Businesses, like people, must overcome struggles and breakthrough barriers. Hill Country Tiny Houses has recently been in the midst of building a new tiny house and filming an episode of HGTV’s Tiny Paradise.While we are so blessed to be a part of this show and to have our company featured, it came with multiple challenges for our new family owned business. One of the main complications was the quick turn around required.

We applied for the show with clients from Austin with 10 acres on a hill top in December, 2017. We were the builder and they the client. HGTV chose a location in Hawaii over our client. In January, one of their builds fell through and they reached out to us to fill in the gap. The interview went well, but we knew if we took the position, we had 30 days to complete the project. We would be the builder and the client, which added more challenges because all the filming would be on us, no breaks at all, and we had to play both roles simultaneously. Thankfully, we already had ordered our trailer and hired a crew to build the shell off site, but we had to secure a paradise location next. Thanks to our friends, family, and added talent, we pulled it off.

We had to design, furnish, build and film this project in only 30 days; a fraction of the time we would normally allot for such a project. It was difficult to ship the items to our location as it was somewhat remote, in a picturesque Texas town, perfect for filming. That meant it was more difficult to find our packages and make sure that they arrived, however, our wonderful neighbors were very helpful and brought many of them to us. In addition, we lost a truck load of stuff as one of the semis carrying some of our furniture got into an accident on its way to deliver our supplies, delaying the shipment.

Also, because of the time crunch we had to spend a lot of time running to and from different stores trying to pick up all the furnishings and different accent pieces from all over the area, this meant many trips to San Antonio for long-winded shopping trips with our 12-year-old son. He was so gracious about the whole experience and extremely helpful both in the actual build and as a shopping assistant. One of the biggest problems this project created was in regards to our business itself; we spent almost all of our time working on the project which made it difficult to focus on our business. Correspondence with potential customers became difficult, though some of our other staff members were able to pick up the slack. However, our film site was very remote and we didn’t have cell service which meant we had to trust our limited staff to get along without us and to answer any pressing questions that we weren’t able to.

Another issue we faced was having to move our tiny houses to different locations to accommodate filming, we currently live in a tiny house that we built last summer so we had to move to a location closer to the film site as well as move the new build to a more “paradise-like” spot. In addition to that, we will be taking our new tiny house, “The Bohemian Bungalow,” to an expo in Chicago 3 days after we wrap up filming which means that we must make sure it’s extra stable and fit for a cross-country haul. As for the actual filming, it was important to us not to sacrifice anything in design or construction simply because we were on limited time and had to spend extra time making sure every detail was perfect for TV. It was important to us to maintain our company’s integrity and to communicate our story to the audience properly. This meant that we had to be prepared for what we were going to say and know the best way to effectively communicate. Not to mention all the release forms that had to be signed to be on the show, having to put together family outings to be filmed, coordinating help with the build, as well as feeding our film crew.

All this was done while, behind the scenes, we overhauled our brand, restructuring before we’re on TV as well as resuming our marketing content; blogging, social media, etc. We only have a 6-week window from the day we wrap up filming to the day the episode airs to make sure everything is where we want it to be, yet another time crunch. All of these different challenges have made us a stronger company and we’ve learned how to utilize each other’s strengths and to trust in our ability to get it done. We are so thankful for the opportunity to promote our brand on national television as well as share this experience with friends and family.