Owning a business in Royston these days comes with its own stories and trials. I caught up with Sue, owner of Cream Ladies wear and lingerie to ask her what she thinks about owning a business in Royston.
Sue has run Cream for 36 years and is an avid believer of buying locally. However we had a chat about how the local high street is looking at the moment. Sue notes that most of her business comes from out of town, mainly due to her large catchment area and specialist stock. She spent most of her Sundays last summer doing wedding fairs and stacked up an incredible 14 events thus bringing a lot of people to Royston who she was only too happy to direct to other businesses in the Town. Sue and I also discussed how a lot of the locals in the area nowadays leave Royston to shop elsewhere. Although Cream has a reputation for outfits for weddings it does stock a varied selection of casual and daywear.
Sue explained to me that the key to any independent shop’s success is personal service, which is something the larger stores are often unable to give. Cream offers a free alteration service on all full priced merchandise purchased along with a free measuring and fitting service for lingerie. It is just as important to have the right garment underneath. A shoe dying service and colour matched hats and fascinators to outfits is also available. A really inventive way of making it special for local consumers and a really good way to add value to buying locally.
We spoke about social media to which Sue admitted to me that they hadn’t started on yet, however Sue did say it is on the list of her things to do, saying that “I have noticed things like facebook becoming more and more important recently”. This clearly shows that every business is now beginning to see the advantage of social media, no matter what business sector they are in.
Cream have just started their big end of season Clearance sale so why not pop down today?
Call 01763 244 073 and mention thebestofroyston