Notes from Chris

Episode 863

Amy McCord Jones studied biochemistry and forensics in college. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but once she had to start working with dead bodies in upper-level classes, she realized it wasn’t her life’s calling.

So after graduation, she tried out a corporate job installing bank security software. That wasn’t the best fit either—but it was tolerable and had the perk of not working with the dead, so she stuck with it.

One day, Amy and her mom were out walking her dog in her hometown of Oklahoma City. Her mom mentioned a nearby chapel that was up for sale. It was beautiful. It was old. It was historical, having been moved all the way from Nova Scotia decades ago. The financial crisis had lowered real estate costs dramatically, and the entire chapel—located right in the up-and-coming Paseo Arts District—was only $125,000.

She did the math. The mortgage would come in right at $900 per month. She figured if she could book just one wedding each month, her bills would be covered. Amy and her sister wrote up a business plan, asked their mother for help with the down payment, and went to the bank.

A couple of weeks later, they were owners of the oldest chapel in the city. And that’s how the wedding planning business got started. It took a couple of years, but Amy was eventually able to quit her corporate job and work with soon-to-be-married couples full-time.

But she noticed a problem. Many of her clients were struggling to keep costs low on their wedding. She’d become quite the floral designer, but she wasn’t using those skills as much as she would have liked—$3,000 for a simple set of arrangements was just too expensive for most people.

And that’s when she came up with her next idea: a website that made it really easy for brides to order DIY flower bouquets that they could put together on their own to save money.

After a bit of research, Amy confirmed that there weren’t any businesses like this already—at least, none that were in pursuit of quality flowers instead of B-Grade flowers like you’d get from Costco or other grocery stores.

She knew the idea would work—she’d already met her target audience dozens of times. Now she just had to build it.

Amy started by reaching out to wholesalers she’d bought from in the past. They were always complaining about not being allowed to sell directly to the public, and Amy knew her business could act as an easy workaround for them.

She shot about twenty instructional videos in her living room on how to actually make the bouquets, corsages, and table toppers once the brides received their flowers. And finally, in March 2015, Flower Moxie went live.

One year later, Flower Moxie had its first $10,000 month—a huge milestone—but not all was well with Amy. Collecting and shipping flowers overnight was stressful, and as business continued to grow, Amy got more and more burned out.

In January of 2018, Amy left the wedding planning business to her sister to work on Flower Moxie full-time. She’s since made more arrangements for sale, improved her website, and made more instructional videos.

Not only is Amy less stressed and tired now, but sales have grown dramatically—and all by word of mouth. After spending a few thousand dollars on ads in her first year, she turned off the tap and currently spends $0 per month. Simply doing everything she can to help brides-to-be save money on gorgeous flowers has been her most successful growth strategy.

And she’s not finished growing yet. At $60,000 per month in revenue (approximately 40% of that as profit), Flower Moxie is now well-positioned to expand into markets other than DIY wedding flowers. She’s currently exploring some new partnerships.

But the core of Amy’s success isn’t going to change: helping people enjoy A-Grade flowers at prices they can feel good about.

 

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  MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE:

• Flower Moxie: Cut the stems off of some of those wedding costs—head over to Amy's website to learn more!
• Shopify: Amy used Shopify to set up her site for Flower Moxie, and they're offering a 21-day trial and exclusive discount for all Side Hustle School listeners!

SEE ALSO:

• Australian Uses Online Classified Ads to Sell Wedding Flowers: After hearing about the Craigslist Wedding Photographer (Ep. 9), a woman in Australia books $7,500 in wedding clients for her newly-acquired floral arranging skills
• Newlywed Creates Floral Services That Can’t Wilt: This project manager was astonished at how expensive a wedding could be. After shelling out a lot of money for his own, he starts a service to help engaged couples save thousands
• Savvy Bride Turns Budget Wedding Into Six Figure Success: A frugal bride starts blogging about how to save money while planning a wedding. After a lot of hard work, she’s now generating over six figures per year

Inspiration is good; inspiration combined with action is better. Now get back to work!

Yours in the revolution,

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