Episode 293: Helping You Live an Organised & Stylish Life with The Style Sisters
In today’s episode of Business Growth Secrets, we explore how two entrepreneurs, Charlotte Reddington and Gemma Lilly, turned their passion for fashion and interior design into a successful business on Instagram. As the Style Sisters, Charlotte and Gemma have transformed messy wardrobes and chaotic homes into stylish and organized spaces, gaining a following of A-list celebrities and social media fans along the way.
Through their savvy use of social media, Charlotte and Gemma have built a strong brand identity and established themselves as experts in their field. They have leveraged influencer marketing to expand their reach and create an omnipresence on social media, all while staying true to their values of creating joy and solving problems for their clients.
In this episode, we delve into the challenges Charlotte and Gemma faced as they grew their brand, from managing the demands of a rapidly expanding client base to maintaining a work-life balance. We also explore their process of writing a book and discuss their tips for enjoying your business while achieving sustainable growth.
Join us as we learn from the Style Sisters’ journey and gain insights into building a successful business on Social Media.
Show Highlights:
- How Charlotte and Gemma became the social media sensation ‘Style Sisters’
- The steps that Charlotte and Gemma took to start a Home Styling business from their social media following
- Creating joy through helping people solve problems
- The impact of social media and word of mouth on the success of their business
- How Charlotte and Gemma create an omnipresence on social media
- Adopting Influencer Marketing at the right time
- Challenges faced and lessons learned as the Style Sisters grew as a brand
- Exploring Charlotte and Gemma’s process of writing a book
- Tips for achieving work-life balance and enjoying your business
Links Mentioned:
Check out their Book: Style Sisters: Helping you live an organised & stylish life
https://www.amazon.com/Style-Sisters-Helping-organised-stylish/dp/1529347254
Visit the Style Sisters’ website at www.style-sisters.com
Get your Business Growth Secrets SUCCESS PLANNER for FREE and profit like a pro: https://adamstottplanner.com/free-book47315172
Adams website: https://adamstott.com/?el=Pod
Watch the Episode on Adam’s YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/adamstottcoach?el=Pod
Connect with Adam on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/adamstottcoach/?el=Pod
Join Adam’s network on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/adam-stott-coach/?el=Pod
Business owners: Monetise social media, get more clients, increase your following and make more sales: https://socialmediamonetisation.com/unlockfb?el=Pod
Coaches, Consultants and Speakers: lower your marketing costs, increase ticket prices and get more high ticket clients: https://personalbrandunlocked.com/fb-event-reg?el=Pod
Transcript:
Please note this is a verbatim transcription from the original audio and therefore may include some minor grammatical errors.
Adam Stott:
Hey everybody, Adam Stott here. Thanks for checking out my podcast, Business Growth Secrets. You’re absolutely in the right place. This podcast is going to reveal to you all of the secrets that you’ve been looking to discover. They’re going to allow you to cure your cashflow problems. Attain more clients, bring in more leads for your business and create systems and processes that give you the growth that you want. You are going to discover the business growth secrets you have been looking for that I’ve used to sell over 50 million pounds worth of products and services on social media. and help clients everywhere to grow their businesses on demand. So let’s get started on the business growth secrets podcast. Hello everybody and welcome to this very, very special episode of business growth secrets. I’m joined today and I’m really excited. I think this is going to be a super fun podcast with these Style Sisters who have been a social media phenomenon, building their Instagram, going on to secure a list stars people like Rio Ferdinand, getting them to organize his home, Rita Ora, Amanda Holden, Stacey Solomon, and more. They’ve gone on to write their own book, which we’re going to mention today, which sounds awesome. As well as helping many, many, many people to organize their homes and create amazing results and clarity in their lives. So welcome both of you really excited for today. How are you both doing? You good?
Charlotte Reddington:
Thanks for having us. It’s exciting. We love doing podcasts.
Adam Stott:
Yeah, I’m really, really excited to have you both on. I think, you know, reading and understanding more about your story can be really, really, really inspiring. And really want to talk to you about this amazing business that you’ve created, the Style Sisters. I understand you’re not actually sisters, so you’re best friends, is that correct?
Gemma Lilly:
That’s right. I think people think, Oh my God, we fooled them. But no, we’re not really.
Charlotte Reddington:
We always say sisters in style. So basically we do finish each other’s sentences. We’re like a married couple. We talk with our eyes, telepathic.
Adam Stott:
Perfect. And, you know, I think that you’ve gone and created this amazing business from scratch that’s dealt with some super people, really inspired lots and lots of people as well and built this huge social media following. But where did this all start from? You know, what was this an idea that came up between the both of you? You know, how did you get started on this journey? You know, really from the beginning, because there’s a lot of people that listen to podcasts that start out businesses, businesses that, you know, really inspired to get going. I think it’s really inspiring your story. So where do we actually get started from and how did this idea come to fruition?
