One Christmas, Caroline Gidiere opened a present under the tree and found that she had been gifted a heavy stack of paperwork: her business license, a resale certificate and articles of incorporation. The parcel, it turned out, was from her husband. Though she had spent years in the high-pressure legal industry—serving as an attorney in the Department of Justice, then settling down in Alabama as a partner in a law firm—she’d been slowly dipping her toes further and further into the world of design. First, it was her close involvement in the professional design of her own home, and then the few projects she picked up for friends.

Her passion for interiors soon became undeniable, especially to her husband, who hoped that giving her the paperwork to officially launch her firm would help her take the leap away from law and into design. Making the transition from one career to another, she says, was the hard part. Once the decision was made, however, there was no question about it: She was ready to put her solo operation on the path to something much bigger.

“I’ve been sitting on ‘go’ from the get-go, and ready to scale up,” Gidiere tells host Kaitlin Petersen on the latest episode of Trade Tales. “I’ve never had a sense of, ‘This will get to be too much and I can’t manage it.’ I’ve had a sense of, ‘Put me in, Coach—I’m ready.’”

In the years since establishing Caroline Gidiere Design, she’s done just that: determinedly building a trade network, structuring a well-balanced team, and developing an approach to charging that supports her firm’s goals for growth. Now, with a space that just opened in the Kips Bay Decorator Show House in Palm Beach and her first book about to debut, she’s seeing the results of those efforts unfold just as she’d hoped.

Elsewhere in the episode, Gidiere shares the lengths she went to in securing her first workroom relationship (including a year’s worth of baked goods), how she’s preparing for the launch of her new book, and how she has adopted the mindset to charge for the clients she wants.

Crucial insight: Gidiere has been careful about determining her rates. After consulting other trusted industry peers and analyzing her output, she has valued her work carefully—and she expects prospective clients to view the cost of hiring her firm with the same respect. “You have to price yourself for the client that you want,” she says. “You have to be willing to sit there and not get the project because you’re too expensive, particularly in a small town. I believe in us. We bring an A game. It’s a high-quality product. I’m not here to argue with someone over the cost. If you want to argue about it, then we’re probably not the best person for you.”

Key quote: “You never want to burn a bridge [in the industry]. Everybody’s busy, everybody makes mistakes. When you have to rely on people, you have to have them be your allies and friends, and rooting for you. You can’t do that unless you invest in the relationship.”

This episode was sponsored by Ethan Allen and The Shade Store. If you like what you hear, subscribe on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.