You wouldn’t expect Australia’s biggest annual arts festival to end on a solemn note, but when the final week of the 2020 Adelaide Fringe drew to a close, Lauren Thiel CA recalls an overwhelming sense of uncertainty.

It was the last week of March and Thiel had just shifted to full-time work in her accounting practice, The Real Thiel, which she started as a side gig in 2016 to support sole traders and micro businesses in creative industries. A regular festival attendee – and occasional performer – she’d hoped the 2020 Adelaide Fringe would result in some new business leads, as well as entertainment.

“I remember artists hugging each other goodbye, not knowing if the world would open up again because of COVID, and many people were having to leave their shows early to try to fly home before borders closed,” says Thiel.

“There were so many questions and I was suddenly in the deep end, with creatives coming to me in droves, saying, ‘help me!’”

“It created opportunities in that we were able to provide additional support during COVID and we built a lot of new client relationships, but it was a very hard time because artists were watching their work calendars being completely wiped out. Years later, I still see the impact on an individual level.”

Mixing commerce and creativity

Part of Thiel’s success as an accountant is her ability to speak the language of her clients. She excels at translating complex business matters into concepts that creative minds can grasp.

Thiel’s family background is a bonus. Her father was an accountant and her mother was a visual artist – and the blend of finance and creativity was an early influence. Thiel’s first part-time job as a teenager was in performing arts and she completed her first individual tax return when she was 15.

As she was finishing a university degree in tourism and event management, with plans to work in the arts, her final subject, accounting for business, prompted her to change course.

“I didn’t want to do that subject but when I read the textbook, I realised that it was the language of money, so I signed up for a commerce degree with the aim of becoming an accountant. The rest is history.”

“I think there’s not enough education about how to support the creative industries and the sole traders, and very small businesses.”

Thiel’s goal was to start her own accounting practice, but she realised it was a wise move to learn the ropes by joining KPMG’s graduate program in 2015. The same year, she co-founded a dance studio and continued to blend commerce and creativity.

“It started when a friend of mine was performing at Adelaide Fringe, teaching a comedian how to do the [Beyonce’s] Single Ladies dance, which was all the rage at the time, and I would sometimes help with back-up dancing,” says Thiel, who worked there until mid-2018. “The business was my friend’s baby, but it became my first company. It grew to having 120 students across three states at one point.”

Thiel worked in KPMG’s tax and audit team for two years, before moving to an analyst role at Duxton Capital. Throughout this time, she dedicated spare hours to The Real Thiel, helping creatives to set up Xero files or make spreadsheets.

“I care about the arts and I care about these individuals who are just trying to have a go in a creative business,” says Thiel.

“I’d observed at Adelaide Fringe, and in the Adelaide comedy scene in particular, that a lot of people running these businesses were really confused about tax and money and budgets, and all the things that I understood. Many were either confused by their accountant, or they didn’t feel that they were approachable, or the information didn’t seem relevant to them. They needed someone who understood both worlds and I happened to have that in my genes, with dad in the numbers game and mum as a visual artist.”

Thiel says she “ran the numbers” and decided to quit her full-time job when her annual revenue from The Real Thiel was half of her annual salary.

“If I couldn’t generate additional income in six months while giving it full-time attention, then I decided I’d go crawling back,” she says. “But it did work. Now, we have more than 550 clients.”

“The [dance studio] business was my friend’s baby, but it became my first company. It grew to having 120 students across three states at one point.”

The art of money

The Real Thiel employs a team of four full-time accountants based in Australia and the Philippines. Clients range from performing artists to photographers, videographers, visual artists, writers and editors. Thiel describes her client base as “anyone whose brain works in a creative way.”

While each of her clients has individual needs, she sees some commonalities.

“They are comfortable using technology, but are often challenged by record keeping,” she says. “Oftentimes, they'll have multiple jobs and that can make it difficult for them when it comes to forecasting, budgeting, cashflow planning and especially how much tax to put aside.”

Thiel adds that, for clients in the film industry, their agent may withhold tax.

