We were lucky to catch up with Terra Swinderman recently and have shared our conversation below.

Terra, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today What’s the backstory behind how you came up with the idea for your business?

We had only lived in Florida for about a year when we started our business. I had taken on a few jobs here and there that weren’t for me, or that I thought was a good fit. While working as a Media Clerk at a local Orange County Public Elementary School (and pursuing my bachelor’s in early childhood education), my sister-in-law, Lori Swinderman, Travel Agent/ Owner, asked us to deliver a gift to one of her clients. It was some snacks in a paper gift bag we added Disney stickers and ribbon to (little did I know how that would unfold later). Then, shortly afterwards, when she and her family came to Walt Disney World for a personal trip, asked again if we could deliver groceries to their resort. I remember looking at my husband and saying, could this be a thing? He said, ‘yes, but it’s going to take work!’ He wasn’t wrong!!

Getting started was tricky. I had no idea what I was doing, no clients, but commissioned once more, I put together my first basket; surprised myself when I did a great job! First thing though was a name–I ran a contest on my personal Facebook wall and landed on Practically Perfect Delivery Service. I then opened a Facebook Business Page, and not soon after that, by word of mouth, a client of my sister-in-law’s needed a grocery delivery and agents began contacting and recommending me for gift baskets and grocery services!

Terra, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I’ve heard before that businesses are built out of a need to solve problems. I am not sure if there was a lack of gift basket options for guests and travel agents who wish to send gifts to their clients, but it sure feels as though I created viable solutions within a void. I didn’t even know that gifts at Walt Disney World (let alone, Universal Studios) was a thing until I began doing it. When we came here for a vacation, we had discussed grocery options, but I noticed right away how costly the suppliers were..again, little did I know what would happen within a year and a half!! As mentioned before, we deliver groceries and create gifting options for guests of the Disney and Universal parks. For five years, it’s always been our family, so from start to finish, guests know whom they are working with and can trust our services. Not only do our clients trust our product, but our vision has always been to uphold integrity no matter what. I also have been a personal shopper since the beginning, but don’t really remember exactly how that came to be, but it has leant itself into a major proprietor for our business model.

When we started, we did what we thought we needed to do, what we assumed was expected of a ‘gift basket delivery company.’ It didn’t take long before we realized that something needed to change, more viable solutions needed to be created. We were spending a lot of money on materials for baskets–the woven basket, wrapping, etc–and they weren’t efficient timewise with our fast growing small business. We also began to wonder what happens to the baskets once they are emptied by the guests and that led us to learn that many are tossed because guests can’t take then home, can’t fold them up, etc.

So, we started researching other options, which didn’t work for what we needed. Then one day we came across a Mickey Mouse plastic tote bag at a grocery store. So, much like Walt Disney’s famous quote “it all started with a mouse”…for us it kind of all started the same way. We had unknowingly stumbled upon an efficient and cute way to sell our product., to set us apart, and to solve an environmental issue. Ironically, my sister-in-law’s travel company became the recipient of said bag that we gave as a gift.

We use regular woven gift baskets from time-to-time, but for the most part, and thanks to stores like Publix and The Dollar Tree, we’ve been able to sustain and cut our labor / material costs way down for 4- 1/2 years!! When I see someone around the Parks carrying one of the tote bags, I often wonder if they were whom we delivered a ‘basket’ to.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Our family moved to Florida for two reasons: my health and better work opportunities. My husband and I have always worked in the hospitality field, so moving to Orlando seemed like a great fit, plus the cold weather in Ohio was making me very sick. I have a neurological condition called POTS (Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome) and for 2.5 years my health was declining to the point where I couldn’t drive or write anymore. My husband has always supported me, and took a giant leap of faith to move us here, and by the time I started our business, I was almost in full remission. Not only could I start a business, but physically meet the demands of running one as well! The condition does not have a cure and the possibility of it resurfacing is always there, but for 3 years, I was well.

When Covid shut down the world in 2020, there wasn’t any certainty that my business would reopen, but we took another leap of faith that September to resume (business) and I’m very glad we did. The end of 2020 and all of 2021 were really good years for us for growth! In 2022, however, our business began to not do so well, to the point where we thought we might have to close forever. After much deliberation, especially since everything we have vested in it–our time, our money, etc.–I decided to get a part-time job to supplement where was lacking. The past year has been extremely trying, not only with my business, but my POTS has come back making both work and our business demands more challenging. Nonetheless, I keep going–overcoming obstacles is not a foreign concept to me and my family, but giving up certainly is!!

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

As I have mentioned previously, I started running my business on Facebook. At the time, I really didn’t know much about social media presence, SEO, trends, or tags. But I was creative and can make great graphics, so I just started posting “ads” there, along with my work. I opened a free Google website, in which I learned pretty quickly that it’s a really great way to promote your business and doesn’t have to cost any money (unless you want to pay of course, same with Facebook ads). Besides Instagram here and there, I didn’t use any other platform for several years, and only recently have I begun utilizing TikTok to promote my business!

Everything with this business has been learn-as-we-go and self-taught, from marketing, to financial, to client relationship building, to social media, to building and maintaining our own website. I spent many hours putting together not only one, but two websites! It’s far from perfect, but because I did it on my own, I’m very proud of it. For a couple years, using PayPal as our financial medium worked perfectly fine, but as we grew, knew we had to make our presence more visible as well as ease the added labor of creating custom orders for every single client!

Some days we don’t know what to post which can be challenging, but since we’ve built our business around Walt Disney World and Universal Studios, and personal shopping, can find something to post about on a daily basis. It gets very hard to keep up at times when it’s just me, but I love every aspect of this business and don’t mind spending my ‘downtime’ working on my site, answering emails / messages, or social media; Facebook has been a fantastic vehicle for business traffic as it makes it really easy to build clientele relationships and connect your product(s). I sometimes wonder if my or any small business owner would be able to be so successful if they didn’t have social media to put themselves out there so easily!

For 5 years I’ve been building my social media presence around something I call “March Hare Madness” where we find the number one Disney movie spanning a couple months of voting!  It has grown significantly over the years, plus is a great way to connect and learn about my followers..and gain new business!!

I still use Facebook Business and I also still create those graphics, but not nearly as much as I used to because my work speaks for itself :)

Contact Info:

• Website: practicallyperfectdelivery.com
• Instagram: practicallyperfectdelivery
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/PractPerfDS/
• Other: TikTok: practperfds

Image Credits
All photos belong to myself, Terra Swinderman.