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Speaking of Curves: Meet Plus Size Resale Boutique Owner, Rachel Cadie
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Oct 31, 2024
We're back with another Speaking of Curves series where we spotlight, celebrate, and support entrepreneurs and businesses in the Plus community! Join us on Thursday at a special time, 11 PM EST for a very special interview! Today's guest is no stranger here at TCF! We had the pleasure of chatting with her about her boutique last year. Allow us to re-introduce you to Plus Size Resale Boutique Owner, Rachel Cadie of Secondhand Curves! Grab your coffee and make sure you're tuned in because she has some MAJOR news she's going to share with us today!
View Video Transcript
0:06
hello hello hello um welcome to a special speaking of cars i'm marie denae the creator of the curvy
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fashionista no you aren't missing it you're you know don't get you know turned around we are going live an hour
0:19
earlier today because we wanted to make sure we were able to have our guests on and and really
0:26
introduce you to them so as you're tuning in make sure you say hello let us know where you're tuning in
0:32
from as i mentioned my name is marie denae i'm the creator of the kirby fashionista
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we are back with another speaking of curves it's our facebook live and our we're live on twitter we're in
0:44
some groups like we're saying hello right so we do this every week normally at 12 o'clock but
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today it's at 11 but we are really like connecting with introducing to you
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um and sharing um journeys with other plus-sized business owners plus size influencers boutique owners designers
1:03
creatives you name it we're having discussion talking about journey more specifically
1:08
we're talking about like how folks are navigating through this through the rona through this panini
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like however you want to rename it right um and it's really important because we
1:21
need these indie businesses to survive and thrive afterwards so we created this series so that you could
1:27
get to know them learn how to support your indie designers and businesses and i'm already going to say hello
1:34
keisha from arkansas thank you so much for tuning in so our guest today a good one because
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she's already been on however she's been on fire and i wanted to bring her back to talk
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about you know some of her good news um if you love shopping thrift or secondhand you
1:53
don't love this guys if you love sending your clothes to
1:58
be you know confined or you want to donate and you want to give it to another business owner you're going to love this
2:05
guest right she is a dear friend of mine hello bruce um a dear friend and i want you guys to
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meet miss rachel katie hello rachel hi everybody happy thursday
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happy thursday so if you guys don't know rachel owns um second-hand curves
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and they're in illinois based i'm not i don't want to get the city wrong but they're you're you're in chica in illinois area um and you have
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had a secondhand store like where people could come consign and buy secondhand items but you
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have amazing news to share like and i'm just my mind is blown because we're in arona
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retail is hurting retail is in its own little space but you have done something
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amazing tell everybody what you've done thank you hi everybody i hope everybody is well
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so thank you marie for having me on so i own secondhand curves it's a women's plus size resale shop uh we are one of
3:04
the only i think we're the only uh plus size resale shop in illinois um there's probably only a handful of us
3:13
plus a plus size resale shops in the entire world um i do sizes 12 and up
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and i'm located in rockford illinois which is about an hour and a half away from chicago and then also about an hour from
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madison wisconsin about an hour and a half from milwaukee wisconsin so um we're in a great
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location but my exciting news is i just opened and i'm in it right now i just opened my second location in the
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chicagoland area so here we are um after eight years of
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business at the rockford store i decided to open up a second location
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during rona because i'm crazy um during during a pandemic um we are in
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bloomingdale illinois which is about 35 minutes depending on how you drive because
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um i won't tell you how fast i drive but it's about 35 minutes outside of the
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city and um it's next to like carol's stream glendale heights it's 15 minutes from schaumburg which
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if you're familiar with woodfield mall um it's it's one of the busier or the busiest biggest malls in the chicagoland
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area so we're about 15 minutes from there so i am just super excited to be here and
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um there's yeah here we are i'm i'm still in shock like if you guys are
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just joining in i'm here with miss rachel the owner of secondhand curves um one of illinois's only plus size
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resale second hand consignment store and she opened a second location y'all in the
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middle of a roanoke in the middle of where people are like you know buckling down like coming you know like retail stores
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are closing bankruptcies are being filed you have literally weathered this storm
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and i wanted to to share your story and share kind of
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like your thoughts around this because some people have like you know don't see
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a way out of this or they have been severely impacted and they're trying to figure out their
5:15
pivot can you tell us what gave you the amazing
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audacity to be like we're gonna open a second location
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you know it's thank you it's it's something that i've always wanted to do like i've always wanted to open up
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a second location in the chicagoland area like since since the beginning um and honestly i found the location by
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chance it was a great location and i couldn't pass up the opportunity honestly
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um yeah most people are not thinking about expanding their businesses and most people are
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you know there's a lot of retail stores that close just in my strip mall alone on the strip mall that i'm at right now
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which is uh bloomingdale court off of army chill road in bloomingdale um this is a hi christy
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thank you this is a um super busy strip mall
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but um i'm in a big box strip mall um which is different because a lot of us small businesses are not in
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big box strip malls i'm literally between torrid and ross i love it so yes so it's an awesome
