The “Skinny” on Lagniappe
Before we just up and start blogging, I guess we should be formally introduced. You have made your way to our page (Yay, we are thrilled to see you!) so you may know a bit about us already, but for those of you who entered some crazy google search that miraculously directed you here I will give you the skinny on Lagniappe.
First of all, we have been around forever, we are nearing our 25 year mark and in retail I consider that a huge accomplishment. We run what started as a gift store and morphed into so much more over the past 25 years. Lagniappe means “A Little Something Extra” and we are just that. We are your place for wedding gifts, baby presents, fabrics, interior design, fabrics, sofas, lamps, original artwork, books from Southern writers, and on some days we make really good counselors for our customers who need a little love, advice, and retail therapy!
Who is we, you may ask? We are a fun group of women, ladies, girls, designers, who come together everyday and absolutely love our jobs. We joke that we could be paid in “happiness” and that would be enough.
Seriously though, Lagniappe was founded by my mom’s friend back in the 80’s and she joined her a few years later. Her friend left about 10 years ago to be supermom and my mom, who you will know as Sherry, kept the store going. She is super talented on many levels and has a great buying brain. She has great taste and knows what will sell! She employs several of her good friends. Kathy, who handles our visuals has been here for 15 plus years and she is really good. I throw a lot at her and expect a lot out of her, she always is up for the challenge of the constant flipping and flopping to handle new furniture and product that we get in daily. Another bonus with Kathy is that she cooks for all of our luncheons (more on that later in another post). Then there is Leslie. She is our adorable, cute new mom, accountant and book keeper. She has only been here for 8 months and other than her maternity leave we plan to keep her around. She puts up with the mess we (mom and I) create daily in our shared office, and she miraculously handles all the accounting which honestly at times blows our creative minds. Debi is AMAZING in all departments. She is our Thursday through Saturday girl, who is awesome with customers. She is patient, and attentive, and if I had to use one word to describe her it would be “effervescent.” She will shop with you over the phone, help you register for your wedding gifts, and so much more! Then there is me,Sarah, to be quite honest, they refer to me as the HBIC (Head B$*#@ In Charge). It’s a tough job but someone has to do it. I micro manage each and every one of them and make sure our list of tasks stays checked, I have an overall vision for the look of the store and make sure it looks that way, I buy with mom, I consult on interior design projects, I handle our marketing and all of our events, and apparently now I blog…. So there you go, that is us in a nutshell.
Now that you have met us, you can start to visit us for a cup of coffee (I prefer iced) and catch up with what is happening in our store. I promise you it won’t be boring, we have tons of projects and a wide range of what we do on a day to day basis. See you soon.