Charlotte Reddington:
Right. Let’s take it back. So me and Gemma were both young mums. We both felt pregnant at 21. We met at high school, actually in sixth form. So we were friends, but we weren’t close, close friends, but we admired each other’s style.
Gemma Lilly:
I always remember my first ever memory of Charlotte is her walking through the school halls with this white and black coat on and me thinking, Oh, she looks nice. And that’s a style sister colors now, isn’t it?
Charlotte Reddington:
That is a style sister color.
Gemma Lilly:
So it was just kind of, we’d always admired each other, like Charlotte said from not far, but we wasn’t massively close. We were more Facebook friends. And then when we fell pregnant, because we were the first of our friendship groups to be pregnant because we were so young, we kind of bonded over that we were going through the same thing as each other and it kind of just slowly went from there and Charlotte was always interior design. I was always fashion and we kind of egg each other on and push each other on and sort of beat each other’s fangirls in each of our respective careers.
Charlotte Reddington:
So Gemma had previously a boutique, a really successful shop in our local town. And I was doing interior design, working for different showrooms and studios, but we kind of was frustrated. We just wanted to, we knew there was more to us.
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah. I’d sold my business. And for the first time, probably ever, I was not doing very much. I was doing a bit of freelance styling, but I was massively creatively frustrated. I didn’t really have any money to invest into a business. Charlotte was feeling the same and I was doing a little bit of wardrobe organization prior to Charlotte and I joining forces, but it never really occurred to me that this could be a business, especially not as big as it is now. And it was over dinner that we were like, why don’t we join forces and kind of create this, do you remember Trini and Susanna?
Adam Stott:
Yeah.
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah. So it’s kind of going in…
Charlotte Reddington:
We’re the new version.
Gemma Lilly:
Going in and doing it for the home. So it’s kind of detoxing and organizing your wardrobe, detoxing and organizing the home, styling it, offering interior design.
Charlotte Reddington:
We’re such people pleasers and anywhere, even from growing up for like growing up as a kid, like for my birthday present every year, I would want to redecorate my room. That was my thing. I just loved going to all the DIY shops at the weekends. I was just obsessed with interiors and design. And I think, and then we’d always be rearranging our friend’s bedrooms, tidying up. It was just, I think, naturally in us from an early age.
Gemma Lilly:
I never thought that there was somebody else as strange as me that would do that. Like I would go to my friend’s house and physically couldn’t leave until their room was tidy. And I’m always late because I can’t…
Adam Stott:
I’d like to invite you over my house.
Charlotte Reddington:
We honestly, we go over and beyond every house we go to. We’re like, do you want us to do that room? And like, okay.
Gemma Lilly:
We’re the same type of weird basically. And it was, we knew that we were both very aligned, but we didn’t realize how aligned and just the same type of person that we are until we started business. And we literally set up the Instagram account that afternoon and within a few hours, we’d already had our first client and it just so happened to be a celebrity. And honestly, we’ve both tried businesses before, both been proper grafters, but I just think sometimes the stars align and things are just meant to go your way. Obviously, we’ve worked incredibly hard, but I think it just was the right thing at the right time. We tapped into a market that really, when we would tell people, are we going to do a wardrobe organizing business? They would laugh at us and go, what people pay you to go to their home and tidy their room. We’re like, yeah. And they’re like, Oh, good luck. And we’re like, yeah, you watch, you watch. And then honestly, we started a movement. There was like, we were inspiring people. Women would message us guide. You’ve made me leave my job and start a career doing this. I didn’t think it was a job and now I know it is. And that’s such a good feeling. We’ve been able to help people get the confidence to do that for them and their lives.
Adam Stott:
Absolutely. I think it’s awesome that you found saying you’re really good at really passionate at and something that you really believed in. And then of course, that’s gonna, you know, transfer to lots of other people out there. So you go out, you get your first client and just get your first client, like literally straight away. How did you get your first client? What’s the, did you do some Instagram posts? What did you do? What did that look like?
Gemma Lilly:
The Instagram was very, very, very, very basic. Obviously, it had only just been set up, so there was nothing on it really other than we can help you detox and organize your wardrobe kind of one post. And a friend of ours had obviously seen that we’d set this account up and she was following the celebrity that we ended up doing. We wasn’t, to be honest, she was a Love Islander. Neither of us had ever watched Love Island. We had no clue who she was, but she’d put out a post or a story on Instagram. I mean, we’re going back five years now. Saying, is God, my wardrobes driving me crazy. It’s such a mess. Wish somebody could come and help or something along those lines. And somebody said, and our friends sent us the story and we were like, Oh, so like, we’ll reach out and say we’ve got a business doing this. It was just, the timing was just, you couldn’t have made it up. It just, the fact that nobody had ever really put a shout out for people to help them with their wardrobes before ever, or not that we’ve witnessed. And we’ve just set this business up doing just that. It was just like, and we offered our services, she took them up, and the rest as they say, is history.