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location um but just in this strip mall alone um and the area catherine's catherine's has closed
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avenue has closed dress barn has closed even like for jewelry charming charlie had closed
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there's been so many big chain big box stores that are closing and i think the thing about resale is
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you're getting great prices our prices are even lower than what you're gonna pay for at tj maxx or ross you're
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getting unique stuff you're getting different stuff not everybody wants to wear the same thing that everybody else is wearing
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so not only are you getting good deals but you're getting unique stuff and let's just touch on the fact that
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recycling your clothing is saving the environment we are saving so much waste in the community by recycling your
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clothes um you know fast fashion is it's what it's called it's fast fashion
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we wear something we're tired of it um bring your stuff in to sell um you know
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at either store the bloomingdale or the rockford store you can bring in your stuff to sell by appointment and it's it's just nice
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because you're able to get rid of some stuff that you're not wearing anymore we also do a store credit option where you get
7:32
paid more money for credit hold on a second so for some of those of you guys who are
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just joining in i'm here with miss rachel owner of secondhand curves over in the
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illinois area she's like one of the only consignment second-hand store places and she just opened a second location in
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the chicagoland area in the middle of the roanoke right and so i'm like we need to give like
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you your roses so like if you guys are just joining in let's give her some hearts show her some love yeah having like the
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guts to take that leap of faith in a time where people are
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there's so much uncertainty i have to give it to you because many indie brands and many you
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know businesses like you know everyone's learning the art of a pivot but for you your pivot was kind of like
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and let's do more like can you talk about like what that process was like and even like some of the feedback you
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may have received as you were going to open up the second location yeah no um thank you yeah i can get
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carried away talking about the store i can because i love what i do but you know the thing is is
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um yes it's a crazy time to open up a second location when a lot of businesses are
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closing um i i guess i took the fact that a lot of
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businesses were closing around me and um realized that there was still
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such a need for plus-sized clothing there's still such um such a need for people to come
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in and try on um not everybody wants to order online so i kind of took that
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and kind of rolled with it and thought you know all these businesses our clothing are closing they're missing such a mark
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it is so needed plus sizes are needed the average woman in america is a 14 16. we need clothing to fit our bodies
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we want to shop and look cute too so there were so many stores closing and
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i knew that you know this is just something that we needed and not only that but because the pandemic
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the economy is a little bit different because you know you're deciding so this is like from an economy space
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you're thriving because people are looking for like they're purging they're getting rid of all the things that they just would
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never wear anymore because all the like it's been a year right and you know like all the things we bought that we've
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never worn that we've lost interest in our taste of change compared with
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people's uh spending dollars may have been impacted and so for you this was like an
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opportunity uh kylie jo said at a good price rachel is all about a
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good deal all right yeah i mean really we're we're all about a
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good deal and i think no matter what your pocket is like no matter how much money you
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make i think everybody likes a good deal and everybody likes to find something that
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looks cute that looks great on their body um and really you know like you said you
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know having being in a pandemic we have a lot of extra time to go through our closets
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because we're not doing as much so we have extra time to get rid of stuff and i've heard from several customers you know the
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the pandemic 15 or the covet 15. you know unfortunately you know
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sometimes our bodies fluctuate you know when there's a lot of stress going on in our world whether we're gaining weight or losing weight
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and needing a new wardrobe because you know our pants that fit us before the pandemic are either too big or too
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small so we're wanting new stuff as well that would be that i said that's comfortable
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and that matches our lifestyle right totally go ahead i call it pandemic chic of
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course we're still going to wear dresses and cute outfits yes but i call it pandemic chic because
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we are seeing a lot more um loungewear we are seeing like you know eloquii had
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launched their new launch loungewear line which is beautiful i mean there's so many brands that are
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pivoting into what the pandemic is you know
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requesting you know like this is we're all going through this we're all in this together and it's it's a different it's a
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different life lifestyle right now for us and obviously hopefully it's for the time being but right now we need to make sure that
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we are having in store what is going to work for everybody that they're looking for so like athletic wear pajamas
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loungewear i love pull-on pants i'm sorry i like my skinny jeans and my side part
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okay i like it but you know but but um you know yes
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yes i got you know but you know um we're all looking for those more casual styles and yes there are still people
