CELEBRATING 15 YEARS
Join us as we celebrate our 15th Anniversary. Enjoy 20 % off store wide through this Saturday June 13th. Mention the blog and we will take an additional 5 % off.
Raffia: Lesson 4 The Most Important Lesson
If you have been around us much you'll know the one thing that we never expected when we opened the store was the people that would come into our lives because of it. We opened shortly after Mom had passed away. It has always been a bit strange how when we have needed things to work out they have. Each decision to expand or change has really been fairly easy for us. Not that any of it has been without struggle....but we also know Mom would have wanted it that way a bit as well. We think it is the only real way you come to appreciate what you have.
The Raffia Girls have been with us pretty much since day one. We started with Lanette, then Jackie and then Donna.
We have also been very lucky to have numerous friends and family that are willing to step in whenever we need. There is also our Saturday girls, Marcia, Jen, Toad, Sally, Sam, and the Sisters next door always willing to step in whenever needed. These girls all work other jobs but are always willing to step in and help..
We always have people ask how tied down to the store we are. They worry for us about how hard it is to find help. We have been blessed to never have this worry. Oh sure, we have an occasional day that is hard to get filled, but for the most part we never have a problem. There is no doubt that these girls treat it as if the store is their own. And in many ways it is.
We bought Julie out several years ago. She has gone on to make beautiful jewelry. We still keep in touch, and every time we go to market I have the memories of Julie keeping us up all night busy telling us funny stories of Billings slander.
Lanette retired a couple years back. And Donna is entering into semi retirement. Jackie is of course going strong as always. The funny thing is once you are a Raffia girl there is no going back. We have been through the deaths of Husbands, Mothers,fellow coworkers and friends. There has been sickness, worries, all those things that make this the weird thing we call life. But there has also been weddings, babies, high school graduations, college graduations, and grand children. These women know us better than about anyone. The have "Mothered" us along all through this journey called Raffia. And we know that they would all be there any time we need them.
And then there is you! Our customers that have become much more than a customer. You have become our friends. And together with you we have also shared sadness and sorrow, and very very much love and laughter. You too have made Raffia what it is. Without you there would not only be the brick and mortar but a hole from the friendships that we have shared.
Lynda and I are off to home this weekend. Our cousin Sarah is getting married and we get to do the flowers (NO PRESSURE). I did a little trading with Lovely. She got to go to lunch (what a great boss I am) in trade that she will be our guest blogger. So be kind, leave her lots of comments, but don't enjoy her too much.
The YCW issue arrived the other day. There is a section included that honors our Dads. As I was reading, our friend Julia Warmer over at Wild Purls ,our favorite knitting store, had written a wonderful tribute about the advice her Dad had shared as she opened her store. I have to end with their quote. It sums up so many feelings as we travel through this crazy world called retail.
Her dad, Bill Leslie said," Every day you put the key in the door of your business, you are taking a risk. But you have to remember that you've got a key. Think of all those people who never took the leap to acquire key, a business plan, a bank loan or any piece of owning their own business. Now that is a risk I never have to wake up to face." She continues on that this has also become her lesson in life. WOW thanks Bill and Julie...perfectly timed reminder.
Our deepest thanks and love to you all for making 15 years of wonderful memories.
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June 10, 2009
CELEBRATING 15 YEARS
Join us this week as we celebrate our 15th Anniversary. Enjoy 20 % off store wide. Mention the blog and receive an extra 5 % off.
Raffia: Lesson 3
Am I making all my fellow photographers out there in blog land cringe.....what do you think of my pictures of a picture. (sorry no scanner on my computer...see I am not that computer with it YET)
As I remember things went pretty well right off the bat. I still see some of our first customers walking in the door and being very supportive. (many we are still blessed to have as customers today). Things continued to roll along. Then we got a strange opportunity to open in a second location.....and since we didn't know much the first time why we thought we should take another chance is beyond me. But we went ahead and made another plunge and opened....Raffia at the Inn.
Many of you may not know that we had a second location at the Holiday Inn, right in Beautiful Billings. It was the first we really started to dabble in clothes.
(set up at the Inn)
It was really a cute little spot. To be honest my memory is a bit shaky on exactly how long we held this location. They had a small fire in an electric room that did smoke damage to most of our merchandise. Shortly after that we had a lady interested in buying the space so we sold. And shortly after that we bought out Marcia and became three.
Looking back these past few days at some of the pictures I have truly had to laugh. I think if there was a trend in the last fifteen years we tried to represent it in some way. We have sold about every animal in the book. Our biggest hits being frogs....yes lots of them...(I even last week had a lady come in looking for a specific one we had carried when we first opened. I still have one outside in my garden). We have been the bunny queens. I can't even begin to tell you how many rabbits we have sold. There has been numerous chickens, horses, cows and even pigs. Oh and don't forget birds..they have been very long standing at the store. We have had fishing rooms,
the lodge look.....
glamour rooms.....
and yes, have even made attempts at Grecian Rooms.
