Topsail Insider
Topsail Insider interviews local businesses and nonprofits in the Greater Topsail area of North Carolina including Hampstead, Surf City, Topsail Beach, North Topsail, Holly Ridge, and Sneads Ferry. Locals can learn about all the new businesses popping up in our area, prospective residents can find what’s available before making the big move, and vacationers will see we have much to offer beyond our beautiful beaches!
Topsail Insider
Blue Ridge Boutique
From dreaming of one day owning a “boutique by the sea” as a little girl growing up in West Virginia to realizing that dream in Surf City, North Carolina, Simran Canterberry has managed to balance motherhood, a thriving online business, and the opening of her Blue Ridge Boutique storefront, complete with its own app! She’s an energetic businesswoman with a big smile and a big heart. In this episode, she shares her family history, her passion for family and fashion, and all the ways you can shop and save at Blue Ridge Boutique.
Address: 108 Charlie Medlin Dr, Unit D, Surf City, NC 28445
Phone: (910) 233-2311
Hours: Mon-Sat, 10am -5pm
Website: blueridgeboutique.com
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Topsail Insider is edited by Jim Mendes-Pouget.
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Welcome to Topsail Insider, where you can hear all about the businesses and events in the beautiful coastal towns in the greater Topsail area of North Carolina Coming up. If you've been on Facebook checking out ladies' clothing lately, you've no doubt seen the lovely Ms Simran Canterbury showing you all of the fabulous items you can find at the Blue Ridge Boutique in Surf City, north Carolina. She is a dynamo, a smart businesswoman with a big smile, a big heart and loads of positive energy, and I am thrilled to have her in the studio today. We'll be discussing her West Virginia roots, her Surf City storefront, online sales from her website and Facebook, and she even has a Blue Ridge Boutique app. Stick around for all this and more on today's episode of Topsail Insider.
Speaker 1:It's time to indulge and experience the finest coastal hospitality on Topsail Island, with Saltwater Resort and Suites in Surf City, north Carolina Designed to exceed your expectations. Guests can enjoy elegant suites featuring premium, luxurious bedding, fully equipped kitchens with dishwashers, 75-inch flat screens, en-suite washers and dryers, and gorgeous ocean views. With the grand opening of their newest location, you can now relax in their saltwater pool opening at the end of July, and their modern clubhouse. Perfect for unwinding and sociales redefining luxury on Topsail Island. Come on out to Surf City Line for the best made-from-scratch beach and bowls on Topsail Island. Treat yourself to their delicious bowls with shrimp steak, fish, chicken or pork, or enjoy their peel-and-eat shrimp. Beach break salads and more. They offer a full bar serving handcrafted cocktails, incredible margaritas and they proudly serve North Carolina craft beer. The line boasts the biggest deck on the island with three levels for listening to live music, relaxing in the sun, or head on up to the top deck to enjoy your meal with ocean views. Visit SurfCityLineNCcom for their full menus. The best service and beach vibes on the island await you at 2112 North New River Drive. Whether you're a local or visiting from out of town, celebrating a special occasion or just soaking up the sun with family and friends, it's always a great time at Surf City Line.
Speaker 1:Hello everyone and welcome to Topsail Insider. My name is Krista and I am your host. Today we are talking to Ms Simran Canterbury. She is the owner of Blue Ridge Boutique in Surf City, north Carolina. Welcome, simran, and thank you for joining me today. Thanks for having me. I'm really excited to be here. Yeah, I have to say that every single time your store or your name comes up, people just light up talking about you. They love your store, they love you and, as much as you still carry a huge following in West Virginia which we're going to talk about, you've made quite an impression here in these beach towns. Before we dive into your background a little bit and your why, let's go ahead and give the listeners an overview of what Blue Ridge Boutique is and the products you offer and where you're located and such yeah, of course, like you said, we're Blue Ridge Boutique.
Speaker 2:We're located in Surf City, north Carolina, right behind the Salty Turtle. We're a women's boutique. We carry a little bit of kids. We focus mainly on bright, colorful, patterny clothes, accessories, anything that you need to create a fun outfit. We are open every day, 10 to 5, except Sunday, because that is the Lord's Day and we need one day of rest. Amen. But we are just here to make sure that all the girls in Surf City women, ladies, children look and feel their best all the time.
Speaker 1:I also think that folks often mispronounce your name. I did, until I spoke with you on the phone and it's Simron, not Simran, which is what I was saying, and I think, a lot of other people. I imagine that a lot of people mispronounce your name as well. So for anyone who's been wondering or maybe you've been saying it wrong, no hard feelings, she forgives you?
Speaker 2:No, of course not. So I usually go by Simran but Surf City. I've created Sim because that's a lot easier for people to say. So I'll answer to pretty much. I've been called Skymarin. I've been called Simran.
Speaker 1:I mean, if you just say the S-I, I'll probably turn around and answer. That's so funny because most of the people that I talk to they do say Sim, oh, sim, she's awesome.
Speaker 2:So I just felt like that was easier for everybody, and that's what we just get with now.
Speaker 1:Okay, but it's Simran. Correct Is the correct pronunciation of the full name. Okay, since we're talking about it, could you just share the origin and the meaning of your name, because I thought that was pretty cool yeah of course.
Speaker 2:So my grandpa, we call him Nana. His name is Senthok Chawla. He came to the United States from India. He took a ship from India to Italy and then he made his way to West Virginia where he became an engineer. So my name means to recite the name of.
Speaker 1:God, the culture is called Sikhism. The Sikhs they're often confused. They wear the turbans.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so they're not Hindus, but they're their own religion and it's called Sikhism. Got it Okay?
Speaker 1:I want to talk a little bit about your grandpa Nana. He came here by himself and educated himself. Can you tell me a little bit about how your family just one by one came over here, yeah, of course.