Charlotte Reddington:
And then in every house we would go to, they would be on the phone, you gotta get this girls in. And it just, they started this like crazy movement and next thing we got like Daily Mail doing articles on us inside Amanda Holden’s wardrobe. Amanda Holden’s leaving her key for us just to go into her house. Like the trust, it just, we were like, are these people really, like, they trust us so much.
Gemma Lilly:
I think that is a testament to us as people because we’d never ever want, it’s a very personal thing, people coming into your home and going through your cupboards and especially showing you, we’d never want anyone to see a messy wardrobe or a messy room for example. We make people feel comfortable because we’re very, very aware that it’s quite a personal reason.
Adam Stott:
Very friendly. I mean, as I come on today, you’re very, very friendly. Very quickly, you feel like, you know, you both, which is beautiful.
Charlotte Reddington:
Thank you. So sometimes we think, because it’s like two of us, it could feel a bit threatening to someone on their own in their home. But honestly, we are like counsellors and therapists and we love that. We go through like laughing things, talking, crying. It’s an emotional thing.
Gemma Lilly:
It is an emotional, it is if you’re delving through things that, you know, your personal items, it sparks emotion and memories and we just love it. I think we’re obviously both being in jobs. I was obviously at the shop, Charlotte has done the interior design and stuff. You’re dealing with people all the time, so I think you get very accustomed to people’s personalities and how to deal with different people.
Adam Stott:
What is really interesting is the fact that you got sent the post, right? Now, this is the thing, obviously, I’ve trained a lot of business owners, worked with a lot, a lot of people, been doing it since 2016, worked with thousands of people. A lot of people wouldn’t have reached out just so you know, a lot of people would have gone oh, yeah, but they’re too big. I can’t. We just started. You come up with all these excuses in your mind about why you can’t go and have that conversation.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah.
Adam Stott:
Why didn’t you just reach out? What allowed you to sort of break through? Did you have any thoughts like that? Or just like, ah, let’s just go for it.
Charlotte Reddington:
I would be. I remember ringing Gemma. I was in my local nail shop having my nails done and Rochelle Humes was in there and she lived locally to us. And I was like I’m just gonna go up to her. And Gem’s like, Oh my God, are you going to do it? And I was like, I haven’t got a business card on me. Then I found one at the bottom of my bag and I was like sod it. She can only say no. So I went up to her and she was so lovely. She took the card. We didn’t hear anything for about three months and then she contacted us. And honestly, since then, we’re probably around there once or twice every few months, aren’t we?
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah, we’re there a lot.
Charlotte Reddington:
They’re like one of our regular clients. We’ve built such a relationship with them and their family, and all because and you think to yourself, if I didn’t take that opportunity then, maybe that wouldn’t have happened. I think you’ve just got to grab things by the balls almost, haven’t you? And just go with it.
Gemma Lilly:
I think as well, like when, because we come in, when we started doing Rochelle’s, if we hadn’t taken that opportunity, she then asked us to style her first ever My Little Coco shoot, which, because we got onto that conversation with her, we’d obviously done a good job in our home previously and we told her that Charlotte done interior design. I was the stylist and we’d do shoots and stuff like that. It was through that organic conversation that she then thought of us for styling her first baby shoot, which is just wild when you think, obviously, the means that she’s got at her disposal. And she’s asked little old us to style her first ever shoot. It’s such a testament to us as people, but we don’t believe we’re that. It’s so weird because as much as we’ve really pushed through and really, really worked really hard, we’re still a little bit in denial that we’re worthy of this.
Charlotte Reddington:
Is it imposter syndrome? I think.
Adam Stott:
Well, I don’t necessarily think that you guys, from what I’m hearing, suffer from that. But of course you can, yeah, imposter syndrome is when you feel like, you know, am I worthy of this? Is this really going to be, you know, do we deserve this? What’s happening? Can I actually do this? I’m starting to doubt your ability to pull off what it is you’re doing. But you know, what I find really interesting is how many people, because I think it’s also interesting to hear about the people that you went and spoke to that said no. Of many people that you’ve gone and approached and talked to turned you down, not gone and done business with you, have you found that as well? Have you had people that you’ve gone after? That’s just not…
Charlotte Reddington:
We gave our card to a Spice Girl once. We met her and she was DJing and we gave her a card with a bit of sharpie pen written on it, like call me. But then we ended up doing another Spice Girls and then wardrobe which…
Gemma Lilly:
It was just organic that came from another client. So, I think, to be honest, in the very, very beginning, we thought sod it. What have we got to lose? So after that first ever client, we just kind of went hard and message…
Charlotte Reddington:
Hint everybody.
