Lea Gilbert launched her North Carolina-based decorated-apparel shop Treehouse Creations at the beginning of 2025 because she was burned out from a career in professional theater and looking for a change. But her background in the professional arts is precisely what’s giving the Gen Z entrepreneur an edge.

Lea Gilbert, Treehouse Creations

While many in her generational cohort are leveraging social media for sales, 27-year-old Gilbert is taking an “old-school” approach: going door to door to small businesses and explaining the services her small direct-to-garment (DTG) print shop offers.

“I’ve been told a lot that, ‘You’re going to get turned away,’ or ‘People won’t talk to you.’ And that just doesn’t seem to be the case,” Gilbert says. “People are just so much more welcoming than you might expect. … I think there’s some fatigue with emailing and social media.”

Treehouse Creations has fulfilled DTG orders for a variety of organizations and small businesses. (photo courtesy of Treehouse Creations)

Sales calls, she adds, have a lot of similarities to theater, with both requiring you to think about how your audience is going to perceive you. “The only difference is with a sales call, you’re not playing a part; you’re being yourself,” Gilbert says. “A really big part of it is being authentic.”

Thanks to her proactive approach, business has been booming. Treehouse Creations produces custom merch for dance studios, schools, camps and other organizations and businesses. The shop also works with independent artists, collaborating with them on webstores and exclusive merch collections. By June, Gilbert was so busy she had to bring on her mother, Louise, full-time to help keep orders flowing.

Here are four tips Gilbert has for salespeople looking to dip their toes into the world of cold calling.

1. Be prepared. In advance of making a sales call, Gilbert spends time researching her prospect, getting a bit of insight into the type of business they run and the kind of merch they’ve ordered in the past. Having some foreknowledge leads to more constructive conversations.

2. Set expectations with yourself. Before knocking on a door, Gilbert says she’ll take a deep breath to ground herself and settle any nerves. She doesn’t go into a call expecting to close a deal right away; she frames potential rejection as an “opportunity to meet someone new” and make another contact, rather than a personal setback.

3. Talk less, listen more. Gilbert tries to keep in mind that she doesn’t need to talk the whole time. As a theater person, she says, this can sometimes be hard to remember. But she notes it’s important to let the prospect have the floor. “I let them talk to me about their needs, wants and what they haven’t gotten from a vendor in the past.”

4. ROI isn’t a straight line. Initially, Gilbert says, she gauged her cold-calling success rate at about 50%. But a customer’s sales journey isn’t always a simple metric to trace. For instance, Gilbert had given up on a certain contact she’d made over the summer, as several months had passed with no response. Then, out of the blue, the contact reached out, referencing “the great conversation” they had with Gilbert, adding that they were finally ready to place an order with Treehouse Creations.

“Even if it doesn’t work out right away, maybe it will work down the road,” she says.