Shop Small | Wld West Shop

What are your backgrounds? How did you two meet? 

Lori: I’ve been a floral designer through my business Wild Green Yonder for almost 7 years. Prior to that I worked in a variety of fields centered around entrepreneurship, customer service, merchandising, and retail, and studied Fashion Merchandising and Marketing in college. Colleen and I met when we were both in the earlier stages of our individual businesses - she reached out to me as a fellow self-employed creative business owner to go grab a beer! We became fast friends and began working together on all kinds of projects through our individual businesses. We started referring to ourselves as wldwst because of our business names - Wild Green Yonder + Colleen West. 

Colleen: I graduated college with an art degree and that is where I truly fell in love with design. I took a modern architecture course that redefined the way I viewed design, its place in our world, and my place as a designer! Right after school, I started working as a display artist at Anthropologie. This really sparked my passion for interior design and storytelling in commercial space. I decided to venture out on my own to explore working solely working with small businesses to help them tell their stories. Like Lori said- I emailed her after stalking her instagram profile for a while!  I was looking to connect with like minded creatives in our area, and I’m so glad I did! I’ve always believed if you want to connect with someone, don’t be afraid to reach out. You truly never know where  it could lead! 

Do either of you have children? How do you balance being a mother and running a business?

Lori: We joke all the time that Colleen is my baby daughter all grown up! There’s a big age gap between her and my real life 1-year old son so it’s an interesting dynamic haha. 

There is no balance of being a mother and running a business! Sawyer is our sweet shop baby and loves visiting us in the studio - but it was really challenging when he was first born and we didn’t have child care yet. Work had to be sandwiched into very small windows of time. But the beauty of running my own business is that when I need to step away to prioritize family I can - I don’t have to save vacation hours and sick leave - and that was one of the huge catalysts to me starting my own business in the first place. I wanted to have more ownership over how and when I worked. 

What is the hardest part about self-employment? 

Lori: Isolation and uncertainty. You are solely responsible for whether you succeed or fail - while yes you can have support systems in your family, friends, and colleagues - ultimately you are the final decision maker and that can be daunting. There’s a lot of uncertainty about when your next client will book, when your next customer will purchase - and in turn when your next paycheck will be. 

Colleen: For me the hardest part has been the uncertainty of figuring out how to expand my business to be beyond just me. From the initial first leap of becoming self employed, you are taking a huge risk. At times it’s thrilling and drives me to push myself harder, and at times it can be a bit paralyzing. It’s the juggle of knowing when it’s time to take the next step to propel yourself forward, and also nurturing all the things in your business you love most! Luckily, I have many fellow small biz friends to lean on for advice and encouragement through the uncertainty.  

What is the best part about self- employment? 

Lori: The best part for me is the freedom of creating my own schedule. I can work when I feel most productive and not work when I need to focus on other things in my life. Also, the unlimited options you have in what types of work to do in your business. When you work for someone else, you have a specific job with a role and responsibilities and that’s pretty much the lane you have to stay in. But being self-employed, you can expand and contract your offerings to suit your passions and interests! Wldwst is a great example of this and really how our shop came about. Wldwst originally was our “experimentation” brand where we would just try out different ideas and projects - what started as us wanting to do a 1-day mother’s day shop has exploded into a bi-annual pop-up shop series and e-commerce site!

Colleen: For me the best part is doing the work and seeing a design come to reality (that can also be the hardest…).  It’s the feeling of working closely with a client to help create an atmosphere better than what they dreamed up. It’s like a perfect swing, the magic, inspiration  and unspoken factor of just knowing when a design is right. And the hope that in that space there will be so much joy and community shared.  

What advice would you give yourself at the start of this process? 

Lori:   Ship it! I tend to over analyze and over critique everything - sometimes you just have to put your product out into the world and figure it out as you go. Releasing some perfectionism tendencies is hard - but finished is better than perfect. 

Colleen: Begin Anywhere! Don’t get caught up in the why, the how, the what if’s! Trust your hands, your eye, your process and everything will work out. 

What are three things you couldn't live without?  

Lori: (Sharing three things from the shop!)

1. Stacker rings from Cicie Jewelry - wear these every single day and so do all my friends!

2. Naked Goat Soap - these raw goat milk soaps are incredible - and were the very first product we ever wanted to sell in our shop. I buy them in bulk!

3. Nourish & Refine Rosewater Spray - this is a skin-softening pick me up that we keep in our studio bathroom - it’s such a great facial refresher throughout the day!

Colleen: (I want to copy Lori’s 3 BUT that’s no fun) 

1. Skincando’s CBD Cleansing Oil - A little self care goes a long way. This cleanser will make you feel like a million dollars after a long day.

2. Figure Form Prints- I consider myself a bit of a color connoisseur and Shana hits the nail on the head everytime! The colors and combos of shapes are always so striking to me. I have several in my house and have used them on many client jobs. 

3. Okay I had to, this is a major Wldwst staple! Naked Goat Bar Soap - Especially in Botanica and Luna! I use Heather’s soaps every day and have for the last three years. It makes my showers feel so luxurious and they last forever. 

What’s your favorite part about running the shop? 

Lori: I love every part!!! But I especially enjoy interacting with all of our vendors. We want to support them and see their products succeed, so coming up with fun ways to teach our customers about their brands and products is a favorite. I also really love transforming our studio into a shop - the creative process of merchandising the store and reimagining it into this experiential shopping space is fulfilling! 

Colleen: By far my favorite part is creating a truly set apart retail atmosphere! I like to think of our studio as our design lab- one where we can fearlessly test and showcase new ideas, switch things up on the daily, and design a more experiential shopping experience. Our vendors make it easy to tell dynamic, interesting and meaningful stories within our little work house! 

In light of current circumstances, what changes are you bringing to the pop up? 

The focus of our pop-up shop series has always been about creating community - so we’ve had to reimagine how we can create community in a virtual, socially distanced way. The most major change is taking the shop online! We’ve never offered ecommerce for any of our previous pop-up shops, so it’s been a fun challenge to learn as we go. We are also currently working on live streams and other virtual events that can help our community feel connected.

What’s next for Wld West? 

We plan to work on our service offerings we have for small businesses - we want to expand our client roster for the work we do in product styling. We also plan to open a permanent storefront in Downtown Leesburg!

Originally the shop was going to be open through the end of June, but word on the street is Lori and Colleen now plan to stay open through the whole summer, with the ultimate plan to never close! They especially want to stay open “as long as it takes in order to have real, live, in-person people coming through our doors again.” For now they are always open online at wldwst.co - and are offering contactless, curbside pick-up from the studio every Wednesday and Friday and ship anywhere within the USA.

Interview by, Emily Dean | Meet Lori | Meet Colleen