Speaker 2:So he came in 1959, which sounds like a long time ago, but I guess it really is, it is. So he went from a ship to Naples, italy, and then he flew from England to New York. He took a bus to Pittsburgh. He started his undergrad degree at the Carnegie Mellon University. He wanted to come to America because there was just a lot of corruption happening in India and his dad wanted him to come here to see better opportunities. He didn't know anything of the American culture. He always laughed about hot dogs because he didn't really understand. Like, hot dogs to us are obviously a food, but to someone who doesn't know or isn't around here, you don't. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And even things like revolving doors at the't around here, you don't?
Speaker 2:Yeah, he thought it was a dog, yeah, so like, and even things like revolving doors at the hotel, things that we don't think about. Somebody who's coming from a different country that long ago didn't really understand. He came to WVU in Morgantown to do his master's in instructional engineering. It was at that point he felt like he was obligated to bring his siblings one by one. So at that point, when he had come here, he had two small children, my aunt and uncle, and he left them behind with my great mother. Her name was Nani, so she stayed behind with the kids. He left them when they were two and four, but he didn't fully reunite with them until they were 10 and 12.
Speaker 1:Now, that's a long time. So that's a long time.
Speaker 2:So the family dynamic is very important. So he, one by one, brought his siblings to America. He knew that he had to figure out how to get them here because he was funding the whole thing at this point. So he worked with congressmen and professors so that his siblings could have a mission to either WVU or West Virginia Tech. He got a job with West Virginia Department of Highways. He took care of their needs. He paid for everyone's tuition and airfare. All of his siblings prospered with different careers here. Did they all go into engineering as well? So we have some that were engineers, some that were mathematicians, just a little bit of everything. He left a few behind that didn't want to come. He had a sister that was a well-known poet and author, but he still has brothers living right now and siblings in Missouri, michigan, west Virginia, north Carolina and Canada. Wow.
Speaker 1:He came over and just really made the most of everything. So eventually your mom did come over here, correct? You told me a really cool story.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:There were arranged marriages.
Speaker 2:There still are today, that's still a thing of today. So my mom was actually born in the United States.
Speaker 1:So she was born in West.
Speaker 2:Virginia. So it was. My mom has three siblings, two of which which were born in India, and then her and then my uncle were born in the States. But, like you said, prearranged marriage is still a thing that happens. You don't? It's not publicized, so you don't really see it in your face. My mom won a pageant called Miss Sternwill Regatta. That's where she met my dad, miss what Sternwill Regatta, sternwill.
Speaker 1:Regatta.
Speaker 2:Yes, so she met my dad there. He owned a bar in downtown Charleston, west Virginia. She was set to be married to a doctor in Hawaii. It was all planned out, it was ready to go.
Speaker 1:They had taken her to my aunt's house in Maryland where they were going to start the process of the arranged marriage. Was she going to fly to Hawaii and marry and then live there? From what I've heard, that's what was supposed to take place.
Speaker 2:So who threw the wrench in the plans? My dad drove up to Maryland in a white van and came and got her.
Speaker 1:You didn't mention that. That's pretty scary. My aunt was not home. Were there windows on the van Right?
Speaker 2:I don't know my aunt was not home, so it was just the gardener, the housekeeper that was there and she knew that mom wasn't supposed to leave. But mom just went and left and started a life there Was there a fallout there?
Speaker 2:was. So my mom was considered the black sheep for a long time, because she was the first one that had broken away from that system, missed the cultural norms. But you have to think, though, how much courage and strength it took to like you've been indoctrinated in this culture your entire life and then to go doing something you've never done before, knowing that you're going to disappoint your family, knowing how they feel. So ultimately, she got pregnant with me. My dad and her got a divorce, unfortunately, but at that time we were living in a trailer.
Speaker 2:So my mom knew that the key to getting us out of the situation we were in was education. So she felt the need to prove to the Indians that she did not make a mistake, that she knew what she was doing and she was going to raise somebody that was going to not necessarily she'd already broken the cultural mold, but was going to make something of herself. So I always felt in my heart that I had to do it for my mom, so that she wasn't considered a black sheep. She had done something correct, and I feel like that's probably why I'm not necessarily hard on myself, but so driven and focused, because I wanted my mom to know that what she did wasn't for nothing.
Speaker 1:I love that you and your mom are pretty close.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we are.
Speaker 1:Did she get an?
Speaker 2:education. She did so, my mom. She knew that her ticket out was a education. So she got a degree in early education and while all this was happening, when she was pregnant with me, she also went back to live with my grandparents. So imagine how that's tough.
Speaker 1:That is tough, I don't.
Speaker 2:I can't even imagine what that would feel like for her.
Speaker 1:She did what she had. She did what she had to do.
Speaker 2:She saved up enough money for us to move to a trailer there. She put herself through school, got us out. I mean, just made something for herself. So if it wasn't for her kind of passion and drive to want better for me and her, I don't really know where we'd be today.
Speaker 1:Yeah, your family history is pretty cool and unusual and not something I hear very often.
Speaker 2:So thank you for sharing that.
Speaker 1:Of course, you said that you always dreamed of owning a boutique I think you said boutique by the sea even as a little girl. What was it like for you first of all, growing up in West Virginia, and when did this passion for boutique clothing start?
Speaker 2:I've always had a love for fashion. My grandma and I call her mama we would go to Goodwill all the time because boutique shopping was expensive. So I knew from a young age that if I wanted to wear boutique clothing I would have to find it secondhand. So every Wednesday she would pick me up from school and we would scounder the racks at Goodwill and I knew what I was looking for. I knew the big brands that I wanted to wear to kind of fit in and feel cool.
Speaker 1:But I could do that on a smaller scale because we knew all the good wills by heart at that point.
