Enter the word Thanksgiving in the coupon code when checking out and recieve 30% off your order!!
Thursday, November 19, 2009
Thursday, November 5, 2009
Divalicious Photo Shoot!
Announcing our Divalicious Photo Shoot by Lillypads and Butterflywings Photography. This shoot will be held on Dec. 20th with location to be determined. The shoot will consist of fabulous petti skirts, bling tops, and over the top bows. Message us or comment if you are interested and you can always go to our website.
Friday, September 4, 2009
Sneak Peak at our Fall/Halloween Line
I absolutely am in love with this line. I love the photography and how they all came out. Not to mention the adorable babies. Here is a pic from the shoot to leave you with!
Monday, August 10, 2009
Sorry, it has been forever!!!
I am definitely not a very consistent blogger and it is even worse when I am super busy. I will try to be better for all of you Cotton Candy Shop lovers,since you mean the world to us. We have had some very exciteing things happen to us this last couple weeks. We were featured on Good Morning Texas and got to talk about how we got started and showed some of our fabulous new outfits. I was so nervous, but when I got on it went better. I had lots of fun and the people at Good Morning Texas were awesome. Check me out http://www.wfaa.com/video/nspparent-index.html?nvid=385694. Also, wanted to announce that we are taking models for our Christmas shoot so sign up today, the shoot will go really fast.
Sunday, July 19, 2009
Cotton Candy Shop in the Dallas Morning News
So excited about the article in the Sunday Dallas Morning News. It is on the back page of the Guide Live section! Beyond honored they decided to do a story on my business. If you are local make sure and pick up a copy. I want to thank Rori Harrington for writing the article and Lisa Michelle Photography for the pictures we included.
Here is the online version
Cotton Candy Shop in the Dallas Morning News
Sunday, May 31, 2009
4th of July Sale
We have gone through so many changes over the last couple of months. Three months ago I can honestly say that I would have been surprised if we had received an order from somewhere other than Texas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Arkansas, and other Southern States. With our new Twitter accounts and Facebook page we have been opened up to a whole new audience. We even had a person from Utah mention her purchase from us in an article picked up by Business Week referencing the power of twitter. With that said, we want everyone to order from us because we know that once you order from us, you will order again. A majority of our customers are repeat customers and that is just how we like it.
We have never done a public sale on our website. Sometimes we will announce things on other peoples blogs, Myspace, or what have you but never to the public. With all the new people visiting our site we want to give them a reason to give us a try. In order to do that I am going to give you a reason to give us a try!
The "Give Us a Try" Outfits
From now until (extended until) 7 PM CST on Monday JUNE 8th we will be offering one girl outfit and one boy outfit for a no-brainer price.
The girls outfit is our 4th of July Tutu and Bling Star Top. The tutu is three colors red, white, & blue and you can see a close up of the bling top. Your daughter will be the star of the show while you are shooting off fireworks celebrating our Freedom!
From now until Monday morning this 4th of July Tutu is $20 and the 4th of July Tutu & Star top is only $35 combined. We also knocked the price of the Beanie (Normally $13) and Headband (Normally $4) in conjunction with this offer down to $8 and $2 dollars respectively. Just to give us another reason to say "Give us a try".
You can order your little girl her 4th of July outfit here
Ok, for the boys we are going to have our 4th of July Jon Jon on sale. It is the Star Jon Jon and it is also red, white, and blue! It will be $20 and that price includes the initial of your little boy on the front.
You can order your little boy his 4th of July outfit here
*Besides our "give us a try" outfits we have also marked all of our July 4th clothing down 20%. Follow the link to see the rest of our July 4th clothing !
*We will be sending a very special offer to the people on our Mailing List and people in our Pillowcase Dress of the Month club pertaining to this offer. It will be a code for free shipping on this already incredible deal! So if you are on our mailing list don't order until you get that code. If you aren't on our mailing list...now would be the time. It's free to join!
Lastly! Sometime this week we will be launching a giveaway. So either subscribe, become a follower to this blog, or check back often to see details on it!
Sugars,
CCS
www.cottoncandyshop.com
Wednesday, May 27, 2009
Help Cotton Candy Shop go VIRAL!
We want to go viral and we need your help! As you can see we just uploaded our first video. Please watch the video and if you have a youtube account please rate it (hopefully 5 stars) and put a comment in the comment section. It is best seen in High Definition and you have to be a member to view it that way, so sign up anyway! We have stiff competition with the "watch me set myself on fire" videos but I know we can do it. Also feel free to embed the video, forward the url, email it to your friends, or anything else you can think of. We would definitely appreciate it!
