Sisters In Business Thriving After 10 years
Announcement posted by The Audacious Agency 13 Jul 2018
Brisbane’s Beautiful Weddings is the brainchild of Sisters Nicole Ritchie and Justine Douglas who are not only prospering but also winning multiple awards for the work they do in the wedding space.
Younger sister Justine said many of their clients cannot believe they are sisters successfully working together. “We often hear ‘Oh I could never work with my sister, we just don’t get on’,” she said.
“We’ve been in business together 10 years and that’s a great achievement. Even more so when it's with your sibling. We are tenacious hard workers and at the heart of everything we do is our passion to succeed and create the very best for our clients.”
This commitment to customer service saw Beautiful Weddings take out the national gong in the ABIA (Australian Bridal Industry Academy) Gala Awards for the fifth year in row for wedding styling recently.
Nicole said the ABIA awards are voted on by customers. “Businesses are judged on quality of product, quality of service, value for money and attitude of staff. We won the Queensland state award eight times and the national award five times. To be eligible for nationals we needed to have top rankings in our state awards program for four years,” she said.
“It is a real accomplishment to still be around in business but to also be consistently nominated and to win in this competitive space.”
The business started over 10 years ago, after Nicole built a highly successful business selling etched glasses for wedding gifts. Then this creative mind decided to branch out. After returning from her Vanuatu wedding, Nicole was theming her own wedding celebration party and realised how hard it was to get beach and coastal theme decorations for weddings in Australia.
She reached out to her sister and Beautiful Beach Weddings the online wedding decor shop was born.
Justine said Nicole’s idea came at the right time. “I was pregnant with my second child and was due to go on maternity leave. I loved the idea of having the opportunity of building a small business during this time, so we combined Nicole’s creativity with my panache for marketing skills,” she said.
“After nine months of researching, creating the logo, photographing stock and building the website we launched online. It grew really quickly,” Nicole said
Like all good things, the business grew by filling gaps in the market. Clients loved the style of the decor and asked the dynamic duo if they could assist with setting up their wedding. They moved into wedding styling. It took off.
When they were at capacity with styling, they introduced a hire division so clients could hire and do it themselves.
Since then, they have sold their online store to concentrate on their award winning styling services and their hire business. They have also expanded into corporate styling as well.
“It was not until we were in business together that we realised how alike we are in terms of our drive and work ethic. Our relationship has deepened, and we are the best of friends.”
Nicole agrees. “We understand each other and can work with each other’s strengths that we bring to the business,” she said.
“That is the blood thing – we are connected and drive each other.”
It seems these sisters are perfect business match.
Awards won over the past five years:
- Australia's #1 Wedding Stylist for 5th Year running
- Australia's Number Two Wedding Hire company
- Queensland's #1 Wedding Stylist 8 times