We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Hailee Thoen a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Hailee , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love for you to start by sharing your thoughts about the pros and cons of family businesses.

We are a family owned business and absolutely love it. When we first threw out the idea of starting a business together, we wanted to build something that we love and would have together long term. We all come to the table with different strengths, and we’re able to comfortably communicate what those are and how we can best approach each client’s needs. Because we’re family, it’s easier to share thoughts without feeling nervous or weird about anything. We love being together and doing something that we have a passion for–bringing clients’ visions to life. Throughout the years, we’ve really gotten into a good groove of who is best at which of the multiple “hats” we wear in business, and it’s been so fun to do it all together and bounce ideas and dreams off of one another.

When we dream of the future of our business, we would love to bring our future children in on it. As a mother daughter owned company, it’s always been a dream of ours to build a legacy for our company and family. We’ve loved creating this business from the ground up with our mom, and we think it would be so special to have our children continue to grow the company with us. Our spouses are always jumping in to help when they can too, so it truly is a family affair here! We couldn’t imagine it any other way.

One piece of advice we’d have for family owned businesses is to make sure to schedule times for just business and times for just being together so it doesn’t feel like every time there’s a family day, you also end up having a business meeting. It’s easy to get caught up in ideas and sharing one quick business task, thought, etc., but setting those boundaries is so important so you can make the most of your time and not feel burnt out.

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.

A Family Affair is an event styling and rental company that specializes in full-service styling for our clients. The three of us have always had a passion for hosting and were known by friends and family for going all out whenever it came to a party or event. Every detail of whatever we were hosting was always well thought out and fit within a specific style or theme. One day in 2020, we decided it was time to take the leap of faith and start our own business doing what we knew we loved.

We offer a wide variety of services and have expanded our offerings over the years. The bulk of our business is event styling and event rentals, and we offer a full-service styling approach that sets us apart from others. This means that we’re here for our clients from initial consultation to a personalized Style Board to delivery, set up, take down and everything in between. We work with our clients to help design their dream event through styling and unique rental pieces. Our goal is to make the entire process for them seamless, stress free, and perfectly curated to their unique vision. Some other services we offer include: a la carte rentals (pick up + drop off options), Day of Coordination, custom builds + custom signage, and more.

Something that we pride ourselves in is our client satisfaction. We aim to always go above and beyond for our clients and to exceed their expectations on event day. We believe that the connections we make with our clients, processes in planning and design, and time and attention to detail truly allow us to execute their vision to the best of our ability. We’re able to pivot when needed and be the “magic” behind the scenes so our clients can be present for their day. Here’s a quote from one of our clients that we feel sums up what we do: “I could not be more thankful for the AFA team. Planning a wedding can be stressful, but they stepped in and helped build my vision when I had a hard time even communicating what I wanted. I couldn’t be more happy with the decision to hire them, and I was especially thankful they were willing to travel the distance they did for me. Not having to collect every item for decor myself took a lot of stress off my shoulders, and it truly made me happy knowing I didn’t have to pull my family to help decorate or flip the room, allowing them to fully enjoy the day. Karen, Hailee, and Brooke have created an amazing business and made the process leading up to and the day of our wedding so seamless. If you’re questioning hiring them for any event, please save yourself the stress and just do it; you will not regret it!”

We love working with clients who are hosting all types of events (weddings, birthdays, baby + bridal showers, corporate events and more) to help bring their vision to life. With a thoughtfully curated collection of inventory and a focus on sustainability, we aim to make our clients events stand out!

Where do you think you get most of your clients from?

The best source of new clients for us has been referrals! Whether it be from vendors we’ve worked with previously or clients that loved their experience working with us, referrals are our number one driver of clients.

The connections you make in your industry are so important. We feel so grateful for all the wonderful vendors we’ve worked with (and become friends with) along the way. When you create those connections with other people in your industry, you’re not only fostering great working relationships when you’re on an event together, but you’re also cheering one another on and want to see them succeed.

It also makes us SO happy when our current + past clients send new clients our way. It’s truly the best compliment we can receive! We get so much joy from working with our clients, and then it’s fun to see them again at other events along the way.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

I think the biggest thing to building an audience on social media is to just be authentic. Show up, be true to your brand, and post content that is relevant to the clients or customers you want to work with. I also think engaging with others on social media is important. Whether its people within your industry, within your community, or even your followers, engaging with them so they can get to know the face behind the screen helps people connect with you and your brand.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://afaeventstyling.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/afa.eventstyling/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/afa.eventstyling
• Other: Google Business – https://g.co/kgs/8LU1en7

Image Credits

Morgan Maxine Photography and Framing Fairytales Photography