What a great song also. Support Nichole Nordeman! Purchase the CD but if you only want the song you can get it for .89 cents! Music for my soul!
Music: Nichole Nordeman
Album: Recollection: The Best of Nichole Nordeman
Song: Legacy
My husband did this as a gift to me. He picked the pictures and even spent three hours searching for the perfect soundtrack. As soon as he showed it to me he pretty much knew he was in trouble. I loved it so much that I told him he needed to go back and do a separate video for all of the shoots and that we needed to do one for every shoot from here on out. I haven't seen him since. If you see him wandering the street with a glazed look in his eyes please feed him, let him rest up a bit, and then send him home! He has a lot of work to get to!
Lastly, we have a shoot with www.lisamichellephotography.com at the Ft. Worth Botanical Gardens tomorrow so definitely be on the lookout for those outfits to "hit the scene" soon. I know you will like some of the "funky" designs from this shoot.
Sugars, Lauren
Monday, May 18, 2009
Cotton Candy Shop and Soot’s Big Surprise
We have just been given a wonderful opportunity to work with author Rachel Heskett on her newest book, Soot's Big Surprise. Rachel is very talented for she is not only the author but the illustrator of the book. She has asked us to design the outfits for the two witches (Millicent & Constance) and we are beyond excited about the opportunity.
Rachel has the sequel Soot’s Big Adventure already planned but if things go well we may be incorporating Cotton Candy Shop directly into the story line of the 3rd book! Designing outfits for Millicent and
We will be designing five outfits for each character and Rachel will choose two of those outfits for
We need 10 models so Lisa from lisamichellephotography.com can get great pictures and show Rachel a perfect representation of our vision of the outfits. We are working on a date but if you are in the vicinity of the DFW area keep an eye out on our Local Models page for the listing. If you have questions you can catch me on the Live Chat section of the website.
In a place, nestled between rolling hills and lofty trees, sits the small village of Candlegrove. A cat named, Soot and his young witch, Millicent live in a cottage outside the village.
In Candlegrove there is one day of the year that is more important than any other, and that day is Halloween. Every Halloween The High Witch's Court holds a contest to select one young witch to become its newest member. She must create a witch's brew that is unlike any other that has come before.
Millicent had entered the contest with high hopes for the past three years, only to lose every time. This year she was determined to win.
Millicent stirred the black kettle simmering over the open fire.
"What could my brew be missing?' she asked Soot as she raised the spoon for him to taste.
"Your brew is about as exciting as warm milk. Perhaps it could use some .......?"
Soot eagerly suggested.
"Don't be ridiculous. " exclaimed Millicent.
Soot watched Millicent disappear down the stairs to the cellar to look for her grandmother's rare dried roots.
Sunday, May 10, 2009
My heroes have always been Stay/Work At Home Moms!
Last year on Mother's Day I was a stay-at-home mom preparing for my daughter's sixth birthday party. I thought it would be cute if I were to buy her a tutu and dress her up like a rock star. I went online to find the perfect birthday tutu and an idea was born. At the time, my husband was working for one of the top three insurance agencies in the world so my little business venture was simply started so I would have an outlet for my creativity. There may have been a teensy bit of motivation also to be able to have the extra money to buy the things that most moms do not buy themselves when they are stay-at-home moms. Although my husband could care less if I would've bought myself something, like most SAHM's, there's always something else for the kids or something else for the house that needs to be bought before you. This was going to be money I worked for and earned based on something that I created with my own hands.
I had no idea what to expect. I thought at most I may sell a tutu or two a month and also be able to provide my friends kids with birthday presents. I wish in hindsight that I could say that I had dreamed bigger or that I knew my business would be what it is today but that would be a lie. I started a MySpace page for my business called enchanted tutus. You will even notice today that my MySpace page is still MySpace.com\enchantedtutus. That name did not last very long as I almost immediately changed it to cotton candy tutus. At the time, I had like 100 friends on MySpace. I was so distraught that I might lose those hundred people if I started a new MySpace page with cottoncandytutus that I just changed the name on the page and kept the actual URL. Small beginnings!