“But this isn’t always the case, and then some clients go through your own sole trader ABN. I think not having the financial literacy and financial foresight means they often feel in the dark and are trying desperately to catch up, which is a really challenging place to be.”

Thiel’s clients often share more than their financial information. She says the often-precarious nature of their work can impact their mental health.

“A lot of my clients have anxiety or depression,” she says. “I've got a client who has a trauma trigger response anytime the ATO calls them, because they’ve had severe warning letters in the past.

“I suppose if I were to find some commonality among my clients, it would be often feeling overwhelmed and confused about their finances, but a lot of determination and desire to do better and wanting to understand.”

Speaking a different language

A 2024 Creative Australia report, Artists as Workers: An Economic Study of Professional Artists in Australia, revealed there are more than 47,000 practising professional artists working across the country. Their average total income is 26% below the workforce average, with half of the artists earning less than A$10,000 from their creative work.

Australian Bureau of Statistics data disclosed that arts and recreation businesses had the second-highest number of job losses in 2020 due to COVID-19 restrictions. Live Performance Australia data shows that although the JobKeeper payment program provided more than A$76 million to the arts sector in April 2020, both JobKeeper and JobSeeker excluded much of the live performance workforce due to unique employment arrangements, such as casual work and freelancing.

“Today, many of my clients are feeling the impact of having years with almost no income because of COVID, or getting behind in the tax or not having a process in place to save for their tax,” says Thiel. “Having a much lower superannuation balance is also a disadvantage, but the world keeps spinning and I can see how resilient our artists really are.”

“Helping clients understand their tax and finances requires clear communication,” says Thiel.

“A lot of us work in accounting because our brains work in a particular way and that’s why we're good at it,” she says. “But we have to provide support and information to clients who are in a lot of different industries and whose brains work differently, so maybe we shouldn’t just present information in a way that makes sense to us.

“Maybe we should think about getting to know other people and becoming more aware of neurodiversity, so that we can provide information in ways that are more accessible,” adds Thiel, who presents information for clients in a range of formats including infographics, explainer documents and videos.

“We also need to reconsider the language that we use,” adds Thiel. “If I put an accounting phrase like ‘property, plant and equipment’ in an email to a client, they may have no idea what I’m talking about, so I ask specific questions like, ‘do you own a kiln for the sculptures you’re creating?’. There’s no point throwing accounting terms around in an email and assuming that everyone knows what you mean.”

“I suppose if I were to find some commonality among my clients, it would be often feeling overwhelmed and confused about their finances.”

Big plans for small business

Thiel believes accountants can play a valuable role in “lobbying for the little guys.”

“I work with a lot of sole traders and micro businesses, and I think they are often overlooked,” she says. “I think there’s not enough education about how to support the creative industries and the sole traders and very small businesses, because accountants are often too busy dealing with A$10 million small businesses, which are quite big in the scheme of things.”

While tax compliance represents the majority of The Real Thiel’s services, Thiel is passionate about expanding her advisory work.

“The questions we get from clients are things like, ‘how long do I need to keep my receipts for’, or ‘I’m thinking about buying an investment property, what do I need to think about?’, or ‘I used to work from home but now I don't have a home because I am a nomadic performer, so what can I claim?’”

“We provide advisory services where we sort of become a friend who knows about finance,” says Thiel. “We want to be the money person and offer advice when needed, but I realise that people don’t go to an accountant for that first, they go to an accountant to get their tax return done.”

Thiel also plans to develop an artist management division of her business, while still making time to exercise her own creativity. She’s currently learning the drums and performs as a stand-up comedian. She’s also a board member and treasurer of Cabaret Fringe Festival.

“I had a bit of an internal crisis about my business last year because I hit all the milestones that I really wanted to hit. Now, I’m thinking about what else I want to do with the businesses, and other ways that we can support and help the clients that we’re passionate about,” says Thiel.

“Ultimately, my goal is that we have a more financially literate creative industry, and that we have a lot less trauma and stress and anxiety related to money.”