Speaker 2:We camped a lot as kids. I always wanted to go to the beach. My mom and stepdad he's great they always wanted to go camping in the mountains. And I just said one day I know I'm going to move to the beach and I'm going to open a store and I'm going to have pink chairs hanging from my wall. Everybody thought I was crazy. But we moved down here. Things kind of took a slower turn and I was still hoping that we would open the store. But there were a lot of steps and processes that we had to get to get to the point where we are now.
Speaker 1:Do you remember the first time you ever saw the ocean? What made you fall in love with having a beach town boutique?
Speaker 2:So we always with my grandparents, my nana and nani and my mom, we would go to Myrtle Beach, so we would go to the pavilion and there was just something about Broadway at the beach that just made you excited, walking on the boardwalk. It was just that life and excitement that you knew that people were not stressed because of work. It was not. You can't even explain it. It's just like that positive energy walking the boardwalk and I knew that I wanted that, but I didn't know how to create that energy as a kid. But I saw all the shops. We would go late at night. I don't know if you remember there was a dragon at the golf course at Broadway at the beach. He would come up.
Speaker 1:Oh no, I don't, so we would always go and watch the dragon.
Speaker 2:And I would see how busy these stores are and I was like, wow, what are they doing to bring people in? Even my nunny and we would just watch the people going back and forth and I thought, what is it like to own a store, even at Broadway, at the beach?
Speaker 1:I can just see you as a little girl sitting there the wheels turning, even at a young age. Yeah, you married your high school sweetheart.
Speaker 2:I sure did Tell me a little bit about your husband. Okay, so we met when I was 15. We went to the same high school together. Our high school cafeteria was divided. You had people that lived in the creek Davis Creek. They sat where they called it the creaker corner, and it was all separated, like you would see in a movie, by different jock types. Yeah, Football players.
Speaker 2:Yes, very clicky. My husband came from the creaker corner, so that was on the outside of the cafeteria and I stayed on the inside. But I thought, well, let's venture out and see, because clearly nothing great is coming from the inside. So let's see what the country boy has to offer from the outside. That's funny.
Speaker 2:So we met when I was 15. He came to pick me up for our first date. I'll never forget he drove a Ford F-150 truck. Back then I was kind of still like how I am now. I would get along with every group, but a little bit preppy, but just a little bit different than my husband was. So he came and picked me up in his Ford F-150 that had the words redneck and camo letters on the back of his glass and I was like, oh wow.
Speaker 2:I don't know where this is going to go from here, but we dated all throughout college and high school. We went to prom together and then we ultimately moved here together to start our family in Surf City.
Speaker 1:So Myrtle Beach was where you got to know this area and now it makes sense why you ended up here in this area being coastal. So tell me how you ended up in Surf City for your store.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So my husband, when we were in high school we would for like senior trips in college we would go to different beaches in the area. So we stayed at Carolina Beach, we stayed at Holden Beach, oak Island, topsail, wrightsville all the beaches here and we just fell in love with it. I'm ashamed to admit it, but I used to watch a lot of One Tree Hill.
Speaker 2:And I just wanted to be in Wilmington and it was just so fascinating to me so we would go and do all these tours and I would just tell him I want to move here one day. But once we did move down here, he got a job. We had just bought a house in West Virginia when we were in a job to redo the Oak Island Bridge, so that's what's brought us down here. Okay, so your husband's also an engineer. He is. When he was in high school he's a jack of all trades. He would work contract work. He can lay floor. He can build you a table, he can build he just said he built out your storefront.
Speaker 1:He sure did, yeah, so he was.
Speaker 2:He built the bridge. Where again In Oak Island, they redid that big Oak Island Bridge. So that's what brought us down here. I didn't have a job at the time, so I just worked at different boutiques learning the ropes. Then we I guess we're having a midlife crisis. I don't know if you have a midlife crisis without kids but we bought a motorcycle and so we would just drive the motorcycle to Myrtle Beach so that I could go back to Broadway at the beach it.
Speaker 2:I'm not a motorcycle person. I was reading a romance novel on my book on my phone while I'm on the back of this motorcycle, the phone dropped. Oh, we ran over it on the way to Topsail. Not that it was bad, but I don't like not being in control, so if I just focus my energy on something else, I wouldn't think about it. That's funny.
Speaker 2:We saw that they were developing all this land and I thought, wow, we had been to all of these different beach areas, been to Wrightsville, been to Carolina. Well, I hadn't really explored Topsail and there was something about it that was just. You had that same hometown feel as West Virginia, but on the beach. So when we drove through it I said it wasn't as commercialized as Carolina Beach, it wasn't as ritzy as Wrightsville Beach. It was the perfect mix for us. So we saw that they were clearing land and I just put that in the back of my head to one day come back to. We didn't make any plans then, we just enjoyed the day. But I always, in the back of my head, fell in love with the Surf City area.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Okay, there's a lot of engineers in your family, but what did you study when you went to college?
Speaker 2:I have a degree from Marshall University. My degree is in marketing and I have a minor in entrepreneurship.
Speaker 1:When did you open your online store? You started your business in West Virginia.
Speaker 2:I did so. We got married in 2017. We were on the way back from our honeymoon. We had a small wedding. We saved up our money. Nobody paid for it. We went to Italy for two weeks Nice. It was amazing. We traveled around and I just I knew that I wanted to open a boutique, so we would go to all of these little boutiques at the Amalfi Coast, in Rome, in Florence, and I was like wow, Even in going to a different place and seeing other boutiques, knowing that that's what you want to do in your heart.
Speaker 2:But not knowing how you're going to get there. It's still cool to see how they do stuff, how their layout was. I still have on my phone pictures that I've taken of displays in the Amalfi Coast boutiques. So we got married. We were coming back and the song Country Roads comes on.