To my surprise I immediately started getting orders on MySpace. People who were getting the product were saying that my tutus were different than any of the other ones that they had ever bought. People were sending me pictures of their little girls in my tutus and to this day, receiving those pictures is still the best part about this business. At this point I wanted to start a website. Seeing the pictures that were being sent to me gave me an idea. I wanted to create an opportunity for little girls in my area to come and have their pictures taken and be the first models on cotton candy tutus. The response was overwhelming! Most of the little girls and moms look forward to it and it creates an experience that they will be able to visually celebrate for a lifetime. I try and keep in mind that although I am there on business that these moms and daughters will be looking at these outfits and pictures for 20 years together. I am almost just privileged to be given the opportunity to create “the moment”.
Every time we drive by the McKinney Park my husband says, "That’s where it all started". To this day the tutus from that shoot are my biggest sellers. My photographer was Kelsey and she was a sweetheart. I forget if she was 14 or 15 years old but she was a local McKinney student. I have a feeling that by 18 she will be a star photographer. I met her through Trina whos company Prissy Bowtique supplied the bows for the shoot. I am pretty sure that I didn't make any money on that shoot because any money I made I immediately turned around and bought my daughter, what seem like 100, bows from Trina. I loved Trina and if she wouldn't have moved to Louisiana, I would probably still be buying bows from her today. You will notice that several of the girls in my very first photo shoot are still models for me today. These are no longer customers; these are people that I now call friends. They are my number one champions for the cotton candy shop and I am very grateful for them. One of the most special people I met at the first shoot was Julie Rogers. We have become very close friends. She has formed Chunky Monkey Boutique and she now does a majority of my embroidery and we are increasing the amount of business we do with each other by the day!
I spent the next several months living off of the success of that photo shoot. Orders started coming in daily, my time started to fill up quickly, and it was becoming apparent that this was now a business. My next shoot was to be for my Halloween line. My husband ran across a photographer’s site and immediately came to me and said you have to use her for your next shoot! I contacted Wendy from Expressions by Wendy and we worked out the details and the shoot was a go. This was a huge undertaking. I'm still not sure if Wendy has forgiven me for bringing 30 kids into her home studio yet. She and her husband Richard were very gracious hosts. We had Amber from Fairy Godmother Couture make the bows and Amy from Cupcake Kids Art Wear hand paint the shoes and some of the tops. I had also contacted Kellie Rasberry from the morning show at KISS 106.1 for the shoot. I wasn't sure if she was going to do it but when she wrote me back and said that she would, I can honestly say, that was one of the highlights of the past year. I have been listening to Kellie for so long that I was honored that she would accept my invitation.
The pictures turned out amazing. Unfortunately because Wendy was so great at what she does I had set a standard of what my photographs had to be in the future. Meeting Amy also brought me into the fold of the Dallas Cowboys wives. Amy, Amber, and I did a trunk show for the Dallas Cowboy wives. Knowing that Demarcus Wares' (my favorite Cowboy & Cowboy Wife) child wore my tutu on the Cowboys field before a home game was another moment that 2 years ago I could not have imagined.
By this time my business was growing so fast that I couldn't keep up. I was paying stay-at-home moms in my neighborhood to sew ribbons on shirts, cut tulle, and other odd sewing jobs. I must of had 10 of the stay at home moms at different times in my neighborhood helping me out. The best part of that was actually MEETING my neighbors, which I don't think happens enough these days. This was also the time that I started realizing the success I was having and the potential for further success. They say you know you are on the radar as a boutique when you can accomplish two things (using my best Jeff Foxworthy impression). 1) When crazy people will spend an inordinate amount of time and energy to try and destroy your business, you are on the radar 2) when people start to blatantly copy your stuff, you are on the radar. Well both of those have happened more than I care to recount.
Next up was our Christmas shoot. Jessica from Aravaggio Photography had contacted me about being a photographer for the shoot. She had done things for D magazine and her pictures were amazing. I jumped at the chance to work with her. We shot the shoot in downtown McKinney and even the local candy store offered to close down for a short time to allow us to take pictures in the actual store. I had a great time at the shoot and some of my favorite photographs come from that shoot also. I appreciated Jessica so much that I asked her to also shoot my Valentine's Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Easter, and my Princess Couture line. She accepted and we decided that for this one we would do it in her home studio. I'm still amazed at the work that Jessica does. I frequently check her blog just to look at the pictures that she is putting out now. Amazing! She makes me want to divorce my husband and remarry him so that she could take my wedding photographs.
I wanted to get a small spring line out so I asked my friend Selen from Selen Paredes Photography if she would be willing to photograph the shoot. I met Selen because I am the President/Director of McKinney Youth Cheerleading. I am also a cheerleading coach for 1st graders and Selen is the mother of one of my cheerleaders. To be honest, I had to ask several times nicely for Selen to participate. She prefers family portraits and had no interest in getting into catalog shooting. She finally agreed and despite the chilly weather I think the shoot went well.