Gemma Lilly:
And just said this is a service that we offer because how are they going to know that it exists if we don’t tell them kind of thing. So we just literally messaged every single person that we could think of or who’s wardrobe that we would have loved to do. So we message everyone and some people got back, some people didn’t, but it was just with that was kind of if even if one person got back, we would have been happy and a couple did. And then obviously we did those people, they shouted about it. They did Instagram post about it. And the people that didn’t get back months down the line did, so we’ve never really, and then we didn’t reach out to anyone after that because it was just kind of that everyone came to…
Charlotte Reddington:
Adam, the only doors that we kind of keep knocking at over the last five years is the amount of TV production companies that have been on the phone to us and the meetings we’ve had. And we get so close to it being commissioned and then something else comes over.
Gemma Lilly:
Or it just doesn’t happen.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah, I think that for us is probably the most…
Gemma Lilly:
Closed door.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah, that’s a closed door. And we’re like, it will open one day when the timing is right I think.
Gemma Lilly:
If it’s meant to be.
Charlotte Reddington:
Maybe the business will go that way. We do stuff on this, but not our own stuff.
Adam Stott:
Yeah. And I’ve, you know, what, the reason that I mentioned it is because fundamentally, if you want to grow a business, it’s about speaking to more people, right? And you went out and spoke to people and you did a good job. So you’ve done the, the basic parts of business really well. Go out, speak to lots of people, when you get them, do a great job, they’ll stay with you. And it seems like you’ve done that really, really, really well. And that has then started to really blow up for you. And you built your, let’s talk a little bit about your social media. You’ve obviously used it around really well. You’ve got a great following there. You know, you built that up and you’ve got big engagement. What’s that been like for you? I’ve watched a lot of it actually. I think you do really great creatives. Tell me a little bit about, you know, who’s the wizard at the two of you? It seems like you both, I know you both got different skills. Are you both good at that? Did you both consciously say, hey, look, we’re going to use social media. What was the plan behind the social stuff?
Gemma Lilly:
Social media was at the time a way to get you out there on the internet. And what we do is very, very visual. It’s great to show a good before and after.
Charlotte Reddington:
It’s definitely moved on though since five years ago. Like we’d do a nice picture post and that would get so many likes. Whereas now it’s about being a videographer, a creator, a reel maker. It is just, and everyone now is on TikTok and they wanna be constantly entertained and it takes a lot of time and effort to create these videos. And I think you almost, your business, you end up almost having to spend a day or two just to create content. It’s changed a lot.
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah, it has changed hugely. Just from when we started out, it was all about just showing a really good before and after. The messier, the better.
Charlotte Reddington:
The tidier, the better. And then we never really used to be on stories, but I think stories became a thing. So then we started getting on the stories and that’s probably really where our business came to life. And sometimes we would just be on there traveling to a client’s home, doing questions and answers with people. And I think the, our followers enjoyed the engagement they were having with us. They were watching Gemma singing in the car.
Gemma Lilly:
We enjoy it as well. We loved being there.
Adam Stott:
Good singer, Gemma.
Charlotte Reddington:
So good, honestly.
Gemma Lilly:
No, I’m actually terrible. I didn’t realize I was quite as bad as I was until I listened to it. I was like, wow.
Charlotte Reddington:
But we, yeah, we just love them. We kind of fall all in love with doing the social media and you’d be in the client’s home. You just be taking them through the day. Then we did a job locally to us and it was a 10-day project and we gained 20, 000 followers in five days.
Gemma Lilly:
It was just mental.
Charlotte Reddington:
We had people from the minute we woke up. When are you back there? We want to see what you’re doing.
Adam Stott:
Really?
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah, I mean, it was a really really messy before and after and it was through no fault of our own blessing, they just moved into their house too quickly and it was just too soon and it was overwhelming. Stuff was getting shuffled from one room to the other. They’re two young kids, busy lives.
Gemma Lilly:
But that’s rough. We were just thinking then we kind of opened our eyes to we don’t need a celebrity or the person to help us grow. We grew that ourselves…
Adam Stott:
Yeah.
Charlotte Reddington:
Massively, and I think that was a real kind of nice feeling for us actually. We did this organically via just what we are doing and who we are. So that opened our eyes.
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah, I think in the beginning it was all about if a celebrity did a shout out about us, our Instagram account would grow, and that was kind of where we’d set our sights on. We had obviously clients in between that as well, but the celebrity clients was our means of advertisement, so it was kind of, they shout about us, that’s how we grow as a business. There was that pivotal moment as Charlotte mentioned, that actually we can grow this business without that method.
Adam Stott:
Yeah. Well, the, you both and the product became the thing that got the attention, right?
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah. Yeah.
