We were lucky to catch up with Kara O’Brien recently and have shared our conversation below.

Kara, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Let’s kick things off with your mission – what is it and what’s the story behind why it’s your mission?

We began with animal rescue: dogs, cats, chickens, and then with a focus on alpacas and llamas. And our mission has grown to rescuing mama & babies from horrible auctions where they rip the mamas from the little babies. Often the little babies end up passing away without their mama and without the specific nourishment they need.

The treehouse airbnb/wedding/tv show component of our business occurred on accident really. The treehouse was built for personal use and then we decided to make it a short term rental to help offset the staggering costs of rescue: feed bills, vet bills, shelter costs, and farm maintenance.

So the mission began with wanting to be helpers and then it just exploded into a whole concept, which has been magical and wonderful.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

Well, we sort of accidentally began a business and this just all grew organically. It was not planned or supposed to be this organic gardens and farms, populated with rescued dogs, cats, chickens, alpacas, llamas, and guanacos. But that is now what it is!

We really expanded organically into several factions. We have short term rentals: the Alpaca Treehouse, the Luxury Llama Cottage, and the Llama Stay Farm Cottage. On top of that, we accidentally started hosting weddings, tv shows, commercials, photo shoots. And then we started doing tours for people that didn’t need to stay over. And Llama Yoga is just a fun community-based experience and we donate another 15% to Pet Buddies Food Pantry, another great non profit organization.

We are about to have our first Llama Wine Tasting event and we are super excited about that. We will have some local artists and a little pop up bizarre for holiday shopping.

I’m really proud that we are able to run a business that began with helping animals and continues in that vein. I’m also really proud of our “Treehouse Tribe” a wonderful group of women that help with tours, yoga, retreats, wine tastings, gardening and photography.

What else should we know about how you took your side hustle and scaled it up into what it is today?

So, yes. The goal of putting the Alpaca Treehouse up as a short term rental was just to help feed & vet all of the rescue animals. And it still does that! But it got so big after we did 3 Netflix shows and Treehouse Masters on Animal Planet, and were twice featured on CNN International (along with a host of other tv shows). And we started filming music videos and that was also very intense.

I was forced to choose between my treehouse job and my job as a general contractor. I chose the treehouse job because there wasn’t any turning back at that point and it was unpredictable and mostly a lot of fun.

One of the things I never expected was how much the combination of the Alpaca Treehouse overnight stay coupled with the magic of the bamboo forest and the roaming llamas, alpacas, and guanacos– just how much that experience– would touch people’s hearts. The same is true for the cottages, which are family friendly. Often folks write and express the amazing memories they’ve made and how they will come back. And that in turn, touches my heart that we created something that really makes people happy. And we provide them with experiences that bond families and couples.

Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?

I don’t know that I’m that good at social media, but I have found that authenticity and posting regularly attract fans that regularly comment. I’m trained as a writer so good storytelling also doesn’t hurt.

I also try to post stories daily about what ridiculously thing the herd is up to. Figgy the llama, is also a full blown character and she has her own fan base.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.alpacatreehouse.com
• Instagram: @alpacatreehouse
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/AtlantaAlpacaTreehouse/
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/alpaca-treehouse-in-the-bamboo-forest-atlanta?osq=alpaca+treehoues
• Other: https://www.tiktok.com/@alpacatreehouse

Image Credits
Joy Cannis Photography