Who: Daiisy Boutique
Where: Waroona, WA, Australia
When times got tough, Danielle found her entrepreneurial spirit and made herself into a successful business owner. Of course, it wasn’t without a few trials along the way, but through Daiisy Boutique she has cemented herself in the local community of Waroona. We spoke to Danielle about how she got into retail in the first place and how Vend has helped her along the way.
Tell us how Daiisy Boutique got started?
In 2009 I was made redundant from my job at a mining company. Being a single mother of two children, my world looked like it was falling apart. I decided I needed to do something to make ends meet, so I spent my last $1,000 on buying children’s clothing and a business name. And off I went to markets and Facebook to sell them. Two months later, I opened up a shop in town and less than a year after that, a local women’s clothing business came up for sale.
Not one to back away from a challenge, I did some research and decided to jump in with both feet. The shop had been around for several years and relied solely on local support. After working out well, a little while later my lease was up and it was time to move the shop to another location. Called C to Scarp Fashions at the time, (Sea to Scarp has long been the identity of the town due to it’s location), I felt that not only did it limit the business geographically, but I also couldn’t believe the number of people honestly thinking the name was C to SCRAP Fashions! I decided that it was as good a time as any for a whole new brand and identity.
After much thought, Daiisy was the chosen name and the colour teal was chosen as a result of the ovarian cancer I had overcome not too long before. I strongly believe that women should look and feel amazing no matter what they are going through and something as simple as a new outfit is sometimes all it takes. It doesn’t matter what size or shape you are, there is something out there to suit you and make you feel fantastic. Daiisy exists for these women.
You’re in a small town called Waroona, do you get a good local community following?
Waroona is a small country town located about 110 kms south of Perth. The town itself has about 2,500 people in it and we have our regular locals but we certainly have a lot of support from people passing through or visiting from surrounding towns.
That said, there will always be limits to operating a shop in a small town, so it was vital for us to expand into the online shopping world. We had a local website developer build an awesome website for us which allowed us to expand our customer base; we now send products to Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and many other places around the country.
How did you come to start using Vend?
After numerous problems and lack of support from our POS provider, we decided to look for a solution which could be integrated with the website so that it was easier to manage stock control. We also wanted something that had an app so that we could manage sales easily at fashion parades and similar events. We did a lot of research and found a lot of possible solutions through search engines but decided to try Vend POS. We found it easy to set up and it seemed to tick all the boxes for what we needed, particularly with the reporting, which wasn’t possible with our previous system.
How has using Vend impacted on your business?
There have been two things that have made a major difference to the way we do business. The first is the ability to print and use barcodes! We now have every product loaded into Vend and have created barcodes for each one which means that whether we are out at events or selling in-store, we can simply scan the barcode and let Vend do the rest!
The second is the ability for Vend to be integrated with other online services such as eBay, Xero and even our own website. We now use Vend as our central point and the products, images and sales automatically filter through to everything else. This has not only saved us a massive amount of time (and therefore money) but it’s also resulted in Daiisy looking much more professional and consistent.
What advice would you give to other retailers?
As for advice to new retailers, there are a few lessons I have learned along the way:
- Professional branding is so important as it sets the tone and character for everything you do in business. Getting this right from the start will make things easier along the way.
- Get digital and automate. The beauty of this digital age we live in is that programs and apps can generally all be linked in some way. It may cost a bit to get set up but once it’s in place, you’ll save a whole lot of time and money and you’ll be able to focus on actually selling your products.
- Small business is hard. Small business in a small town is almost impossible. Surround yourself with good people and hang in there. Life has many curve balls, but with good support, you can make it work and it will be worth it in the end.
– Danielle Wilson, Owner, Daiisy Boutique
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About Grace O'Hara
Grace is a Marketing Assistant at Vend and helps make cool things happen behind the scenes. She enjoys talking to incredible Vend retailers from around the world and making the world a better place with her side projects. You can get in touch with Grace by email or connect with her on Google+.
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