Adam Stott:
Awesome. One of the things that I wanted to mention again, just because I know the audience list, I know that we’ve got lots of different business owners and lots of different stages, and they’ll be very inspired I would hope by by everything that you’re saying. But what typically happens with people is they go oh, yeah, that sounds great. I could do that. And they go but I don’t want to be on video or I don’t want to go and put myself out there. Did you ever have any of those thoughts where you didn’t want to put yourself out there, you didn’t want to get on video? Or was it easier because it was two great friends having fun, do you think? What do you think?
Charlotte Reddington:
I think it’s nice like when we do events or speaking, there’s some days where one of us might not be on top top form, but the other one will help the other one. And we do live TV because we pick each other up.
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah. And for us on the social like getting on the camera and talking, it was fun because it was two of us. It’s not so much solo. It’s not so much all this precious on you. I would say more so now because we’ve had a bit of a break from doing the story. Now we’re camera shy, which is mental because now we should be in our peak, but actually we’re a bit more, I think, as because the account’s grown so quickly, you just get, you’re aware that there’s more eyes on you. You don’t want to do anything wrong.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah. The business now is becoming more of a brand. We’ve got our products out and we’ve got licensing deals, you know. I think we, you feel a little bit more like we’ve got to be a bit professional.
Gemma Lilly:
More responsible, whereas we were being, but then actually we’ve had licensing meetings and the guys at Tesco’s, for example, just as an example, not actual Tesco’s would be like, Oh my God, did you see the girl’s stories last night? They were so funny. And that was us being silly. So actually what we’re scared to be is what people love. But going back a little bit to what you were saying about networking, that doesn’t come natural to me. I am so sure I’m really, really confident when it comes to talking about what I do as a business and I could talk to whoever wouldn’t couldn’t care who you are, if it’s about the business. But. promoting myself or going up to someone like Charlotte can, that is her real strength because that is just not mine at all. So doing it behind a screen and reaching out to people on Instagram, I was happy doing that because it wasn’t personal.
Adam Stott:
Yeah, absolutely. It’s really, really good to see the skills combining and it’s really interesting you said about, hey, you know, the thing that got you really popular. You almost like buying away from doing it. But it’s probably exactly what you should do to keep that, you know, that’s what people want to say, right? Is they want to say the personalities and that’s what people buy into is, you know, reality TV now is the, you know, the cheapest to produce and the most consumed form of media, right? Is what people want to see people, right? Yeah. Which is really cool. So you built this Instagram followers at 280, 000 people. You’ve got these celebs going on, the business is growing and what’s it been like growing the business? Have you found challenges? Have you found that things have been difficult? What are some of the things that you’ve learned along the way for some of the people that are listening? You know, what are the things that have been challenged you a little bit that you’ve had to learn and you’ve had to grow in?
Gemma Lilly:
I think when we first started, obviously, we’re both very, very, very passionate about what we do. I mean, we wouldn’t do it if we didn’t like, we absolutely love it. And for us, it isn’t about the money and it’s really important to stress that because yes, we need to make money. We need to live, but Charlotte and I are very, very good at not doing something if we don’t enjoy it. If there was a client that we felt that just wasn’t a right fit for us, or if we didn’t quite like…
Charlotte Reddington:
Or a brand deal. Like a social media brand deal that we wouldn’t actually use that product.
Gemma Lilly:
We won’t do it. It doesn’t matter how much money it is. We just wouldn’t do it because for us, enjoying what we do and being authentic is at the core of what we have created. And we would never want to deter from that. And I think before the challenges that we’ve had is when we hit our absolute peak, when people were just obsessed with this business that we’d created, we then went into lockdown and COVID. And for us being a duo, being on our Instagram was always very much together. So it was very hard to do things separately or create that content that people were used to seeing because we just weren’t together anymore. That energy that we give off, we couldn’t create. So, That really presented a challenge. And in that time away, we’ve got licensing deals, a book deal, wrote the book. So not only had a break, there had there been a break and in that break, everybody became an interior designer or a home organizer and set up their own accounts. Our business have completely changed in that breakaway that we all had. And I think for us, the challenge that we’ve had is still being the reason why people come to us and being interested in the business that we’ve created, but the dynamics completely changed now. So I think we struggle sometimes because we’re not in clients houses every day because of how our business has grown in delivering what it was that people loved about us in the beginning to people when we physically can’t be doing that anymore. So you either stay doing that and stay just in clients’ houses, which is quite limiting. Or in order to get where we, I mean, we always said we wanted a lifestyle brand, didn’t we?
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah. When we sat down and started Style Sisters, we literally had Style Sisters in the middle and we had all these umbrellas coming off and we’re like gonna do this for this range for houses, this range for like sleepy wear like pajamas, this range, this range, candles, like you name it. We had all these little avenues. We’re going to go down to be a lifestyle brand. And I think the organizing got us our way in and that’s what we are passionate about, how they needed to grow, like we were watering it and it was just growing and growing…
Gemma Lilly:
But I think it’s a transition. And I think that’s the challenge that we’ve had within our business is transitioning into still being that authentic brand that we created and that our authentic selves, but it’s getting bigger than us now. And I think because it’s such a personal thing we’ve created, people are used to our faces.
