We were lucky to catch up with Emily Smith recently and have shared our conversation below.
Emily , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today 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.
The idea for my business was a cumulation of ideas and life experiences. I’ve always loved fashion and have helped friends with their closets or outfits for events and what not. However, there have been seasons in my life where I was unsatisfied and that was directly reflected in how I presented myself. When we feel beat down in a relationship, in a career, in life, the way we feel about ourselves and how we treat and love ourselves is heavily impacted. For me, after getting out of an unhealthy relationship, I had to take on a second job to help cover new bills and the responsibilities I was obligated to from that relationship. I was a full time commercial interior designer, working already 40-80 hours a week. There was no way I could go back to the service industry (which is what I had done in college). Instead, I signed up for a MLM jewelry company where I could make my own schedule. It really did impact and improve my life in the best ways. It served as a great distraction for what I was healing from, but it also made me shift my focus back to myself. I would get excited about the new piece of jewelry I was going to wear that day, which trickled back to me really thinking about the whole look. It brought back my confidence because I felt good about myself again. I also met some fabulous women in the process, some of whom went from customers to now some of my closest friends.
Fast forward several years, I changed careers and attended many events. As I would meet people in my industry or who were in some of the same philanthropic groups as I was, more and more I would hear, “Oh, I know you! I always look forward to seeing what dress you are going to wear!” When Covid hit, everything changed for everyone. I had just gotten so many clothes for upcoming events and no where to wear them to. The first week of lock down, I would make dinner and wear them just so i didn’t feel like it was a waste. The second week, I was in my sweats and did absolutely nothing to myself. As a creative person, I was quickly feeling down and uninspired. At the start of April 2020, Tiger King had just launched and I had the perfect shirt to wear as a work from home look. My little fashionista great aunt had passed the year before and I had snagged some fun items from her closet for future theme parties. This shirt was one of those. Hot pink, purple and green with tigers and leopards. It’s ridiculous. It was a fun concept to do a WFH outfit series and something I thought would honestly last a week or two. I managed to do 6 months of it. Over 120+ outfits and I didn’t buy anything. Each week was a different theme that tied together. Everything from Iconic women, doppelgängers, 80’s and 90’s week etc. I did it for me, because it kept me to a routine of getting up in the morning, thinking about what I would wear ahead of time and kept me on a schedule because I wanted the social media content to be done before I started my workday. Even a year afterwards when I would see someone that I hadn’t seen during covid, I heard some many times, “covid was such a dark time, I hated getting online but I would just because I wanted to see what you came up with. I looked forward to that every day.” I tear up repeating that, because I had no idea my quirky and silly idea would have been something that was a joy for others. Many time that comment was followed by, ” you must have the biggest closest!”
I don’t, I just figured out how to mix and match things to recreate looks and use what I have.
After things opened back up, I started helping a friend who had an online boutique. It started out as fulfillment and just back of the house stuff to set up products manage inventory etc. Even though my background is design and architecture, I have always been interested in the business of things and so I started getting more involved in the marketing, numbers etc with my friend. It was so exciting and so fun. Once again, I was helping friends style their day to day looks and their vacations and special events. The business side was like a puzzle, and I realized that I was perhaps treating my friend’s business as mine and not as hers. The amount of time I spent planning, and coming up with ideas was what a business owner does and not just a friend who helps here and there in her free time. It seemed like something I should consider exploring to do myself. My friend was beyond understanding and encouraging of me to explore the idea. I am forever grateful to her for that intro to how all this works!
As I began telling my closest friends and family this dream, more and more said to me, “will you make sure to have sizes I can wear or that such and such can wear? So many boutiques size out in a size 8 or 10 and they consider that a large.”
My friends and family really are reflective of the diversity of our shapes and sizes so I wanted to make sure that I could provide a place that would help empower them in their wardrobe choices. When I started sourcing manufacturers, it has been such a blessing to find styles that fit and flatter the shortest and most petite ladies, but also the tallest or the curviest. As I meet women that shop my boutique, it has been a consistent response to hear, ” I love that you have curvy sizes!” or ” I love that you show how it fits on different bodies.”
All that to say, my own personal experiences of how I found ways to empower myself through fashion and accessories has encouraged me to help others as a personal stylist as well as boutique owner.
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.
I’m Emily, founder of Smith House Couture. I’ve always had a love for style, design, color, pattern and texture which is why I studied and practiced Interior Design. I love and apply those same principles to fashion and my own style. After years of styling friends and family, being asked where I got my look and dreaming of opening my own boutique, I took the leap!
I launched my online boutique, Smith House Couture, to be a place women could shop curated collections to represent current trends and styles. Fashion can be overwhelming for some people, so I love being able to help women find something they love, flatters their shape and boosts their confidence.
My friends and family are representative of my favorite thing about Houston, it is diverse! I wanted to build a brand where no matter your age, size, or background you can find something that works for you. It has been so much fun finding styles that my smallest and most petite clients love as well as my tallest or curviest girls and everyone in between!
In all my rolls in my career my goal has to always be a trusted advisor and friend. As a designer, turned sales rep and now personal stylist I always want my clients to feel that I would use their time and money wisely to achieve the look and function they desired. Additionally, I will always be honest with them in terms of what looks best and is most appropriate for them. I will tell it to you straight as I want you to be happy and confident in your choices.
Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?
Oh wow. Social media is such a beast and honestly there are days where it feels like a beat down. I understand why there are so many agencies out there that offer to do it for you. It takes time, patience and strategy. My advice is to always be authentic, consistent, and engage with your following. I also suggest to set realistic goals and expectations. I am so guilty of doing what so many of us do and that’s beat ourselves up for things or have unrealistic expectations. Don’t expect overnight success. It takes time.
Social media can also be really time consuming, but as you do it more and more, it becomes easier. Set up your branding to make your content easier to design, recognizable to your audience and consistent in your feed. I try to find ways to capture moments I am doing in my day to day as a way to save and repurpose for content but without taking up so much time or documenting every moment and every detail. You will have to establish a balance and set boundaries. I also suggest following a small handful of social media experts that provide valuable ideas, changes to algorithms etc. It can be overwhelming to follow to many, but some of those tips have really helped me in growth as well as engagement. Because at the end of the day, the number of followers really does not matter. What matters is the engagement and quality of the followers you have. So remember, it’s a quality not quantity.
How’d you think through whether to sell directly on your own site or through a platform like Amazon, Etsy, Cratejoy, etc.
I use Shopify for my business and I have loved it. They integrate with so many tools to make your job easier as well as so many metrics to help analyze your business. I love that it integrates with Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, the shop app as well as your point of sale system for in person sales. By doing so, it allows you to have your business available on multiple channels as well as a plethora of payment options for your customers. I love that there are a ridiculous amount of apps that you can utilize within Shopify to help you grow your business depending on what it is that you do. You want to set up a rewards program, they have an app to help you. You want to have a blog as an additional part of your site, its there. You need reporting so you can file your sales tax, its all there in one place.
I taught myself Shopify and only scratched the surface. Its incredibly intuitive and they have lots of videos within Shopify to help you understand it.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.smithhousecouture.com
- Instagram: @smithhousecouture
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SmithHouseCouture.Boutique
Image Credits
indie&mod and cinematic candy for one photo Abe aldana