Speaker 2:You know that's West Virginia's theme song and it said we knew that we wanted to move. We didn't have plans to move at this time. We were still in West Virginia. And it said Blue Ridge Mountains, shenandoah River. My mom loves the mountains. We would always travel through the mountains Anywhere we could get near. Blue Ridge Mountains is where my mom wanted to be. So I told myself even at this point when we hadn't moved Blue Ridge Boutique just has a nice ring to it. It does, and I'm going to take Blue Ridge Boutique to the beach one day, lord willing, if that's. I wanted to be like Vineyard Vines Patagonia. I wanted to be like a lifestyle boutique. So at the beginning he went to market.
Speaker 2:He was more interested in eating Chick-fil-A at the little vendor booth than actually working, but he did model for a little bit. I'll have to go back and do some throwback pictures, but we had some men's clothes, some kids' clothes and that's what we started with when the boutique launched online. So it launched online in October of 2017.
Speaker 1:There's no storefront, so all of the clothes are coming into your home and you're shipping them out from home as they're being ordered.
Speaker 2:Correct. So we had also. Even from that point, I knew that there were so many boutiques Everybody. The market even at that point in 2017, was becoming saturated with boutiques, so I needed to figure out what was going to keep us standing apart, and that's what I've kept in our business. Everybody can do what you do, but you have to have an edge that sets you apart from everybody else. So in 2017, that edge that set us apart wasn't embroidery. There wasn't. There was monogramming embroidery businesses. There were boutiques, but there wasn't a lot that was together. You would order clothes in and then embroider personalized stuff on it. Yeah, so we would have boutique clothing on our online store and then we would also carry like comfort colors, pocket tees and do embroidery. I was terrified of that embroidery machine. I like being in control and I couldn't control it. So after my husband would get done being an engineer all day he would sit on that embroidery machine and embroider clothes.
Speaker 2:Oh, you have a good husband.
Speaker 1:He's great. I love him. That's amazing. Okay, so your husband did all the embroidery. When did you decide to stop the embroidery? So?
Speaker 2:actually the embroidery still happened right up until we opened our store in.
Speaker 1:Searcy, oh really it did yeah.
Speaker 2:Because I knew that that is what would keep us afloat when the boutique wasn't doing it, because everybody always needed something monogrammed or personalized. I did it by myself for a little bit, but I would still ask him to do it majority of the time because he was just better at it than I was. Are you still doing any of it today? So we're not. We have friends at Savvy's Embroidery. They do all of our embroidery for us now.
Speaker 1:So you still offer it? You're just outsourcing.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we do.
Speaker 1:How was the business going?
Speaker 2:online. So back in 2017, you were seeing a lot of customers really order online. But while we were online, I knew that we also needed to get in front of a larger audience. So any festival you could think of under the sun in West Virginia I would sign up for. They had the Pumpkin Festival. It was a Thursday through Sunday festival. You were there from 8 o'clock in the morning until 9 o'clock at night. I would just lug all of my stuff to set up there the Cupcake Festival, the Harvest Festival, anything I could to get people to shop with us, to see us and that's what we did until we moved in 2020.
Speaker 1:Okay, so you're selling at the festivals, you're selling online, but you still go up to West Virginia for an event each year and you still have a lot of customers in West Virginia. I think you said 96%. Is that right? 90% of your customers are still in.
Speaker 2:West Virginia yeah, so that's huge. In 2021, I created a event called Junefest West Virginia Junefest.
Speaker 1:That's what I wanted to find out about.
Speaker 2:Tell me about this. So Junefest was a way I knew that there was just not enough hours in the day. I just couldn't keep lugging my things while we were in North Carolina back to West Virginia. It was just not feasible. But I wanted to go to an event where I would have a lot of other vendors there, basically make my own event. So that's what I did. So I created Junefest, which is a small business vendor event. Always happens the Saturday, father's Day weekend in West Virginia. We just had our fourth annual Junefest. We're going to be working on our fifth one soon. But we've slowly grown bigger and bigger. So the last event we had over 110 small businesses that are coming from North Carolina like us.
Speaker 2:Virginia, west Virginia, ohio, kentucky, you name it. We're kind of like a hub a big hub event.
Speaker 1:Where are you having this? I know you're in West Virginia, but where are you setting? Are these all?
Speaker 2:tents? No, so we had started. There was a small little building. It's called the India Center and that was where we had it the first year, but we quickly outgrew that. So now we rent out the Charleston Area Coliseum and Convention. Center where they have all their concerts and conferences in the capital city.
Speaker 1:That is big. Yeah, you were pregnant with your first child. That's your daughter. That was pretty soon after getting married. How did this affect your business?
Speaker 2:I nannied, in high school and college. I loved kids, but I never really saw myself with children. I like to do things when I want to do them how I want to do them. So my husband and I had a great routine set up. We knew our flow together. We just knew what worked. So I found out that I was pregnant with my daughter and I had a really hard time, honestly, because I didn't have a storefront at this point and in my head, if you had children, your dreams had to be put on hold. So it took me a while to understand that having a child and bringing a child into this world is not a hindrance, it's a blessing. And my husband kept saying we're going to get through this, You're going to be a great mom and you're still going to be able to have your dream. And I truly didn't believe him. I thought at this point for my daughter, I thought I had to give everything up, but that wasn't the case.
Speaker 1:You continued on with your business. Yes, you didn't even pause.
Speaker 2:So when I was seven months pregnant, I started the first annual June Fest.
Speaker 1:Oh, wow.
Speaker 2:So I lugged all of our stuff by West Virginia.
Speaker 1:Didn't slow you down at all.
Speaker 2:Just loaded it up and we went up there While my daughter was home. Everything was all upstairs in our frog, so I was being a mom during the day, working until 2 or 3 in the morning. Shipping orders would sleep, then she's up at 7. It was getting too much, so I really needed to think. This is not sustainable. We were doing really well on online sales, so financially we were okay, but I had to get it out of my house because I never felt like I was truly present with my family, because I think UPS would always drop off stuff at the house.