Charlotte Reddington:
And we’ve taken it just us two, like we haven’t got a big team. We’re the ones answering the Instagrams. We’re the ones answering the emails.
Gemma Lilly:
Because of our clientele, it’s just us. And then, and we’re still mums. I was building a house for the last two years, which has been so stressful. Like we’ve got family stuff going on, you know, we’ve got lives as well, as well as the business and the business took so much of our lives are like the last five years has flown. Isn’t it? Really? Like we think, whoa. So we would literally go hard. We’d be on the phone to each other for the minute we woke up with ideas, we’d then be at clients houses together and then we’d go home messaging each other till late at night. We were all consumed, but that isn’t healthy. And I think the challenges we find is creating balance between work life and home life because you feel like, because so many people…
Charlotte Reddington:
Not a little bit, didn’t we?
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah. The co, like the break from lockdown was a break that we needed and it was nice and it gave us a sense of like, we can now go hard again. But I think as with any business, you get competition. There’s other people doing what we do. There’s people that are solely doing the organizing so they can create the content because that is all the business is, whereas we’re so much more than that now, and it’s hard to fit. It’s just hard to fit everything in, isn’t it?
Adam Stott:
Yeah, absolutely. And I think a lot of people can, you know, a hundred percent resonate with that. But you have gone down those different angles of building those verticals out. I know you said to me earlier, you managed to get that candle range done and you’ve got that going to Audi, right? I think you mentioned to me earlier, which is really cool, you’ve gone and got the book done. Talk to us a little bit about the book. What was it like writing a book? How’s that helped you? How did you find it? Did you do it together? What was your process?
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah, so Gemma was, we went on holiday and Gem was like, we’ll knock this out in a week. [24:30.3] Gemma, I don’t think we will.
Gemma Lilly:
I loved English at school. Like I must say, it was probably one of the things I excelled in. And I am an essay writer. You won’t just get one message from me. It’ll be like an essay. So I thought, oh, it’ll just flow. It will just come out.
Charlotte Reddington:
But actually, because what we do is so visual, try and put it into, it’s a video of me and Gem in Greece, where our partners are taking the kids there. We’re like, we’re just going to have a night in and get a few chapters done. We honestly wrote a paragraph on a bio about us and we were struggling. We’re like, what is, how do we write what we do into words? And then once it clicked, we was okay. And I think what we did as well, we sent it to the publishers. We got bits of A4 paper, made a fake book and just did the chapters and viciously had it in an actual piece.
Gemma Lilly:
You are visual people. I think it was…
Charlotte Reddington:
On a laptop and I was like, I can’t see it on a laptop. I need to see it in a physical book state. So we’ll just write in bits in a book and then it kind of started happening.
Gemma Lilly:
It blowed. It was just, because it’s like, how do you explain to someone how to fold something without a picture? It was really, really hard.
Adam Stott:
In a simple way because I don’t think I can fold anything.
Charlotte Reddington:
We’ve got an illustrator on board and that was it. And you’re trying to talk to them…
Gemma Lilly:
But even with that, it’s limiting because it’s mad. This is one thing Charlotte and I didn’t realize going into business, that if we was to do something exactly how we wanted, the money involved with certain things, and even though you get this book deal and it’s amazing and so grateful, then we weren’t allowed pictures or colorful pictures. But immediately we’re like, how do we display what we do without pictures? But because we were a relatively new brand…
Charlotte Reddington:
The risk.
Gemma Lilly:
Is the risk. So no one’s going to let you do anything too wild. I mean, maybe the next book, if the first one had sold really well, we’ll do something more colorful. So it’s, and the same with the licensing…
Charlotte Reddington:
You’re limited.
Gemma Lilly:
You’re limited in the beginning to what you want to, and I think as two creative people, that is a challenge that we have come up against.
Charlotte Reddington:
We’re quite strong. We’re like, no, we didn’t realize the value in saying no. Like we are always too scared to say no.
Gemma Lilly:
Like that opportunity went away.
Charlotte Reddington:
Or it was upsetting people or our manager had to damage control or something, you know, like we were always worried, like, Oh no, we can’t say no, we can’t say no, just say yes. But then saying yes is then later down the line led us into problems because we’ve then got something that we might not necessarily wanted. But if we just said no, at the beginning, we could have dissolved that.
Gemma Lilly:
We’re always learning.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah.
Gemma Lilly:
Always learning.