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that you know are like i'm going to go out tonight it's my you know whatever birthday and we're going to celebrate of
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course we can we can help you with those outfits as well we just want to make sure that i want to make sure that i have something for
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everyone for whatever you're looking for so let's talk about consignment let's
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talk about these clothes and sending clothes because some people don't know what consignment is or it feels very foreign or let's
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actually take it a step before that purging your closet because we all got the time
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um and and you've been like putting it off somebody talking to somebody in the audience you've been putting it
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off um i love to continually purge um full transparency i
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send my clothes to rachel because i would rather help um another plus size business
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when i'm turning over my closet so for me it kind of helps keep the economy going so if you
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um yes i'm down here in atlanta but i ship items to rachel so that she can have her inventory and
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keep things moving along so for you out there if you're wondering what to do with all these clothes
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rachel tell them what they can do and maybe like a tip when you're cleaning out your closet to
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send things to you like what's a tip you would give yes and thank you marie i so appreciate
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you um so my tip is to whether we're in a pandemic or not go
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through your closet every every couple of months go through your closet oprah once had taught that trick um
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about the hanger trick about how you have your hangers facing a certain way and when you wear something you put it back a different
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direction and then in six months whatever is that opposite direction or whatever
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um you need to pull because you haven't worn it um but you know honestly my tip is to go through your closet
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every couple of months get rid of your items um some clothing you know over
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time um you know becomes out of style or depreciates in value so you know if you have something that's
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sitting in your closet for a few months six months a year and you haven't worn it just get rid of it bring it in
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right does it bring you joy yes exactly you have to look at it and think do i love this and like stop stop with
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the i'm gonna hold on to this until i lose weight thank you stop with me stop with that
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i'm gonna hold on to this you know whatever because honestly maybe put one piece in
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your closet that's your goal piece but that can be so depressing sometimes and discouraging for us women
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and men everybody to have these pieces that were like they don't fit me and you think you're
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you know it's upsetting so that's one tip is get rid of that stuff because if eventually you know whenever if you want to lose
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weight whatever if you lose weight and you can fit into whatever again
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buy some new stuff you know but but don't hold on to stuff because you know you you've your body has
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changed we're women we're we have hormones our bodies change and then and then they don't tell you
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that as you near 40 your body changes again and then like you know there's just you
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know i'm not i'm turning 40 this year so yeah like i'm like okay body like
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hey like now i want things that fit you know comfort fabric you know things change and so
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it's important to like purge and so when you do get through that purging moment you have this mound
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of clothes and if you can't do it if you have a hard time should probably bring in your friends your partner
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or some kind of body stylist that helps you purge like they're they're experts in helping you like
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clean out your closet right there are different ways to do it so now that you've got this mound of clothes
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what do we do now we send them to you right yeah so feel free to give me a call at
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either store location or you can email me uh curves at yahoo.com
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you can facebook message me instagram me whatever get a hold of me um if you're gonna bring into the store
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give me a call during store hours we can set up an appointment um if you want to ship me stuff you can always send me pictures and say hey is
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this something you would take um you know whatever items i would pass
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on we can just donate to a local organization which i also do in store if we've had things for like 90 days we donate to
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local organizations so it's really the gift that keeps on giving um
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and yeah you can just just say hey i've got like um this you know i've got like 10
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eloquent and lane bryant shirts and a size 2x they're like career blasters this is something you would want to take
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um just feel free to message me and i'm happy to set something up you can ship something to me and i'm happy to reimburse some of the
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shipping uh you know obviously um we want you to send items that are current trials within the last couple
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years uh seasonal styles right now we're taking spring i start taking summer um in a couple weeks and then it really
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um you know as long as they're in great condition and current trends it doesn't matter what brand it is i tell everybody we pick so kylie has a
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question kylie said what if we don't live in the area and want to shop in your store
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is that an option even though you talk about like you have your physical location do you have an online option so
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i do not do um like a what i do not have like a website right now i eventually will
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eventually will um it's harder yes eventually um i for the time being
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i'm not doing a ton of shipping just because i'm kind of pivoting into the whole opening the two
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stores running the two stores but in the next month i will start shipping again so if you see an item on facebook or
