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Name: Serena Richmond
Business: Guilty for pleasure
Location: Surrey, United Kingdom
Industry: Apparel & Accessories
Reason for starting? I started my handbag business 2 months ago, originally planning to sell not only accessories but also lingerie for the modern day woman. At first it wasn’t easy, as the company I had previously planned to wholesale from put a lot on me financially. However I was able to find another wholesaler with reasonable prices.
My passion for my business originated from my own personal love for handbags. I have always found myself buying bags that match my outfit to complete it and bring the whole look together — and I find my friends do the same. Starting my own company allows me to do this whilst bringing out my own personality through designs. I also recognized that handbags today are something that are a necessity for women and therefore an item that they cannot do without.
Related: Read about another fashion entrepreneur here.
How do you define success? Success to me is when you have made steps towards your goal or your passion, when you achieve the things you want to do and are progressing towards greater success and greater development. Success doesn’t have to be making millions of dollars, it could also be reaching a milestone in your business, reaching out to the perfect kind of customer on a regular basis. It could also be just finding the perfect work-life balance and the financial security that you have wanted for so long. Just being able to support my family and be there when they need me to be, is really important too. These are the kind of things that define success to me.
Biggest success: My biggest success to date is just making the leap to start my own business and working towards creating it how I want it to be and have envisioned it in my mind. It’s been a couple of years of procrastinating and writing stuff down on paper. So my biggest success today is making it work, becoming an entrepreneur and getting my first two customers.
What is your top challenge and how you have addressed it? My top challenges have been trying to figure out who my customer is and how do I find them? I addressed this by constantly going through my Instagram feed and Facebook feed to see what sort of things interest my customers — where they are, who they are and what are they posting, and how can I relate this to my business to engage them.
Every day making decisions about my personal life affects my business. But one of the main decisions I have made is to go ahead and work full-time on my business in the next couple of months. So soon I’ll be handing in my notice at my job and going from part time in my own business to full time, and I’ll be able to focus on it 100 percent.
Related: The Independent Life – Samantha Hodgkins
Who is your most important role model? To be honest with you, I would say it’s my kids. When they found out that I was starting a business they came up with so many ideas and had so many opinions on how to run it. I constantly listen to their ideas and see if I can adjust things, they really keep me going and, in terms of inspiration, I want to do better for them. Other than my kids, business women all over the world who have achieved their business goals. Going from nothing to something really inspired me to get up and make a difference in my own business and my own personal life.
[box_light]Website www.
Twitter www.twitter.com/
Facebook www.facebook.
Instagram www.instgram.com/guiltyforpleasure/[/box_light]
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Edited by The Story Exchange