Can you see the grecian pillars....paper mache....beautiful!
We have had angels....
floating in beautiful gold fabric..... elves (look close for the little white one setting on the chair)
snowmen of every type, and any Santa you can imagine. (even beautiful collectibles made by a lady the once lived in Forsythe..... the hit of many Christmases.
We had many opportunities to participate in the Parade of Homes. Where we won several awards. One of the homes was featured in a floor plan book(couldn't put my hand on that copy this morning...but it was one of my favorite homes). Have had the opportunity to work in many beautiful homes around Billings. Can still remember the day when we had one whole room of stuff sell as is....the customer loved everything. And also had the opportunity to have our five minutes of fame in this......
Ok, five minutes may be exaggerating.
We received the call that Victoria was coming to take photos of the store. They brought out one of their best photographers. It was an amazing day, filled with glorious shots of this wonderful Christmas wonderland we created. We took them for Steak.... one of the best they had ever had and chatted the night away. Then we anxiously awaited the Christmas issue. Needless to say we waited and waited and waited. On the day it arrived.....no Raffia. We had been bumped. Talk about gets your hopes up and be crushed. MAN!!!! We soon learned about the magazine world and put our hopes of fame behind us.
It was two Christmases later when the phone rang. Some lady from back east looking for our Tartan Red Bedspread that she had saw in Victoria. What?????!!!!! We were pretty sure she was loosing it and explained Victoria had been there several years before....the red bedspread was long gone......But we did run out and buy a copy.....sure enough without any word from the magazine here was our picture.
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June 09, 2009
CELEBRATING 15 YEARS
Join us this week at Raffia as we celebrate our 15th year Anniversary. Enjoy 20% off store wide. Mention the blog and receive an additional 5 % off.
Raffia: Lesson 2
We soon set to work with all the things we thought we would need to get going. A name, a place, what we would sell, you know the small things. Julie was the one that came up with the name Raffia. We all knew that it was the one right away. We could us it to wrap on our packaging, to tie on our price tags, and Julie could use it in her floral arrangements. It was a simple name and one that we felt would not lock us in to one certain thing. We became Raffia.
Julie's husband and Lynda' boss Darwin, got to work on the location. He was the one that found our funny little spot on Grand and got to work on negotiating us a lease. We made a quick trip to Seattle to the market there, to begin to get an idea of things we could carry. Since both River Run and Gainans were a bit more upscale we thought our goal should be to have a variety of products that would fit any style. Raffia, the finishing touch...... it was starting to come together. We would sell home accessories that would help to finish someones home. We were on a role. At least, we thought so.
I gave up my teaching job to be the manager. I assumed I would substitute teach once in a while so I could at some point resume my teaching career. Lynda would keep her job at Olympic and do the accounting for the store.
We attended some antique sells and purchased our first furniture pieces that would be our display fixtures for the items we purchased. Things were quickly falling into place.
Our funny building. It had been numerous things during it's life. Used clothing store, offices, you name it I think this building housed it. During the first few years we only had the west part of the store. There was a little room to the back that we thought could be Julie's flower room. We just didn't know how to make it CUTE. So luck had it that while junking for some old doors and windows to use,Marcia our silent partner found an old building. When they crawled up on it, the whole wall and window was in one piece. It also just so happened to fit perfect in the space that would go to Julies room. Our first landmark, our porch wall. Still in use today and one of our favs. Also, thus started our obsession with paint and the first of many layers went on the wall. Dolphin, a taupe color with white trim.
I'll never forget looking at some of our first purchases and getting them set out to be ready to open. I look at some of the first pictures of the store and realize we didn't have much inventory, didn't have a clue what we were doing ,but by June 10th, 1994 we were ready to open. Right in the midst of the infamous white car being chased down an LA freeway after the famous O J Simpson.
Thought it might be fun to give you a bit of History.
So this week you will learn more than you ever needed to know about Raffia.
The Beginning, Lesson 1: We Must have been CRAZY !!!
Lynda managed Olympic Village apartments for many years. (You may have lived there, if you have lived in Billings for a long time) I was teaching school and would come over in the summers and work for Lynda doing the yard, cleaning apartments etc. Darwin, Lynda's boss asked one day if I would help his wife Julie cut a bunch of wheat for her dried flower arrangements. Julie did flowers for River Run Interiors a beautiful store downtown Billings. So of course, I got to know Julie after doing odds and ends with her. Out of the blue we started talking about how fun it would be to own a store. And with Julie, Lynda, myself and one other lady, some crazy idea, knowing very little about retail (other than the fact that I had worked at a jewelry store in college and Lynda a shoe store, and Julies work with River Run) started to plan on opening a store.
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