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instagram that you absolutely love that you know will work for you um all sales are final so if you see
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something that you know you want i can ship it to you it's eight dollars flat shipping inside the us
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i unfortunately do not ship outside of the us but yeah we can definitely ship and so it's a little bit more customized
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it's a little bit more intimate so um kylie to your question you know to kind of you know more directly answer
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she does but it's it's it's via like social like she'll share new arrivals and take pictures and if
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there's something that you love from social dm her email her let her know hey can i buy this from
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you and she will ship it yes definitely and eventually we'll have like a website
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put together the hard thing with resale is we get one of one thing so you know retail stores they
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have tons of duplicates and all different sizes so they can post a photo with the description of the link
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this and that for thousands of shirts that they have you know on demand um but unfortunately
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resale we only have one of everything but i do sell
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uh like other items like we get in stuff from liquidation center so it's not just pre-loved items i like to say pre-love
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uh we also get in stuff that is new from liquidation center
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like let's say um catherine's is closing i will buy up liquidation for them let's
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say like right now i have a ton of and i have some coming in on friday
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we've got a ton of brand new with tag items from macy's and nordstrom rack
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brands nordstrom brands i'm talking like cute stuff that are brand new with tags and they
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may be last seasons but super cute same stuff at ross tj maxx whatever
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super cute stuff um and most of them are like 12 to eighteen dollars apiece new
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attacks so hold on a second because i have to restate this
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she's getting a new shipment from like macy's and nordstrom rack those items which you would see at your
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ross's and your tj maxx's but this is a plus size business a plus size resale boutique plus size
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consignment boutique in the illinois area so you've got a chicago land location 30 minutes outside
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of downtown chicago her new that's her newest location and she has one
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and what's the other city honey new york rocker rockford rockford rockford illinois as
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well so you've got two locations to shop plus size consignment plus size
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pre-loved plus size closing at a great deal at great prices
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and we brought rachel on today um the owner of secondhand curves because in the middle of the rona
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she decided to open up a second location and it's really wild to me and
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mind-blowing especially given where retail is but considering where the economy is
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racial has been like on fire and so for those of you guys who are just joining in this is where the
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conversation i see a couple are like oh i'm late like what's happening so we're here talking with miss rachel
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of secondhand curves she's sharing like the process right now like of if you wanted to send clothes
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and consign them with her if you wanted to shop pieces with her so can you share with us
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a little about how consignment works with you definitely so at the it's a little different at
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each store at the rockford store we do consignment you make forty percent of sales in a check or fifty percent of
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sales and store credit when your items sell so you have to wait till your items sell to get money um it's nice because if you do
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the store credit it doesn't go away or expire or anything it doesn't decrease you can use it whenever you want um so
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there's that option and we do my appointment at both stores bloomingdale's a little different we're
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starting something new here at this location it's a new location we're trying to try something new hi
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delilah so we're trying something new and you know
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really we're doing something that a lot of people have requested over the years is that we're doing cash buyouts on the
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spot so you bring in your stuff you get money the same day um it is a little bit less
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than the 40 because obviously we're buying it on the same day we got to make sure it sells um it's 30 to 35 of what we would price
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the items for in cash or 45 to 50 of what we would sell the items for in a store credit
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you get a store credit gift card and here's what's really cool if you bring your items to the bloomingdale store you can use your
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store credit gift card at both stores oh so are you fancy now you've got two
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stores to shop at so you can use it at both stores um same thing it's a gift card merchandise credit
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doesn't go away doesn't expire uh every time you come in like let's say you got 200
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on your card every time you come in you can text yourself what you're available or you know what your
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remaining balance is on your card so it's super convenient and we're just kind of seeing we're pivoting into this
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we're seeing this transition seeing how this works and you know um the first it's been about a
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month since i opened so it's doing really great a lot of people love it um a lot of people are just you know
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happy to get stuff out of their closets and getting some extra money and or
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store credit to be able to trade for items is just like an awesome bonus right i mean especially
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now like i mean quite frankly like you know especially for someone who may have like a closet full of like amazing things
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and they have a bill that's due like being able to like you know they can bring in to kind of help
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like yeah that or they're wanting to make sure and give to a plus size
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retailer a plus size boutique a plus-sized business that's servicing the community they're like
