Thanks to text, Instagram DMs, and email, Shop Hero owner Emily Holt pivoted the in-store experience to in-home.
Against All Odds, This Marin County Fashion Boutique Became a Lockdown Success
“I don’t intend for the Marin store to be open tomorrow or maybe even the whole week. Likely the same for Post Street,” I wrote to my team in Slack on March 15, 2020. How quaint! How naïve! By the time of my next entry, June 18, said Post Street location of my San Francisco store Hero Shop showed zero signs of reopening ever, most members of that Slack channel soon would be laid off permanently, the world was wearing face masks 24/7, and it had been three months since I bothered to put in my contact lenses or color my hair. Which is to say I looked how I felt: rung out.
When San Francisco’s first shelter in place was announced last spring, a three-week mandated closure was incomprehensible. Yet here we are, a year later, that three weeks having extended into three months and our business almost entirely changed.
Pre-pandemic, Hero Shop was brick and mortar focused, centered around the in-store experience at our two locations in San Francisco and Marin, about 20 minutes north of the city. We loved playing great music, styling clients in exciting new clothes and throwing parties every chance we got. Now, down to just one store, we rely almost entirely on text, Instagram DMs and email to communicate with clients (thankfully we took that time in-person to build strong relationships) and the in-store experience is inverted to in-home. Each evening, like Santa Claus, I deliver online orders and approval boxes to doorsteps all across San Francisco and Marin (the driving extending my workday by about two hours).
This story originally appeared on: Vogue - Author:Emily Holt
