We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Lisa Radeck. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Lisa below.

Lisa , thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Let’s start with the story of your mission. What should we know?

I, with my business partner decided to open a boutique in downtown Grand Rapids to fill a gap. Thirteen hotels within walking distance from the location and there is a lack of retail for visitors and locals. Grand Rapids, Michigan has large scale events, restaurants, and museums, but what was lacking was shopping!

I have traveled to a lot of Midwest towns and love to go to museums, museum stores and main street boutiques. There is something special about walking into a store and knowing that everything in the store was carefully hand selected. This is something that was missing from my home city. I thought, ” we have the capability, why not have some of this in my own backyard”?

After being open for two years we still carefully choose local artist work and complementary inventory that has a story. We choose women-owned, sustainable business to stock our store. The artwork of various mediums are local or mostly Michigan based and out of the 32 artists that we sell in our store, 28 of whom are women who are under represented in the art community.

In the beginning this was not by design but we are proud that we have met so many talented women artists and proud to share their stories with visitors and customers who connect with the art and purchase based on that story connection.

We see 80 percent of our foot traffic to the store happen upon us by way tourism and the number one question is “Where can I walk to for more shopping?” It is something we have made our mission by showing up to business association meetings, networking events, even discussing the situation with our landlord as to how we can grow retail clothing, shoes, home decor, etc…? We consider it a our umbrella mission to help attract more retail to the area by supporting our retail neighbors any way we can and in turn develop a mutually beneficial relationship.

As a small business owner it is a constant hustle to market you business, create that awareness and interest. We have found that support with other retailers with the same mission to make the heart of our city a destination for shopping, art, music, food and more!

Creating events like our Third Thursdays we leverage the amazing local artist talent to get locals downtown to discover not only artwork, but perhaps discover a new business to support and realize the importance of small business has on a growing community and having a hand in creating a community that has sustainability.

Lisa , before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I have always loved travel, history, museums, and shopping! Throughout my career I have worked non-profit and corporate jobs, but have also loved to volunteer in my community, That let me to help create the Fulton Street Artisans Market which after 20 years is still growing strong. Then I sat on the board for West Michigan LaborFest and coordinated the Artistan Market within the festival. for 5 years.

In 2015 after volunteering for 3 years at the Grand Rapids Art Museum I was hired part time as a Welcome Center Ambassador which led to becoming the Visitor Experience Manager for 4 years. It was at the art museum where I also became a Ceritfied Tourism Ambassador (CTA) through the city of Grand Rapids. My current status is that I am a CTA at large with the national program since the local program was not continued after Covid. Since becoming a CTA in 2015, I do not travel the same and make it my job to know and experience all the hidden “gems” in my own city.

The Grand Rapids Art Museum is where I met and became friends with my business partner Susan Coombes who was the Retail Manager at the museum for ten years. We have similar likes for art, travel, shopping, and of course our love for the city and wanting others to discover it charm.

Late in 2020 I started to travel with my husband due to his work and the art museum decided to shut down the retail store. Not only was this a retail anchor for downtown because it had a separate street entrance, but retail was really lacking and with the hotel visitors and downtown residents there needed to be a retail presence again.

Since the museum store closed, Susan was now in the boat I was in and looking for something new. We started talking by phone, then meeting literally in parks and mapping out a business plan about what our boutique would look like and where it would be. Covid had been devasting to a lot of cities and by 2021 Grand Rapids was recovering better than most big cities. So we took a serious look and found a location and landlord that was will to take a chance on our idea.

When it came time to choose a name and brand the business, we didn’t want it to pigeon hole us into a specific product or service. We wanted something to reflect our eclectic, modern lifestyle that included what we loved most which again was art, travel, and shopping!

After researching business names and having 3 pages of nothing, I thought about Fog and how the word is simple, yet mysterious and we each had a vision in mind like I go back to my childhood camping in the UP and waking up to thick fog on the water you could not see through but that anxious yet calming feeling watching it disappear off the water and your day could begin!

We married it with Periwinkle just because we love the color and together Periwinkle Fog represents a modern elevated mood when you walk into the store and see all the wonderful pottery, jewelry, books,, stationary, fashion accessories, unique children’s toys,,,something for everyone and everything curated in the store has a story.

We are always rotating the inventory in the story, connecting with new artists and have recently focused on bringing in local authors.

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

Social Media is a necessary component in business today, however, it should not be your only outlet to get your brand out there. It is a balancing act. Consistency is key, Set a schedule and stick to it.

When we first opened the store we didn’t have a clue and tried everything, however, we enlisted the help of our now social media coordinator. She works part time in the store and during down time (small biz owner’s know what we mean by that!) she would research and connect with influencers, take free workshops, follow her favorite feeds on social media and then started putting that knowledge to work.

First, if you are not comfortable with Social Media, get comfortable. You are the face of your brand and people want to connect and know you, so having photos, videos of you in front of the camera as a business owner interests people. Next is the product and services you have in the store, and lastly, we love featuring our neighboring businesses in the community.

All of this seems like a lot but you are now building an info hub. If we don’t provide it we know where to direct you to find it. People remember that, We also built our followers organically. We did not by lists or “bots” to boost our numbers. We know that the 1k plus that we built over the last 2 years are real people following us and engaging with us.

We are now seeing customers coming into the store telling us they follow our social media and that they have finally made it down to the store to take a look for themselves. It takes a while and you have to have patience but it is starting to pay off with awareness where we are and what we have to offer.

How’d you build such a strong reputation within your market?

Our unwavering support for our community. We show up. That is our motto. A chamber meeting, an artist reception, a ribbon cutting, community outreach volunteering (We plant trees with the Mayor to support GR Parks) anywhere we can exchange ideas and support our neighboring businesses and perhaps network to help our ideas come to fruition.

Contact Info:

• Website: [email protected]
• Instagram: @perwinklefog
• Facebook: periwinkle fog
• Yelp: Periwinkle Fog
• Other: Google Page

Image Credits
Periwinkle Fog