By this time my company had grown 1,000 fold. Now it wasn't odd jobs that I needed done, I actually needed employees to help me fulfill orders. Depending on the time and how busy I am I could have anywhere from 1 to 6 people contracted to help me manufacture the outfits. This is also the time that I hired Sarah to work one-on-one with me. She has been a godsend. She is 24, interned for Esquire magazine in New York, and she has a degree from Texas Tech (my alma mater) in fashion design. She enables me to be creative on the design side and then watch as my ideas come to life. I'm still trying to talk her out of moving back to New York. We have a lot of fun together creating!
Most boutique owners will tell you that boys lines are not very profitable. A lot of mothers will ask for boy’s clothes but as most boutique owners know they will very rarely sell. I had no intention of really doing a boys line at all. However, one day I saw an old photo of my brother. He was wearing a Jon Jon, with the knee-high socks, and little shoes with a buckle on them. I knew I had to have a boys line. Most boys lines consist of punk rock or hip clothes. I wanted to make a line that was unapologetically classical. It was very last minute but I decided that I was going to put together a small shoot so I needed a photographer. I was familiar with B4 photography and asked her if she would do it. She accepted and I think that for as quickly as we put it together the shoot came out great.
With that small shoot out of the way we decided to take on a larger venture and do the summer line that I had planned. I looked at the summer line as an opportunity to go to the next level. I spent several months coming up with and designing the outfits for this shoot. I took careful calculated steps to make it harder for people to blatantly copy the outfits. I will let you in on a little secret. All of the fabric from that shoot is of the $10 a yard variety and it is all designer fabric. This is one way that I will differentiate myself…Cotton Candy Shop uses the best quality materials. I'm happy with the outfits, I'm happy with the photographs, and I'm happy with the response from the summer line.
That brings us to today, mother’s day 2009. With all of the new clothes lines and the boy’s lines, cotton candy tutus was not big enough to hold my creativity. We changed the name to Cotton Candy Shop and re-branded the website using the design skills of Michelle from polkadotdandy.com. We already have set the Ft. Worth Botanical Gardens shoot on May 28th, The Teddy Bear Park shoot on June 10th, The Lemon Pie shoot on June 14th, and the Diamonds and Dudes shoot at the Ft Worth Stockyards on July 26th and Of course our Halloween and Christmas shoots will be an EVENT! So it is a busy time for us. For the upcoming shoots we are using www.lisamichellephotography.com and we know that she will do a great job just like Kelsey, Wendy, Jessica, Selen, and Brandi before her.
I forgot to mention before, in the midst of all this, the success of my company allowed my husband to quit his job and start his own business. On a personal level it was one of my proudest moments. I feel like stay at home moms always have to defend themselves, to account for their time in the day, or to feel guilt when there should be no guilt. If you are a stay-at-home mom you have the perfect opportunity to find and nurture your passion. Who knows, your passion may someday allow your husband the opportunity to follow his passion. My husband now owns his own insurance agency www.bergmannagency.com and also spends an inordinate amount of time helping me with my business (thank you!). There is no better feeling than when my daughter walks through the door from school and both my husband and I are able to ask her about her day.
There are a lot of boutiques and photographers who are open for business on the Internet. Each one of those started with one idea. In my case it was one tutu. All it takes is an idea! I have always bought into the rising tide theory. There is room enough for you to find your niche in the industry. It doesn't matter if you are a stay at home mom who needs an outlet or a mom who picks up her kids, makes dinner, and works from the time her kids head hits the pillow until 1AM making bows in hopes that one day she will be able to quit her job... there is room for you. If people tell you that there isn't room, you make room!
When I first started out I contacted several boutiques whom I thought were "larger". Some blew me off but some gave me advice. The ones who gave me advice basically gave me the same advice, which was..."don't steal ideas and be original". If you ask me why I became successful, that advice would be where I would start. No one can be more cotton candy than me, no one can be more (enter successful boutique) than them. Make your own lane and you can't lose.
Another thing that I would say helped me is that to this day I still answer every email, message, or IM that comes through and I still also make every one of my signature tutus. Sometimes you may get a message from me at 3AM even though I have to get up in a couple of hours to get my daughter off to school. I love what I do, I love talking to other moms, and I still get goose bumps every time a mom sends me a picture of her child in one of my outfits.