Speaker 2:My husband was always taking stuff upstairs, the inventory was starting to honestly take over our house. Yeah, and then it hit me in the back of my head oh, remember, we drove by on the motorcycle in Surf City and we saw that that plaza was going to be opening soon. So we reached out to Wellman's Construction, who owns the plaza, and put it in works. But I truly didn't believe it was happening. Because here I am, it's a big leap. It's a big leap. It was very comfortable in my home. I had everything I needed. But for my mental health, my sanity and for me being a mom, I knew I had to get it out of there. I truly didn't believe that it was going to happen. Because in my head again, I'm thinking oh, I have a child, I have a daughter. Society kind of tells you you can't be a mom and you can't have a child. You have to kind of pick one.
Speaker 2:Pick one that you want to do well, yeah, yeah, but I chose both, and that's okay, you can choose yourself and still be a great and encouraged me and knew that I had to do that for myself and for the sake of being a mom. So we opened the store September of 2022. My daughter had just turned one years old. She stayed at the store with me. She grew up in the store. We didn't have employees at that point. The plaza hadn't even finished, so we wouldn't. Sometimes we would have it's brand new, it's brand new, it's brand new.
Speaker 1:I think they finally have all the stores filled at this point, but it just happened.
Speaker 2:Yes, it was us and a couple of others. I couldn't afford a place. My daughter and I would stay there from 10 to 5, monday through Saturday. I worked six days a week. We had an air fryer. We still have an air fryer. We had a TV. We were just hanging out. My kid grew up in that store, in the store, and that's such an awesome thing because customers would come in and it was like she had. Where I came from, west Virginia, and my family wasn't here my daughter Rhett. She was able to get family from customers so they would come and talk to her and bring her treats and just be like be a surrogate and grandma. They were able to fill the role for her that she needed. She grew up in the store. Customers loved it. She loved to take the money.
Speaker 1:She would love to scan Look at this entrepreneurial spirit, though, that you gave her at a young age. So can't you just see her when she steps into adulthood? She's going to be like I already know how to do this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one of my biggest things as a mom, what I want to project onto my child, is that you don't have to listen to what everybody says. You have to do, ultimately, what serves the Lord and what makes you happy at the end of the day. And I think that I'm I hope I'm showing her that that's feasible and that that's doable to do, because you can't whether you're a mom or you're in your career, you have to make time for yourself and things that you truly are passionate about.
Speaker 1:I totally think you're setting a great example for that. I know you just had your second child. It's your son. Yes, right, because I actually followed you online looking at your videos and you're getting further along in your pregnancy. But I guess maybe straight on, when you're modeling the clothes or you're doing your fit videos, yeah, I couldn't even tell. And you're like I am 36 months pregnant right now.
Speaker 2:Where is it? It's all about the angle, yeah.
Speaker 1:And you're like. So this fits a little snug here. But you know it's a box cut. But I loved how you continue doing that all the way through your pregnancy. So the pregnancies definitely didn't slow you down at all. Is your son spending as much time in the store as your daughter did? Praise the Lord, we can afford employees now.
Speaker 2:So I'm not there 10 to 5 Monday through Saturday, but I still make it a point to be at my store. My son comes with me when we go. He's got a little crib in the back, he just hangs out. So I worked up until he came on a Thursday I was induced, worked up until Wednesday evening. Tuesday I was induced, worked up until Wednesday evening, and you had him on Thursday, yes, and then so he came Thursday, stayed at the hospital Friday, saturday, tuesday I was back at the store. Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2:You really are a dynamo. Well when you really love what you do. It's hard. That was my first. I always tell people Blue Ridge Boutique was my first child, so it's a I do mom. Some days I thrive more as a mom. It's just a balancing act that I'm probably never going to perfect, but you have to work on it daily.
Speaker 1:Before we move on, just tell me real quick about your two children. What are their?
Speaker 2:names. So my daughter her name came from my husband's grandmother, loretta, so we'd spelled it a little bit differently. We call her Rhett for short, love that. And then my nana, who came from India. His mom's name was Maya, so her name's Loretta, maya Canterbury, we call her Rhett. Everybody knows her as little Rhett. And then I just have my son named Truett and I wanted so their names both end with TT.
Speaker 1:I love both names, so it's.
Speaker 2:Truett, James Canterbury and Rhett and Truett Very cool.
Speaker 1:I went into your shop a while back and I found the perfect pair of flats and I got to say the price was super reasonable and I love them. Tell me about the clothes and the accessories, but also the price points you choose for your clientele.
Speaker 2:Growing up, like I said, I shopped a lot at Goodwill because that's what we could afford. Going to an affordable boutique just wasn't a thing anywhere. Honestly, when we would travel boutique, you knew you were going to spend X amount of dollars when you walked in. So when I started Blue Ridge Boutique, I wanted to be very conscientious, because I know that there are some people who have money to spend and then there's some people who live paycheck to paycheck and, honestly, both of them are okay. Everybody deserves to have something nice. So that's what I implement in my business.
Speaker 2:We have a wide variety. You can come in and buy a $3 claw clip, or you can come in and buy $180 pair of Spanx. I wanted something at every single price point. Whether a little girl was doing chores to get an allowance, she could feel proud to come in and there was something that she could buy. Or a lady that was more established, that had a little bit more to spend and cared about a bigger name brand. That's what we have too. So I'm very conscientious of bringing bigger brands in as well, because people don't know us. The main reason that I'm doing that is to get the people in the door by saying oh wow, blue Ridge Boutique carries Spanx. Oh wow, blue Ridge Boutique carries Dolce Vita. Then, once you come in our store, learn a little bit about us. We can keep you as a customer with the wide variety of price points that we truly have.
Speaker 1:Love about us. We can keep you as a customer with the wide variety of price points that we truly have. Love that you have the ladies staples. You've got tops, summer dresses, bottoms and you have the swimsuits are so cute. I saw those online. You can go to blueridgeboutiquecom to see all of the wonderful clothes that they sell online. Is everything that you have online also in the store?
