This series is not just to share the highlight reel of real retailers' success, but also the ups and downs as retailers grow into their confidence, CEO role to see that success. It is a journey.

Meet Melanie Kolb. Melanie's shop owner journey is a remarkable one. Her business growth and her love for her customers has grown since day one due to her hard work, following her dream, and pushing through the hard things with determination. Like many, Melanie started out as a hobby, progressed to booths and soon grew to vintage pop-up markets. But she wanted to stop traveling and create a destination shop. She made a pivotal decision to set up shop on her beautiful farm in Alabama, donned her CEO hat and set up marketing strategies to attract her customers to her farm, using things like Facebook Lives selling her french farmhouse decor.

We discuss fear of failure, reverse engineering, keeping customers happy, planning, and knowing your financial numbers. All CEO decisions that helped Cedar Grove Farms become the destination shop that it is today. As Melanie said, "No one's expecting us to be perfect except ourselves. If we let that go, we're a lot happier. Just be consistent, do what you love, love on your customers, and everybody's happy."

Full show notes at https://wendybatten.com/episode-88/