My last piece of advice before I get into what I feel is my most important point. When I have a new idea I am already on step 3 before I even slow down to process what I have just gotten myself into. I have noticed that a lot of women have ideas but they immediately start convincing themselves that it won't work. DON"T DO THAT! It can frustrate my husband to no end because he is a strategizer. I say, what do you have to lose? Jump out there!
Lastly, stay above the fray. Sometimes I wonder if anyone gets attacked as much as me. I will be honest, although I shouldn't, I still take it personally. As I mentioned earlier, it seems to be a prerequisite for being successful but that doesn't mean that I understand it. I must admit that I have sent some emails to people that I have purchased things from that weren't too nice. However, you will never see me publicly try and bring down another company to prop myself up or to sell another tutu. Sometimes I wish I was mentally capable of attacking the people that attack me but even provoked I wouldn't be able to sleep if I thought I took one bite of food out of their kids mouth. It's sad that I am starting to wonder if that is a character flaw on my part. I mentioned earlier about the rising tide theory. This theory is that the more stay-at-home moms who create successful businesses, the more we will be able to help future moms create successful businesses. This isn't going to happen if you have to tear one down in order to build one up. I still buy 90% of all my daughters stuff from stay-at-home mom businesses. It is not uncommon for my husband to tell me "why are you buying that? You do realize that you could make that right?" My response is always the same..."xyz boutique is doing it right and I want to support her".
I apologize for the long post but I hit on just about everything I am passionate about: My family, my business, moms, and just generally being kind and helpful. I hope everyone has the best Mothers day ever!
PS: For comedy I need to add one more thing to my "you know you are on the radar as a boutique when" series. When a 15 year old kid copies your Myspace page (Family pictures and all) and creates a Myspace profile but adds his/her own twist by spelling it cottoncandytutuZ (get it? with a Z), then you know you are on the radar as an online boutique. I don't mind though, occasionally over the last 6 months or so he shows his appreciation for the inspiration that my site has given him by periodically and randomly sending me a message like FU B****. I think I should post a bulletin! Is this your kid? www.myspace.com/jonrizzy456.
I had no idea what to expect. I thought at most I may sell a tutu or two a month and also be able to provide my friends kids with birthday presents. I wish in hindsight that I could say that I had dreamed bigger or that I knew my business would be what it is today but that would be a lie. I started a MySpace page for my business called enchanted tutus. You will even notice today that my MySpace page is still MySpace.com\enchantedtutus. That name did not last very long as I almost immediately changed it to cotton candy tutus. At the time, I had like 100 friends on MySpace. I was so distraught that I might lose those hundred people if I started a new MySpace page with cottoncandytutus that I just changed the name on the page and kept the actual URL. Small beginnings!
To my surprise I immediately started getting orders on MySpace. People who were getting the product were saying that my tutus were different than any of the other ones that they had ever bought. People were sending me pictures of their little girls in my tutus and to this day, receiving those pictures is still the best part about this business. At this point I wanted to start a website. Seeing the pictures that were being sent to me gave me an idea. I wanted to create an opportunity for little girls in my area to come and have their pictures taken and be the first models on cotton candy tutus. The response was overwhelming! Most of the little girls and moms look forward to it and it creates an experience that they will be able to visually celebrate for a lifetime. I try and keep in mind that although I am there on business that these moms and daughters will be looking at these outfits and pictures for 20 years together. I am almost just privileged to be given the opportunity to create “the moment”.
Every time we drive by the McKinney Park my husband says, "That’s where it all started". To this day the tutus from that shoot are my biggest sellers. My photographer was Kelsey and she was a sweetheart. I forget if she was 14 or 15 years old but she was a local McKinney student. I have a feeling that by 18 she will be a star photographer. I met her through Trina whos company Prissy Bowtique supplied the bows for the shoot. I am pretty sure that I didn't make any money on that shoot because any money I made I immediately turned around and bought my daughter, what seem like 100, bows from Trina. I loved Trina and if she wouldn't have moved to Louisiana, I would probably still be buying bows from her today. You will notice that several of the girls in my very first photo shoot are still models for me today. These are no longer customers; these are people that I now call friends. They are my number one champions for the cotton candy shop and I am very grateful for them. One of the most special people I met at the first shoot was Julie Rogers. We have become very close friends. She has formed Chunky Monkey Boutique and she now does a majority of my embroidery and we are increasing the amount of business we do with each other by the day!