Speaker 2:Yeah, so we try really hard to make sure that our app user, our online shopper, is getting the same experience that they will get in store. All of our inventory is on all platforms.
Speaker 1:What size ranges do you carry? I noticed in the store and on the app and online that you offer size inclusivity.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that's something that we really strive and care about. I think that for a while, people just considered a boutique to have size zero through, whatever. That's not right. You should be able to shop at a boutique no matter what size you are and feel beautiful and still have an affordable outfit that you love Absolutely. So that's why I'm really big on carrying things when I have the opportunity to. Some brands obviously don't allow us because of that's just how they're run, but we get the option to carry small through 3X. I always jump on it because I know that everybody wants to feel beautiful and they should.
Speaker 1:Talking about your accessories. You sell earrings, you sell purses, hats, shoes, but you also offer quite a bit more under that accessory tab. What are some of the hottest items that you have?
Speaker 2:We're big on accessories. I really want us to be the one-stop shop if you're going to go to a birthday party, so we carry a lot of like fun, knick-knacky, giftable items too, whether that is a mug that you're going to give your friend, we have little prayer boxes. Just I want everybody to be able to come in pick something out. We carry little kids items, so if you're going to pick out something for somebody, that's two or 200, we got you no-transcript.
Speaker 1:This is where I want folks to really pay attention, because your sales are incredible. Let's go through your sales process, because you can go in the store, of course, but if you really want the deals, you need to be on Facebook and you need to get your app on your mobile device. And I think it's so great that you have a Blue Ridge Boutique app, and I'm going to pick your brain about that later. Okay, I don't even know if I need one, but I want an app, right yeah.
Speaker 1:So just tell us about the app, walk us through the different ways and the days that you drop new sales items, because it's a lot of information, so let's just spell it all out here.
Speaker 2:So we created our app during the thick of COVID you. So we created our app during the sick of COVID. You couldn't shop anywhere because we were on shutdown, but you could shop online. People were stir crazy. They wanted to buy things. So that's when Blue Ridge Boutique really took off, during COVID, because we became the hub for online shopping. We did it just through Facebook sales.
Speaker 2:For a long time we had a Facebook group and then we were presented with an opportunity to create an app and I thought, wow, the momentum is really going with these online sales. Why not? I mean, what do we have to lose at this point? So we created an app and that has really just helped us. It's been a game changer, honestly. So, yes, you can shop in store, but to really find what is super hot and trendy right now, you need to download the app. So I drop new arrivals every Tuesday and Thursday at 7 pm. Make sure you get the notifications. Just enable notifications so that your phone and I promise I don't blow y'all up, but you get notified when new arrivals drop. So these items are dropping on the app before they hit the sales floor. So items that drop on Tuesday on the app are not going on the sales floor until Wednesday. Things that are dropping on Thursday on the app are not hitting the sales floor until.
Speaker 1:Friday I didn't know that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so that is something that we offer to our exclusive app customers and sometimes people will see that things are selling out on the app before it even makes it to the sales floor Wow. So we have a lot of customers that are shopping online that we ship to, and then a lot of them are honestly doing in-store pickup because they know that if they want that item, that they better jump on it because there's a high potential it could sell out. Sometimes we'll offer restocks of items, but I really just try to make sure that we don't saturate with the same item. I want everybody to have a unique piece of ours and then just to stay affordable, because you know that that's one thing that I truly do care about. Every Tuesday at noon on our app, we have 20 Tuesday where I drop a $20 new arrival just for fun. It could be a dress, it could be a pair of shoes We've sold $20 shoes before Just something that you can grab and feel excited about.
Speaker 1:That's really cool. So if you're putting something on the app on a Tuesday or Thursday and it's not on the floor yet and you have six of one item and all six of those are sold that night, but it's at 7 pm, right, correct, 7 pm it goes on sale. It's sold out. Sometimes you can be waitlisted and you place the second order, but you get your orders immediately, like you know how many sold at that time and how many?
Speaker 2:is left so that's kind of a little bit tricky. We always just pray that it works out. So when we buy something at market through one of our vendors, we don't know if it's going to sell. We take a risk. Every time I pray that y'all like it. Sometimes you love it. Sometimes I think things that are going to sell don't sell. Things that I don't think that aren't going to sell sell out. So it's really a guessing game on our behalf. That's why I always try to take one of the girls to market with me or pick their brain, because I think two brains are better than one. They're also at the store with me seeing what sells daily, what people are saying. So we really try to tune in and listen to what our customers want.
Speaker 2:But on our app you have an option to either waitlist an item. So if it sells out you hit waitlist. You will get an opportunity to get that item if we restock it, if you restock it, if I restock it. That's not a guarantee, but let's say, if somebody returns something you would be notified. But the key to getting something that you truly want, that we're going to sell out, that we've sold out of, is to waitlist preauthorize. So I know it sounds like mumble jumble, but waitlist preauthorize means that you have already-authorized the purchase on your card. You do not get charged until I have the merchandise in hand ready to send to you. But when it does come available, it hits your cart first and it's sold to you before it hits anybody else's shopping cart.
Speaker 1:This is why it's so important to get those notifications, so that you don't miss that opportunity, because you don't know if you're going to get a second shipment in or not?
Speaker 2:It's like a little gamble, whether you're going to get it or not. It is kind of exciting. Yeah, it is.
Speaker 1:I know another element to the unknown. Yeah, you still have a VIP Facebook group. I do, but you're not selling as much through Facebook Lives as you once did right Correct.
Speaker 2:So during the thick of COVID, people were shopping on their phone mobile devices all the time. There's still a lot of stores that do Facebook Lives, but now as a parent, I don't have that much time in the evening to watch somebody talk for an hour to be honest, yeah it's true.
Speaker 2:So that's why I really like our app because you can get the information right away.
Speaker 2:You don't have to wait for me to sit there and ramble on for $900 about clothes. I just want you guys to be able to shop immediately, not have to wait. But one thing that we do offer in our app, which I think is so cool and such an added benefit and so many of you guys love it, is each item that we sell myself or the girls that I work with we do a fit video of every item, so you're not seeing it on a model you've never seen before. It is a real life girl that works at our store and we have a fit video. So we're going to tell you how tall we are, what size we are, how it fits, how the material makes us feel, all of that good jazz. So we know that sometimes shopping online is a risk because you don't truly know what you're getting in terms of how it would fit on your body style. So we really try to go that extra step to make sure that you feel confident in your online purchases.
Speaker 1:I love the fit videos. Even though I'm not the same size as you, I can tell. If you say I normally wear size four, yeah, this is a size small Then it lets me know what I should get. And then you also put them on your moving the fit videos.
Speaker 2:And they're short videos.
Speaker 1:They're not long wide videos that you do have to sit through. You can scroll through the app and see a style that you're like oh, I like that top and then watch that.
Speaker 2:just very brief fit video yeah, it's about 20 seconds. Just hit the play button. I'll tell you how it makes me feel and how I feel like it would make you feel, and then we move on.
Speaker 1:Where did you get all of this inspiration? Did you see someone else doing fit videos Like, how are you learning how to do all of this technology and incorporate that into your sales process for your boutique? Because I haven't seen it from other boutiques.
Speaker 2:Maybe it's out there and I just haven't seen it. Yeah, so when I was in high school and college, I worked at a boutique called Yared Shoes, the owner, emily Couch. We worked together all the time and she taught me everything I knew.
Speaker 1:Was she doing the app and the Facebook Lives and the Fit videos too?
Speaker 2:She wasn't. So when I was working there they were big on in-store shopping. So that's where I learned how to treat customers in-store. Going the extra mile, I saw how customers would come in just to see Emily because she was just such a positive ray of sunlight and I wanted to figure out how I could imitate that. I wanted people to be able to come to my store and say I saw Sim today and I went in the store and Sim was working Like. I just want people to feel good they do Well, thank you.
Speaker 2:I hear that from everybody but the fit videos. That was me wanting to shop online. If you go on let's say, for example, you go on Belks you're seeing a girl on a white background. You don't know what size she is, you don't know how tall she is. She's super lean, just like a coat hanger there and you don't know anything about her. I want you to say, oh well, simran wears this in this brand, maggie wears this in this brand. I want you to put our girls and myself with our store and know how it fits our body and how it would relate to you. It's great.
Speaker 1:Your business sense is amazing and I feel like I could learn so much from you. But in the pre-interview you mentioned Google's inverted or reverse image search, which I knew nothing about.
Speaker 2:Thank you for that, because now I'm going to start doing that.
Speaker 1:You find a picture or a product that you want and then you put it in this Google search inverted image search thing and then it tells you like you can find a similar product to this much cheaper. So it's for people who are on a budget but they like really nice things, but you can find almost like a knockoff, yeah. So tell me how you've taken advantage of that platform.
Speaker 2:So when we go to market unless it's like an exclusive brand that Zipco territory protects majority of the time we're all able to carry about the same thing Any boutiques are. It's up to the boutique owner how they want to price things. You could market up 100%. You can market up 50%. You market up 20%.
Speaker 2:People always laugh I want to make enough money so that my family can eat dinner, but I'm not eating filet mignon. I want to eat chicken. So I want everybody to be able to afford something. So I'm not out to price gou. What I really key in, for we keep our prices, what I feel is safe and comfortable and respectable.
Speaker 2:So with that, let's say, you go on a boutique app and you say, oh my gosh, I love this top, but it's $98. And I just $98 just really is not in my budget right now. You don't know the brand, you don't know anything about it. You're going to screenshot that picture, right, and you're going to go to your Google and, instead of typing something in, you're going to upload the picture and it will pull. I guess Google AI. It's a little bit. It's a little bit above me, but this is how I'm thinking it's working, because it's how it's getting us sales. People are going to pull it. It's going to show up everything in that pattern and that style of that clothing item. We show you every boutique, whether or store anywhere in the United States or in the world that's carrying something similar and it shows you their price point. So we are getting new customers literally everywhere that I have no connection to, because they are doing these Google and averted searches to find us and knowing that we are not price gouging them.
Speaker 1:You're not marking up your prices as much as some other boutiques may be doing, yeah, and so when people put in that picture, your store, blue Ridge Boutique, pops up as a less expensive option, and so they can click on the link and go to you and place your order.
Speaker 2:Yep, that's what they're doing. They're seeing us, it pulls up. It doesn't necessarily filter by price, so you're going to have to scroll a little bit to see where it is, but that's what it's doing and it's pulling us up every single time, so smart.
Speaker 1:Before we move on, I just want to talk about your VIP group on Facebook. You said you have 10,000 members in this. Facebook group. Do we need to still go and be a part of that community?
Speaker 2:So before our app was introduced, the concept of it was brought to me. We sold everything on Facebook groups, so that's where people would want to go to purchase. That's not like that anymore now that we have our app. But when you see us posting on Instagram you're seeing Blue Ridge Boutique posting. It could be myself or one of the girls, but when you see us posting on our VIP group, you're talking directly to me. It is coming from my Facebook page. That's where we're right now talking to customers, getting their input. You're talking directly to me. We're getting that personal interaction that you may not get on Instagram. So I'm really big on knowing my customer wanting to hear about how your daughter's first day of ballet went. That's our home base. That's where we started. I'm not going to forget where we came from and that's what we're learning about our customers.
Speaker 1:As a person, Before we wrap up. Neither you nor your employees are pushy with your sales in the store, which creates a very comfortable shopping environment. So many people just can't stand pushy salespeople and there's nothing like that in your store. Can you share why this philosophy is important to you at Blue Ridge?