Adam Stott:
You’ve definitely kept that open mindset. There’s no doubt, which which is awesome. And, you know, like, where are we going now? What’s the kind of next things for you? And actually, before I even go there, I wanted to ask a question about what it is that you do? Because you obviously gained this mass attention and you went out, you got great people on. What do you think is the Is a secret source for you in terms of the organizing? What is it you’re really great at when it comes to that? Because obviously your product is great. Because like you said, you’ve got great people on board, you get the referrals, you get the recommendations, you grow. What do you think about your styling that is really special and unique?
Charlotte Reddington:
We cater to the client’s needs and we really look at their lifestyle, the way they live their day to day life. And we make a solution. It’s going to work for them and their lifestyle.
Gemma Lilly: We are huge perfectionists, like massive perfectionists. There won’t be one thing that hasn’t been thought of. If we can assess a space and if they’ve got, say for instance, they get sent lots of stuff and that is a common problem, there is no point us avoiding that problem and tidying up everything, putting it away. But then next week, the problem that they had in the first place was having nowhere to put these parcels that that’s coming back. So we haven’t done our job properly. So how do we create a feeling for this client that’s actually going to change their life? We create a destination for these parcels, for this influx of things so that there’s some form of organization. So I think we go past just tidying up the cupboard.
Charlotte Reddington:
And we go back like six months time and that solution we’ve given them is working for them still.
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah, we create a system.
Adam Stott:
[28:34.4] Of solving the problem, right?
Gemma Lilly:
Right. So for instance, paperwork building up on the kitchen side. There’s no point us moving that paperwork from that kitchen side where that paperwork lives. It’s nine times out of 10 to a solution to the, we always say your home should suit you. You shouldn’t have to suit your home. So, let’s create a system around your daily habits to elevate your life, to make your life so much easier, rather than say that in a week’s time or two weeks time, you’re thinking, Oh, that’s a little, that’s nice having somewhere to put that. So it’s that feeling and I think because we’re so passionate about that, genuinely, like we want you to feel amazing.
Charlotte Reddington:
We’ve been at these homes and they’ve had these amazing interior designers complete their homes for them and there’s nowhere to hang the loo roll, nowhere to put a towel. And we’re like…
Adam Stott:
We never ask the person, right? So…
Charlotte Reddington:
We look past, yeah, we look past it. We’re going to get up, you’re going to shower, we’re going to go to the toilet. Like we’ll look at every step of your journey and is that going to work for you and make it look aesthetically pleasing.
Gemma Lilly:
But I think a lot of things you see on Pinterest and on Instagram is it cannot be real sometimes. Whereas we’ve always been very real. What you see on the Instagram is what is real life. Because we would, I would hate if we created this I mean, there’s been times when some things look beautiful halfway through and we’re like, Oh, this is like, this looks so good. We could have taken a picture at that point, put that on the Instagram, had a really aesthetic…
Charlotte Reddington:
Four pieces on the wardrobe.
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah. Looking amazing. But actually that’s not realistic. So that when we go to the next client’s house, they’re going to expect that, but that’s not what we can deliver. So for us, it’s always about being very realistic.
Charlotte Reddington:
Honest, honest. All of our posts, everything we do is honest and real. And the what is…
Gemma Lilly:
And what you see is what you get.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah.
Brilliant, brilliant. And what’s next for you? You know, what, where are we sort of moving towards now? What do you see happening next for the business, the brand, growth?
Charlotte Reddington:
The first phase of our product line has gone into next and very online at the moment. We’re hosting, well, we’re talking at a licensing awards this week.
Gemma Lilly:
I think for us, it will be more growing us as the go to for home organization, home styling needs and transitioning in a way where we’re still very much a part of that, but where it doesn’t necessarily require our faces so much and just grow. Yeah. Growing that side of the business up a little bit more. TV is always very on the cards, a podcast. Just yeah, just…
Adam Stott:
Do you have your own podcast at the moment?
Gemma Lilly:
No, not yet, but we are in talk about it.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah.
Adam Stott:
I think that you definitely, definitely be good at that, right? You know…
Charlotte Reddington:
We sit there. We think our clientele, the numbers we’ve got in our phone books, that we’ve got the guests sitting there like, you know, like we think not all these people are coming on and talk about them and their businesses. I think, it’s just finding yeah, the right route for us that’s next. I think things come to us and I think now we’re kind of, you know what, we’re going to go get what we want as well, as well as it coming to us.
Adam Stott:
So what, you know, I think it’s been amazing. I’ve loved talking to you, you know, you’re both great fun and you’ve done really, really, really well to take an idea to being this, you know, well known business with great social media following and really built up in a great way. Along that journey through the ups, the downs, the challenges, the working hard, what kind of three things between the two of you would you say small business owners can focus on to drive their business more and grow their business? What would you, what kind of tips would you give from your experiences?
Gemma Lilly:
I think being as authentic and as passionate as possible.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah, that’s going to be my one.