I spent the next several months living off of the success of that photo shoot. Orders started coming in daily, my time started to fill up quickly, and it was becoming apparent that this was now a business. My next shoot was to be for my Halloween line. My husband ran across a photographer’s site and immediately came to me and said you have to use her for your next shoot! I contacted Wendy from Expressions by Wendy and we worked out the details and the shoot was a go. This was a huge undertaking. I'm still not sure if Wendy has forgiven me for bringing 30 kids into her home studio yet. She and her husband Richard were very gracious hosts. We had Amber from Fairy Godmother Couture make the bows and Amy from Cupcake Kids Art Wear hand paint the shoes and some of the tops. I had also contacted Kellie Rasberry from the morning show at KISS 106.1 for the shoot. I wasn't sure if she was going to do it but when she wrote me back and said that she would, I can honestly say, that was one of the highlights of the past year. I have been listening to Kellie for so long that I was honored that she would accept my invitation.
The pictures turned out amazing. Unfortunately because Wendy was so great at what she does I had set a standard of what my photographs had to be in the future. Meeting Amy also brought me into the fold of the Dallas Cowboys wives. Amy, Amber, and I did a trunk show for the Dallas Cowboy wives. Knowing that Demarcus Wares' (my favorite Cowboy & Cowboy Wife) child wore my tutu on the Cowboys field before a home game was another moment that 2 years ago I could not have imagined.
By this time my business was growing so fast that I couldn't keep up. I was paying stay-at-home moms in my neighborhood to sew ribbons on shirts, cut tulle, and other odd sewing jobs. I must of had 10 of the stay at home moms at different times in my neighborhood helping me out. The best part of that was actually MEETING my neighbors, which I don't think happens enough these days. This was also the time that I started realizing the success I was having and the potential for further success. They say you know you are on the radar as a boutique when you can accomplish two things (using my best Jeff Foxworthy impression). 1) When crazy people will spend an inordinate amount of time and energy to try and destroy your business, you are on the radar 2) when people start to blatantly copy your stuff, you are on the radar. Well both of those have happened more than I care to recount.
Next up was our Christmas shoot. Jessica from Aravaggio Photography had contacted me about being a photographer for the shoot. She had done things for D magazine and her pictures were amazing. I jumped at the chance to work with her. We shot the shoot in downtown McKinney and even the local candy store offered to close down for a short time to allow us to take pictures in the actual store. I had a great time at the shoot and some of my favorite photographs come from that shoot also. I appreciated Jessica so much that I asked her to also shoot my Valentine's Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Easter, and my Princess Couture line. She accepted and we decided that for this one we would do it in her home studio. I'm still amazed at the work that Jessica does. I frequently check her blog just to look at the pictures that she is putting out now. Amazing! She makes me want to divorce my husband and remarry him so that she could take my wedding photographs.
I wanted to get a small spring line out so I asked my friend Selen from Selen Paredes Photography if she would be willing to photograph the shoot. I met Selen because I am the President/Director of McKinney Youth Cheerleading. I am also a cheerleading coach for 1st graders and Selen is the mother of one of my cheerleaders. To be honest, I had to ask several times nicely for Selen to participate. She prefers family portraits and had no interest in getting into catalog shooting. She finally agreed and despite the chilly weather I think the shoot went well.
By this time my company had grown 1,000 fold. Now it wasn't odd jobs that I needed done, I actually needed employees to help me fulfill orders. Depending on the time and how busy I am I could have anywhere from 1 to 6 people contracted to help me manufacture the outfits. This is also the time that I hired Sarah to work one-on-one with me. She has been a godsend. She is 24, interned for Esquire magazine in New York, and she has a degree from Texas Tech (my alma mater) in fashion design. She enables me to be creative on the design side and then watch as my ideas come to life. I'm still trying to talk her out of moving back to New York. We have a lot of fun together creating!
Most boutique owners will tell you that boys lines are not very profitable. A lot of mothers will ask for boy’s clothes but as most boutique owners know they will very rarely sell. I had no intention of really doing a boys line at all. However, one day I saw an old photo of my brother. He was wearing a Jon Jon, with the knee-high socks, and little shoes with a buckle on them. I knew I had to have a boys line. Most boys lines consist of punk rock or hip clothes. I wanted to make a line that was unapologetically classical. It was very last minute but I decided that I was going to put together a small shoot so I needed a photographer. I was familiar with B4 photography and asked her if she would do it. She accepted and I think that for as quickly as we put it together the shoot came out great.
