We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Nia Smith a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Nia, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today Can you recount a story of an unexpected problem you’ve faced along the way?
In my life I have five major titles, a follower of Jesus, a mom, a wife, a business owner, and soldier. All of these take effort, time and sacrifice and sometimes you have to give everything you have to get where you want to be. Recently I stopped styling even though my business was doing great because I had my third son, and my mental health wasn’t the best. I tried to juggle the busy schedule of breastfeeding, styling, content creating, and still recovering but it was too much. I tried to be perfect at everything I was doing. But I learned sometimes in your life you are going to have to choose between taking your rest and getting your peace back or burning yourself out and hustling. Money will be there, the gift will be there, the business will be there, but your mental health, your family, your healing is priority to give your customers, your fans and the people who look up to you, your best version of yourself.
Now fast forward two years later, I’m living in Germany now and I have been exploring with fashion. Seeing how people in different countries dress, showing how I dress in public and receiving compliments really boosted my spirit for me to continue using my talent. When I talked to God about me opening my styling business back up and taking my content more serious I got the email about the interview. I know this is the time and moment that God has set apart for me to elevate and pick up where I left off but better.
I’ve added the recent looks i’ve done and let’s just say, I still got it.
Nia, 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?
Are you really good at something but keep holding back because you are scared it won’t do well if you turn it into a business? Yeah that was me too. In 2022, I made the decision to start a business as a fashion stylist. I was already familiar with entrepreneurship since I was in high school selling bundles and wigs with my mom, who gave me the game early. But fashion was a big factor for me for a longtime, literally sneaking the plastic cinderella dress up heels in my book bag to wear at school. I never wanted to dress like anyone else, I always wore whatever I liked. Once I started growing up more, my friends and family started coming to me for fashion advice, whether it was for a party or a funeral, I was always telling someone which shoe went with which dress. It was natural and fun for me.
Although I am a mom of three boys, and i’m in the Army, I still made time to open my business. Once I started receiving clients I knew I wanted to do this because of my passion not for the money. Honestly, the best thing about styling is that I use my brain to produce looks, I don’t have to buy any product. And by promoting my looks and fashion advice on tik tok I received 500,000 views on my tik tok the same month I started. That was literally God confirming this is the assignment he gave me! Now that has opened doors for me to style people in different countries, work with major brands like MICAS and SHEIN overall creating my own style that influences people all around the world.
Doing this has brought me joy because most women and men are insecure about their body shapes, etc these days and having someone tell you what looks best on you and helping the customer find what gives them their spark back and empowers them without judgement really does something to my soul. Everyone deserves to dress up and look beautiful, there are no limits, at least not over here!
We often hear about learning lessons – but just as important is unlearning lessons. Have you ever had to unlearn a lesson?
“As long as the customer is happy that’s all that matters.”
As a modest fashion stylist there are certain looks I don’t do because I don’t want my name attached to that type of style. It is nothing personal if a client doesn’t want to work with me because I won’t change your business morals for them. If this is why you started the business and what it is about, don’t
let anyone change your recipe just
to make a sale. It’s not worth it.
Any insights you can share with us about how you built up your social media presence?
My social media presence has been a roller coaster, but I figured out why. When I was posting content with the intent to go viral or hop on a trend it never worked, literally never. But when I created my own lane and started to be authentic before I knew it I was at 20,000 followers.
People don’t want to see the same thing over and over again. Bring your true self, that’s giving the world something new! Although I had moments where a video didn’t do good and I got discouraged, once I got my mind right I went right back and posted again. The key is literally to keep going, research ways to make your camera more clear, use apps to edit, it’s so many ways to give quality content, don’t overthink it!
Contact Info: