We recently connected with Teri Alston and have shared our conversation below.

Teri, appreciate you joining us today. Almost all entrepreneurs have had to decide whether to start now or later? There are always pros and cons for waiting and so we’d love to hear what you think about your decision in retrospect. If you could go back in time, would you have started your business sooner, later or at the exact time you started?

For me – I would say later. I started my business in 2020 and given everything going on, I had amazing customers who want to support my business. However, with the rising inflation and the uncertainty around the pandemic, they had financial priorities – and I totally understood that. I wished I would have waited and started my business when I was financially secure and can devote the time to my business. Career wise, I was working a full-time job in Human Resources and my family is important to me so my calendar is booked. I also found it hard to post on social media due to my busy schedule but now that life has slowed down, and a new job with a flexible schedule, I’m ready to resume by business.

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?

My name is Teri and I recently started Tailored by Teri in April 2019 after dealing with life changing situations. I left my first big girl job after some company restructuring and decided to launch my own business! Truth be told, I was afraid to go out on the entrepreneurial journey because I thought I would fail. However, I realized that I couldn’t let fear hold me back any longer. My sister hosted an event and allowed me to sell my personalized products, which was my first huge success as a business owner!

Since then, I have now repurposed my business into a clothing boutique with each product curated by me! I want women to feel empowered wearing the clothes from from Tailored by Teri as our motto is to help women feel confident in the skin that they are in! The business is currently on pause as I’m deciding on the next business venture and if I’ll resume Tailored by Teri. My hopes and dreams are too relaunch but God may have our plans in store for my business and brand. If you like to go on the journey of entrepreneurship with me, follow me on instagram: terishanell_.

The main thing I’ve learned through this entrepreneurial journey: “If a door shuts, God has another one that is ready to be opened for you. You just have to keep your trust in him and everything will workout!”

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

In 2019, I found out that I was losing my job due to budget cuts and a company restructuring. I found out in a meeting and a few minutes to an hour later, the entire office knew. I had no time to properly process before people started prying me with questions. I had to figure out what was next in my career journey. That’s when I decided I wanted to become an entrepreneur and make money for myself. I’m still working a corporate job that I love . However, the passion to own my business and make it successful is still there. I always like to give the advice, find what your passion is and do it because it’ll fulfill you on the hard days and you’ll remember why you are doing it!

We’d love to hear your thoughts about selling platforms like Amazon/Etsy vs selling on your own site.

I sell on my website and I currently use Shopify for my business. It’s an easy to use platform and it’s easy navigating for my clients. I have everything that I need right there in my module. Shopify’s customer service is amazing as they have chat and FAQs that can help navigate through any technical problems you may experience. The pros is that you can have categories for your business. So for me, I have clothing, accessories, but I can break it even down to categorize tops, bottoms, and etc. The other pro is that it can suggest other items to my customers that they may like based on their selection. I absolutely love that it’s mobile ready so as you are designing your website, you can preview what it’ll look like on a cell phone. The only con that I have for Shopify is that the shipping label cost isn’t immediately expensed to your account. It’ll be added to your bill , so you will have the monthly subscription cost plus the shipping label(s) cost.

I have purchased my domain URL through Squarespace.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.tailoredbyteri.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/terishanell_/
• Other: TikTok:https://www.tiktok.com/@terialston Poshmark:https://poshmark.com/closet/terialston

Image Credits
Model Credit: Teri Alston and Angelica Rich