With that small shoot out of the way we decided to take on a larger venture and do the summer line that I had planned. I looked at the summer line as an opportunity to go to the next level. I spent several months coming up with and designing the outfits for this shoot. I took careful calculated steps to make it harder for people to blatantly copy the outfits. I will let you in on a little secret. All of the fabric from that shoot is of the $10 a yard variety and it is all designer fabric. This is one way that I will differentiate myself…Cotton Candy Shop uses the best quality materials. I'm happy with the outfits, I'm happy with the photographs, and I'm happy with the response from the summer line.
That brings us to today, mother’s day 2009. With all of the new clothes lines and the boy’s lines, cotton candy tutus was not big enough to hold my creativity. We changed the name to Cotton Candy Shop and re-branded the website using the design skills of Michelle from polkadotdandy.com. We already have set the Ft. Worth Botanical Gardens shoot on May 28th, The Teddy Bear Park shoot on June 10th, The Lemon Pie shoot on June 14th, and the Diamonds and Dudes shoot at the Ft Worth Stockyards on July 26th and Of course our Halloween and Christmas shoots will be an EVENT! So it is a busy time for us. For the upcoming shoots we are using www.lisamichellephotography.com and we know that she will do a great job just like Kelsey, Wendy, Jessica, Selen, and Brandi before her.
I forgot to mention before, in the midst of all this, the success of my company allowed my husband to quit his job and start his own business. On a personal level it was one of my proudest moments. I feel like stay at home moms always have to defend themselves, to account for their time in the day, or to feel guilt when there should be no guilt. If you are a stay-at-home mom you have the perfect opportunity to find and nurture your passion. Who knows, your passion may someday allow your husband the opportunity to follow his passion. My husband now owns his own insurance agency www.bergmannagency.com and also spends an inordinate amount of time helping me with my business (thank you!). There is no better feeling than when my daughter walks through the door from school and both my husband and I are able to ask her about her day.
There are a lot of boutiques and photographers who are open for business on the Internet. Each one of those started with one idea. In my case it was one tutu. All it takes is an idea! I have always bought into the rising tide theory. There is room enough for you to find your niche in the industry. It doesn't matter if you are a stay at home mom who needs an outlet or a mom who picks up her kids, makes dinner, and works from the time her kids head hits the pillow until 1AM making bows in hopes that one day she will be able to quit her job... there is room for you. If people tell you that there isn't room, you make room!
When I first started out I contacted several boutiques whom I thought were "larger". Some blew me off but some gave me advice. The ones who gave me advice basically gave me the same advice, which was..."don't steal ideas and be original". If you ask me why I became successful, that advice would be where I would start. No one can be more cotton candy than me, no one can be more (enter successful boutique) than them. Make your own lane and you can't lose.
Another thing that I would say helped me is that to this day I still answer every email, message, or IM that comes through and I still also make every one of my signature tutus. Sometimes you may get a message from me at 3AM even though I have to get up in a couple of hours to get my daughter off to school. I love what I do, I love talking to other moms, and I still get goose bumps every time a mom sends me a picture of her child in one of my outfits.
My last piece of advice before I get into what I feel is my most important point. When I have a new idea I am already on step 3 before I even slow down to process what I have just gotten myself into. I have noticed that a lot of women have ideas but they immediately start convincing themselves that it won't work. DON"T DO THAT! It can frustrate my husband to no end because he is a strategizer. I say, what do you have to lose? Jump out there!
Lastly, stay above the fray. Sometimes I wonder if anyone gets attacked as much as me. I will be honest, although I shouldn't, I still take it personally. As I mentioned earlier, it seems to be a prerequisite for being successful but that doesn't mean that I understand it. I must admit that I have sent some emails to people that I have purchased things from that weren't too nice. However, you will never see me publicly try and bring down another company to prop myself up or to sell another tutu. Sometimes I wish I was mentally capable of attacking the people that attack me but even provoked I wouldn't be able to sleep if I thought I took one bite of food out of their kids mouth. It's sad that I am starting to wonder if that is a character flaw on my part. I mentioned earlier about the rising tide theory. This theory is that the more stay-at-home moms who create successful businesses, the more we will be able to help future moms create successful businesses. This isn't going to happen if you have to tear one down in order to build one up. I still buy 90% of all my daughters stuff from stay-at-home mom businesses. It is not uncommon for my husband to tell me "why are you buying that? You do realize that you could make that right?" My response is always the same..."xyz boutique is doing it right and I want to support her".
I apologize for the long post but I hit on just about everything I am passionate about: My family, my business, moms, and just generally being kind and helpful. I hope everyone has the best Mothers day ever!