Speaker 2:Boutique. Yeah, like I said, I've worked at a lot of boutiques that worked on commission. That's how you got paid and I just didn't feel like it was wasn't my. I didn't want to force people to buy anything. I don't know anything about you. I don't know what your budget is. I don't really know what you're looking for. So for me just to force something on you so that I can get paid, that doesn't make sense for anybody. That's not helping the customer, which is truly what we care about. We're in the store to be your. We're never going to push anything on you or make you feel uncomfortable, because I just feel like that's human decency honestly, I find that highly uncomfortable.
Speaker 1:I do too, and sometimes it feels fake. So people are telling you you look fabulous in something and you're standing there looking in the mirror and you know you don't.
Speaker 2:No, and I always tell our customers. I will never lie to you. Because when you go out and somebody asks you where you got your outfit from and you say Blue Ridge Boutique and it looks bad, that's a bad reflection on me.
Speaker 1:I didn't think about that. So we are very honest with you.
Speaker 2:That's a good point, so I want it to always reflect that you love your outfit, you're confident and other people see that when you wear it. One of the things that we really care about and I didn't truly understand the meaning of it until I became a mom is sometimes you just as being a family-friendly place. So I don't know if you noticed, but we started carrying Diffin Dots. I always wanted to carry Diffin Dots. So come in the store. Honestly, I don't even care if you buy anything. I just want you to feel comfortable when you're in my store.
Speaker 2:People bring their kids in all the time. They sit on the couch. We have a quarter bouncy ball machine. I know what it's like to need to get your kids out of the house. You can't break anything in my store because if you could, my daughter already would have. So I don't keep anything. Reach level eye levels that kids can break Smart. We just want people just to come in and just walk around. It's hot right now. Come in, get a quarter for the bouncy ball. You need a snack for your kids. I got a boatload of them in the back. We will help you out. Just get out of the house and feel safe and comfortable coming in our store and not feeling obligated like you have to buy anything, so the Dippin' Dots, especially because it's hot here right now and it's a good break.
Speaker 2:So it's such a nostalgic thing. So I loved Dippin' Dots. As a kid. My goals were to always open a boutique by the beach. Checkmark that I wanted to hang pink chairs on the wall. Checkmark that my husband begrudgingly painted them pink when I went to the antique store trash on Oleander, because they always put their trash out on Thursday night.
Speaker 2:So I would go on Thursday nights and check out chairs, so we use those as hangers. He's like I've never seen anybody put pink chairs on their wall. But it was a vision and I knew what I had and we wanted to carry Dippin' Dots. So pink chairs, dippin' Dots and by the beach and we've got it all covered.
Speaker 1:That's awesome. Okay, so future plans. What can you tell us about any future plans?
Speaker 2:whether it's personal, professional or both. So we are currently in the early stages of working on opening a second location. That's exciting. I'm excited. We can't disclose where it is yet, but we can tell you that where we're looking at opening, there are no other boutiques around us. Okay, we would have the exclusive territory to carry all of the brands that you guys know and love. So, personally, right now I'm learning, and still it's a struggle every day, but it's something that I'm working toward. Different seasons of life have different goals and different priorities, so right now, my priority is just to be really present with my children and be a great mom and also a business owner.
Speaker 2:So that's why I employ such amazing girls that work alongside of me, so that when I'm having to step back and focus on my role as a mom, my store is not suffering. So we're always juggling, like I said, those roles between motherhood and business womanhood. But just knowing that it's okay to choose something different in each season, we're not meant to choose the same thing forever.
Speaker 1:Going back to the second location. Is that a done deal?
Speaker 2:It is not, so we're waiting for the ground to break on a complex All right, we'll stop there.
Speaker 1:I just was curious, like how far along you were in the process. Okay, all right, we'll stop there. I just was curious, like how far along you were in the process, okay. So lastly is final thoughts. So what is the key message or the takeaway that you want to leave our listeners with today?
Speaker 2:I really just want everybody who steps in Blue Ridge Boutique to feel warm, to feel welcomed and to feel loved. We don't care whether you're full-fledged in makeup, whether you just rolled out of bed, whether you have $900 to spend or nine cents. We're gonna find something for you to shop with us and make you feel good about yourself. We accept everybody. We just want you to feel beautiful and special when you walk inside a Blue Ridge boutique.
Speaker 1:It's time to give out that contact information, so take it away.
Speaker 2:Okay, so you can call or text us. We answer during normal business hours, monday through Saturday, 10 to five. That's going to be 9 1 0 2 3, 3 2 3 1 1. We're located behind the salty turtle at 1 0, 8 Charlie Mellon drive, unit D, serve city, north Carolina. You can find all of our fashions at wwwblueridgeboutiquecom, or we highly suggest you go to the Google Play Store for Android users or the Apple Store for Apple users and download Blue Ridge Boutique app.
Speaker 1:And you can also find and follow Blue Ridge Boutique in their socials. I will have the links for their Instagram, facebook and also that Facebook VIP group for you there. So if you missed any of this information, go ahead to those show notes and click away. Thank you, listeners, for joining us today. I appreciate your support always and thank you again, simran, for being on Topsail Insider and telling us all about Blue Ridge Boutique.
Speaker 2:Thank you.
Speaker 1:Hey, if you enjoyed today's episode of Top Soul Insider, please show your support by clicking the follow or subscribe button on your favorite podcast listening platform. You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and YouTube. Please also go to topsoulinsidercom and join our mailing list by clicking on the make me a Top Soul Insider button. While you're there, you can click the send me a voicemail button and let me know exactly what you're thinking. Your message just might be on an episode of Topsail Insider. You can email me at Krista at TopsailInsidercom, or call or text me at 910-800-0111. Thank you for listening and supporting Topsail Insider and our local businesses and nonprofits. These are our neighbors and our friends, and together we build a mighty and a beautiful community I'm super proud to be a part of. I'll see you around Topsail.
