Those early pieces—functional pottery like mugs and planters—stood out because of the faces Katie sculpted into them. Each one distinct, expressive, and human. These weren’t decorative flourishes. They were central to the work. “Even as a kid, I was sculpting faces out of mashed potatoes,” Katie shared. “It’s just something I’ve always done. Faces tell stories.”

As she developed her technique and refined her process, the faces became more detailed, the forms more consistent, and the emotional pull of each piece more apparent. Still, the shift from hobby to business wasn’t immediate. It came gradually, beginning with the moment a stranger messaged her on Instagram, asking to buy a mug. “That was a turning point. I realized someone who didn’t know me personally wanted to bring my work into their home. That moment made everything feel more real.”

What followed was a slow, deliberate evolution from artist to entrepreneur. Katie built a website, learned the logistics of e-commerce, and developed a system for releasing new work. But at the center of it all—through every adjustment and expansion—remained the same creative instinct that first brought her to the wheel.

A Business Model Rooted in Rhythm

Rather than selling on demand, Katie structured her business around timed “shop drops.” Every six to eight weeks, she creates a new body of work, shares the creative process in real time with her audience, and announces a release date for when the full collection becomes available online. This drop-based model has become core to her operations—and the demand is real. Most collections sell out in minutes.

The marketing is organic and rooted in participation. Katie brings her audience into the process, using Instagram polls to choose glaze colors, inviting followers to help name individual pieces, and posting detailed behind-the-scenes footage in the weeks leading up to a drop. It’s not a passive customer experience—it’s collaborative. By the time the sale goes live, people are already emotionally invested in the work they’ve seen come to life in real time.

She closes the loop afterward by sharing stats: which pieces sold first, what countries they’re shipping to, and how the community helped shape the release. These post-drop reflections reinforce a sense of shared authorship—and show that this isn’t just commerce, it’s connection.

Audience as Collaborator, Not Consumer

While many artists feel pressured to perform online, Katie’s relationship with social media has been more fluid and generative. She doesn’t view it as a necessary evil or a marketing obligation. She sees it as part of the creative practice.

“I’ve learned so much from the people who follow my work,” she said. “They give me new ideas all the time. One person suggested I make a face blowing bubble gum. I would’ve never come up with that on my own—but it turned out to be one of my favorite pieces.”

What makes her following unique is the level of emotional attachment. Because each face is different, people develop specific affinities. When someone’s favorite doesn’t sell quickly, Katie gets messages like, “Justice for this piece!” The tone is playful, but it reflects a deeper reality: her audience doesn’t just want a mug, they want that mug, that face, the one they’ve been watching evolve for weeks.

This dynamic has made K2 Clay feel less like a brand and more like a community project—one that balances individual craft with collective meaning.

Scaling Without Losing the Original Spark

K2 Clay is now a successful business. But it’s still deeply personal. Every face is sculpted by Katie. And she’s deliberately chosen not to outsource or replicate her most popular designs. “There’s something that gets lost when you try to reproduce something over and over,” she said. “These faces already exist in my head—I’m just catching them.”

To support the backend of the business, she’s brought in her husband to run the website and her sister-in-law to help with glazing and fulfillment. This allows her to stay focused on the parts of the process that require her hands and her eye. That clarity around what she’s willing to delegate—and what she’s not—is a big part of why the brand has been able to grow without drifting from its original intention. She knows what makes the work valuable, and she’s careful not to compromise it.

Even when requests pour in for customs or mass production, Katie holds the line. “I’ve had to say no to a lot of things. I get asked to make animals all the time, but that’s just not what I do. I’ve learned to protect the creative process first, and let the business follow.”

Social Media as a Studio, Not Just Showcase

Part of what’s fueled K2 Clay’s growth is the way Katie uses social media not only as a marketing platform but as a working space—a studio with windows, where people can observe her process and see the real-time decisions behind each piece.

Her most notable content series, the “Pregnant Potter Project,” documented her pregnancy by creating one piece each week corresponding to the size of her growing baby. The project went viral and brought a wave of new followers to her account—but more importantly, it revealed the power of long-form storytelling in a medium often dominated by short-form content. “Doing a series gave people a reason to come back every week,” she said. “It kept me grounded and gave structure to a time in my life that was already full of change.”

Since then, she’s used the same approach to develop ongoing audience engagement, from naming competitions to post-drop recaps. It’s not strategy for strategy’s sake—it’s structure that supports creativity.

Redefining Success, One Piece at a Time

K2 Clay has become a full-time business. But Katie continues to work part-time as a nurse, both because she enjoys the work and because it reminds her that she is more than her art. That mindset has protected her from burnout and helped her make decisions that prioritize long-term sustainability over short-term growth.

Her goals are pragmatic. Build a dedicated studio. Maintain quality. Stay in love with the process. “If I ever stop enjoying it, I’ll pivot,” she said. “That’s the biggest priority—keeping the work something I love to do.”

She’s not aiming for mass retail, franchising, or licensing deals. She’s not chasing distribution or third-party scale. What she’s built is grounded, intentional, and repeatable on her terms. The business works because it honors the person making it—and the people buying it.

What Happens When You Don’t Compromise

At a time when the creative economy is saturated with advice about algorithms, scaling strategies, and passive income, K2 Clay is a reminder that growth doesn’t have to come at the expense of process.

Katie Rose Fischer-Price built a high-demand brand by staying small, consistent, and connected. Her work is personal, her audience is invested, and her path proves that building a profitable creative business doesn’t require diluting the thing that makes it meaningful in the first place.

The faces she sculpts may be different every time, but they all carry the same intention: to make someone pause, smile, and feel a little more connected—to themselves, and to the person who made it.