PS: For comedy I need to add one more thing to my "you know you are on the radar as a boutique when" series. When a 15 year old kid copies your Myspace page (Family pictures and all) and creates a Myspace profile but adds his/her own twist by spelling it cottoncandytutuZ (get it? with a Z), then you know you are on the radar as an online boutique. I don't mind though, occasionally over the last 6 months or so he shows his appreciation for the inspiration that my site has given him by periodically and randomly sending me a message like FU B****. I think I should post a bulletin! Is this your kid? www.myspace.com/jonrizzy456.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
We are now WWW.COTTONCANDYSHOP.COM!
Hey, were still here just wanted to let everyone know that we are undergoing alot of changes. One of our huge changes is we are now..... Cotton Candy Shop. Please go to www.cottoncandyshop.com to check out all out new things! We will post more tomorrow and let you know how the Summer '09 Shoot went and what is up and coming at Cotton Candy Shop. Check back tomorrow and thanks for reading!
Sugars!
CCS
Sugars!
CCS
Saturday, April 18, 2009
The Winner of our Blog Giveway is.........
We would like to announce the winner of our blog giveaway! The winner is......Amie Craft! She was randomly chosen from all the sweet comments. Congrats Amie! Message us to receive your giveaway. Stay tuned and check back with us often, we will do more giveaways in the future.
Sugars!
CCT
Sugars!
CCT
Thursday, April 16, 2009
Love my Customers and Friends
Hi Friends!
It has been super busy over here at Cotton Candy Tutus. We are still really excited about the upcoming shoot with B4 Photography. We are almost done with the outfits and getting ready to get started on the May 28th shoot at the Ft. Worth Botanical Gardens. If you are wanting to get involved in one of our shoots email us and we will get you all the info!
There are changes happening everyday with Cotton Candy Tutus. Stay tuned to find out our first big change coming.
Sugars!
CCT
It has been super busy over here at Cotton Candy Tutus. We are still really excited about the upcoming shoot with B4 Photography. We are almost done with the outfits and getting ready to get started on the May 28th shoot at the Ft. Worth Botanical Gardens. If you are wanting to get involved in one of our shoots email us and we will get you all the info!
There are changes happening everyday with Cotton Candy Tutus. Stay tuned to find out our first big change coming.
Sugars!
CCT
Monday, April 13, 2009
Summer Line Sneak Peak!
We wanted to be able to show our blog friends a little sneak peak and our Summer line we have been working so hard on. Theses are just a few of the many outfits we are doing. Hope you like out little teaser, we sure do!
Beach Ball Bubble Suit
Hot Pink and Lime Green Romper with Hot Pink Bloomers
Magical Mermaid Top and Ruffle Pant
Beach Ball Bubble Suit
Hot Pink and Lime Green Romper with Hot Pink Bloomers
Hope you like our sneak peak!
Sugars!
Cotton Candy Shop
Sunday, April 12, 2009
Happy Easter
Cotton Candy Tutus wants to wish everyone a very Happy Easter! Don't forget about our giveway going on.
Sugars!
Lauren
Friday, April 10, 2009
Cotton Candy Tutus Giveway!
I am so excited to finally get Cotton Candy Tutus blog up and going. I must admit I am not a very good blogger when it comes to what I am doing it my life, but I do think I will like blogging about what is going on at Cotton Candy Tutus. We are approaching our 1 year anniversary next month and alot has happened with our company the last year. We credit all our success to our amazing customers, we would be nothing without you guys. Check back with us daily and see what is going on in our sugar filled heads.
To kick off our blog we are doing a giveway. We just finished doing one over at Kellys Korner and it went great! What you do is you go to our website http://www.cottoncandyshop.com/ and tell us your favorite item on our site! Just comment under this blog about what outfit you like the best and why then we will draw on April 17th and annonce a winner! You will recieve either a jumper or jon jon. I am so excited about the blog and the giveway.
We created this blog in part for more people to get a sugary taste of Cotton Candy Tutus! We truly hope everyone likes what we have created.
To kick off our blog we are doing a giveway. We just finished doing one over at Kellys Korner and it went great! What you do is you go to our website http://www.cottoncandyshop.com/ and tell us your favorite item on our site! Just comment under this blog about what outfit you like the best and why then we will draw on April 17th and annonce a winner! You will recieve either a jumper or jon jon. I am so excited about the blog and the giveway.
We created this blog in part for more people to get a sugary taste of Cotton Candy Tutus! We truly hope everyone likes what we have created.
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