic.
“All came to a screeching halt because businesses were having to close down or shut while Covid was on. Musicians and other artists in relation to gigs and exhibitions which is what I would usually do for their promotion and their merchandise, that has all come to a halt.”
2020 has also been interesting as she's had to devise two entirely distinct strategies for her businesses.
“I had to go out looking for work for Yindi Artz which, something I hadn’t done for a long time. 11 years we’ve been running and Yindi Artz had only advertised twice, in the very first year when we launched. Everything in the last 10 and half years had come through word of mouth.”
De Greer Yindimincarlie revealed that through the crisis Yindi Artz found new opportunities working with government; a totally new direction for this business.
She says that for her other business, XcessFIT, Covid bought her some time to get some new product samples done and in the manufacturing stage without losing too much time on the surface because people are using less of them. She also took time to look for other business partners in this enterprise.
De Greer Yindimincarlie has total confidence in Indigenous entrepreneurial ingenuity and resilience. “Aboriginal people have been in business for thousands of years. We are good business people, good people, and our products are awesome."
"We look at the resources around us more than others, I think; and see how they can be useful to the consumer market and then we go for it.”
