We recently connected with Ekima Smith and have shared our conversation below.

Ekima, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.

Our journey to entrepreneurship began over 12 years ago when we began to plan our son’s first birthday party. I spent months locating a venue, selecting a theme, purchasing decorations, and contacting vendors etc. I recall saying to my husband “how cool would it be if there was place that provided a one-stop-shop for kids parties where everything was taken care of for us and all we had to do was show-up”. From there, I spent time researching kid’s party packages at family entertainment centers. What I gathered from my research was that, while many entertainment and recreation centers offer party rooms, the current market limits the buyer to strict constraints including time length, inability to select popular themes and the parties occurred during normal business hours with the general public admission. I knew from there creating a model that was both inclusive and exclusive would be attractive to parents!

Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.

My background includes over 15 years in finance and accounting roles at major Fortune 500 companies. While I have passion for finance and accounting, for as long as I can remember I’ve loved planning elaborate events. Everything from the smallest detail was always important to me, I am known by my friends as “The hostess with the mostess”.

Owning The Five Party & Event Center, has allowed to me to live out my passion for event designing and planning, along with managing the business side of things which is equally exciting for me.

The Five Party & Event Center, has three key service areas: Kid’s Parties, Meetings & Events, along with custom event prop building and rentals.

Our ultimate kid’s parties are created with the birthday child and parent in mind! Our service model is designed to provide a one stop shop! Our standard party includes private event space rental, elaborate custom décor, games & activities, food & beverages, dedicated party host and invitations!

In addition to our ultimate kid parties, The Five Party & Event Center offers private event rental options for wedding & baby showers, business meetings, holiday parties and more! Just like our kids parties, our private event rental includes customized décor, creating a one-stop-shop for our customers.

Our final service offering includes custom wood props for events. Whether is a princess castle, carnival tent or carriage, The Five Props elevates your event experience with custom designs leaving you with picture worthy memories to last a life-time. Each of our events held at The Five Party & Event Center includes custom prop décor. We also create, sell and rent custom props to other event designers.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

In January 2020, we signed a 5 year retail lease with a plan to open our doors of The Five Party & Event Center in April of 2020. No one could have predicted the events that would have transpired in 2020. When the pandemic hit, and business were forced to shut down we underwent a slew of emotions and sleepless nights. We allowed ourselves a few days to gather our thoughts, however we knew we needed to revisit our original plan and map out our new path forward. Although a pandemic was not included in our contingency plans, we had planned for other scenarios with similar impacts: loss of sales, constructions delays, etc. to which we applied to the current situation. This included the following:

Altering our timeline: We decided to now target the Fall of 2020 as our new opening date. Our goal was to provide safe activities for children to enjoy, with the summer coming to an end.

Adjusting our service model: Next, we altered our service model. Our model is designed to provide a one-stop shop for the ultimate kid party. In addition to our kid parties we also host Character Experiences, Parents Night Out and more. With gatherings being limited and to ensure we did our part in slowing the spread, we decided to focus on crafts that could be done in a socially distanced environment along with take-home kid activities, in the short-term.

Updating our forecast: We also updated our forecast projections. While seeing unfavorable numbers on paper can be discouraging, it was necessary for us to understand what additional resources would be needed to stay a-float. Our projection update included a review of sales and identifying expense savings opportunities, by evaluating variable costs and adjusting inventory.

Lastly, and probably most important, we continued to network and promote our business despite the unknown future.

Overcoming the challenges of the pandemic has strengthen us personally and professionally and I am excited to be on the other side of the journey.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Aside from launching a business during the pandemic, our biggest story of resilience was around finding a physical location. In the early stages of our search for a location, our main priority was locating a space that could be a blank canvas, with little improvement needs. What we didn’t learn until AFTER we signed our lease, was that there are several building code usage designations for the city. The space that we leased was original zoned for retail, however an event venue required a different zoning designation including stipulations such as ample parking, multiple restrooms along with other requirements to be compliant. This resulted in unexpected expenses and additional months of construction needs. This is major lesson that I often share with new business owners who’s looking to open a physical location. It’s best to research local zoning requirements first, prior to beginning your search.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://thefiveparty.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thefiveparty/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheFivePartyEventCenter/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-five-party-event-center/