Gemma Lilly:
Because if you don’t believe in what you’re doing, it’s very hard for other people to believe in it. Do you know what I mean? Especially when you’re having those down days where things might be a bit slow or a bit tough, but you need to truly believe in it because otherwise you just, the momentum just won’t be there.
Charlotte Reddington:
And people feed off of that. You can, people, you can see passionate people that are talking about their products or their business and they enjoy it. You can see that I think getting a balance, I mean, everyone always says work life balance, but it is very important. We were, like we said earlier, at the beginning, we were just Style Sisters 24/7, which is good. But at the same time, I think we did fizzle out and burn out a bit because it was just, it was consuming too much.
Gemma Lilly:
I think trusting that it’s not going to go away you have two minutes to yourself, you don’t have to completely take your eye off the ball, but you know, it’s what you’re, you need to trust what you’re creating will withstand having a bit of a break.
Charlotte Reddington:
If you’re not mentally or physically at your best, and you know, how can your business then be? You’ve got to get kind of a balance in there.
Gemma Lilly:
And last one, what else?
Charlotte Reddington:
Have fun?
Gemma Lilly:
Yes. Enjoy it.
Adam Stott:
It’s so easy, right? And a lot of people don’t. They take it too seriously. But if you enjoy it, it makes it all…
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah. Every day, like, to be fair, we’re quite happy go lucky people.
Gemma Lilly:
Believe me, we would not still be here if we didn’t enjoy what we did and if there wasn’t laughter that go with it. Me and Charlotte have had some tears coming out of our eyes from laughter on so many occasions and that’s what makes what we do so enjoyable. I think it’s so important that you enjoy what you do.
Charlotte Reddington:
And I think, yeah, I mean, it’s been amazing being in the partnership. I mean, everyone’s like, do you row a lot? Do you like have the same ideas? And we’re very lucky that we very much got the same vision and everything we like is similar. I think the only time we might get snappies is if we’re hungry. Well, we’re tired, but apart from that, like, that’s important, like working with people that have got the same vision as you and the same outlook and the work ethics.
Adam Stott:
Yeah, awesome. Look, I’ve loved having you on. It’s been a lot of fun, as you just mentioned. Where can people go and pick up your book and what will your book help them do? Tell them what your book is and where they can go and connect. Obviously, they can connect with you on Instagram.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yes.
Adam Stott:
At Style Sisters, yeah?
Gemma Lilly:
Yeah.
Adam Stott:
What about the book? Just mention that for us before we…
Gemma Lilly:
The book will help you live an organized and stylish life, as the tagline says, and it’s broken down room by room so you don’t have to read the whole thing front to back to gain the knowledge from it. So you can just, if you’re tackling the kitchen, for example, you can just go to the kitchen chapter and benefit from all the advice that’s there. And it just kind of helps you talk you through how to detox, things to consider.
Charlotte Reddington:
We met a lady at the Excel at the Ideal Home Show the other week and she had the book, she wanted us to sign it and she had all little post it notes. And it was like, and I was like, Oh, wow. She’s like, I love it. She’s like my little Bible of how to get organized. And that for us, we’re like, Oh, it’s working.
Gemma Lilly:
It’s helping people.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah.
Adam Stott:
Yeah, that’s fantastic. So I can get that on Amazon, presumably. Yeah.
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah.
Adam Stott:
Amazon. And it’s How to Live an Organized and Stylish Life, yeah?
Charlotte Reddington:
Yeah.
Adam Stott:
You’ve been absolutely amazing. Thank you for coming on. I’m sure everyone’s really enjoyed it. Just for everyone that’s been listening today, if you haven’t already and you’ve been enjoying today, please share this with someone. Maybe you know somebody that isn’t super organized that could do with a little bit of help or somebody starting out a business that needs a bit more inspiration, go over and share this podcast with someone you feel that can help it. And if you have been enjoying, please go and leave us a five star review. Thank you very much. The soul Style Sisters. You’ve been amazing. I really enjoyed it. And I look forward to seeing you again very, very soon. Thanks, everyone.
Charlotte Reddington:
Thanks for having us. See you!
Adam Stott:
Hi everybody, Adam here, and I hope you loved today’s episode. I hope you thought it was fabulous. And if you did, I’d like to ask you a small favor. Could you jump over and go and give the podcast a review? Of course, I’ll be super grateful if that is a five-star review. We’re putting our all into this podcast for you. Delivering you the content, giving you the secrets. And if you’ve enjoyed it, please go and give us a new review and talk about what your favorite episode is. Perhaps every single month I select someone from that review list to come to one of my exclusive Academy days and have lunch with me on the day, meeting hundreds of my clients. So if you want that to be you, then you’re going to be in with a shout if you go and give us a review on iTunes. Please, of course, do remember to subscribe so you can get all the up-to-date episodes, peace and love. And I’ll see you very, very soon. Thank you.