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i i like the feeling of like i'm helping another business right like like helping
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someone so like that kind of feel good vibe or someone who's just like oh my gosh
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you exist here i'm gonna trap you all the time because i get more bang for my buck definitely
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and it is you are getting more bang for your buck and i have some people that bring in stuff once a month or a couple
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of times a month and they're like you know i gotta have a running store credit every time i come shopping so i have some people that
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never have to spend money they're like bringing every time they come in they bring stuff to bring stuff
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back home to bring stuff to bring stuff back home it's just like a revolving beautiful closet it's just a beautiful
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friendship i love it now what would you say we're gonna pivot a little bit why would you say to the business owner
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who sees a viable opportunity but they're like unsure about how it will work because
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for you like you know and you seeing this viability like what would you say to that business
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owner or to that person who's got an idea or something what would you say to them
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that's a great question i think that uh there is no reward without the risk
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so i think that um you know risks are are hard they're not easy um
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but the rule it can be a great reward and um you know really just having passion
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and loving what you do i think it's important to be passionate um really be dedicated to
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what you do you have you have to have drive you can't just say i want to do this and expect it all to
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just happen for you you have to get out there and do it you have to hit the pavement you have to you know make something of it and um you
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know those who those who can be super successful without having to do that i mean kudos to them
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but i've had to put a lot of like as i always say blood sweat and tears into my business
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but i love what i do and it was worth the the risk
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yeah just just have faith if you really really really love what you want to do go for it if it doesn't work out it
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doesn't work out and then you can go back to doing whatever you were doing before and you know that's the beautiful thing
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about life is you you can do whatever you put your mind to
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i love that and you know for me it's always like uh oh my god i don't know if i can do it i did it oh my god i did it like and
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look like it's a muscle right it's a confidence muscle oh i made a mistake like life is full of
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mistakes like you're going to make mistakes you learn from them take those lessons improve upon
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grow stretch right and so in this case like here you are miss
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rachel you've opened up a whole second location yes daphne no reward without risk
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right call it out like i'm just so freaking proud of you like
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so excited to see you just like like growing like i'm waiting for like a
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new city right like outside of illinois like maybe atlanta
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i mean come on like come on like i'm sure i need for y'all in the comments to tell miss rachel
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like where you envision secondhand curves yeah where are you envisioning her third
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store let's where are we going next ladies outside of your comfort zone miss rachel right
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like let's see you know where are you i am next right like where are we going
27:43
next right i can see you out here in atlanta i can see it i can see it i mean so
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what is next now then for you like honestly we're over here like i'm over here just like you know telling you what
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i think you should be doing but like where where what is next for you
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so i have a few little projects going on um i did i did create a loungewear line so i
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designed a loungewear line called cozy curves um i launched it um
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a little bit before christmas so in december um it is a plus-sized laundry line in sizes
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1x through 6x which is very hard to find um and i have a couple different i probably
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have five different styles available right now what's that is this online or only in
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your location so it's at both of my locations and then i also have it on the cozy curves instagram
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page you can look at it's just it's cozy curves boutique and you can look at it on instagram and
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i post pictures of styles um i just had a new style come out this week and
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really it's just i i just was wanting to fill a need for the plus size community because
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we're in a pandemic everybody's looking for loungewear because we're lounging i mean let's be real we're lounging
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we're hanging out we're hanging out at home and um you know it's very hard i am like
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a 3x forex so it's very hard for someone my size to find pajamas i don't want pajamas that are
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super tight and like uncomfortable and you know those extended sizes
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um i hate that word but the extended sizes that you don't see like a lot of plus-sized brands only go up to
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3x right so i go up to 6x in this pajama line
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you got a robe in there you got a robe with some pants i can work on a robe we need we need a
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floor-length robe with like some matching pants right
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so i can handle the auntie situation happening i like that i'm so freaking what
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girl i'm so happy for you launch you whole clothing line and a new store location in the
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in a year in a year's time like y'all please show
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miss rachel some love thank you so much i have like the the gumption to just keep
30:09
going and like oh we're gonna add a closing line oh we're gonna do this oh let's go i
30:15
mean like where else can we go what else like for like it's like nothing stopping you you
30:22
know i i feel like i'm always so busy that during the pandemic it's been like this is weird not having
30:28
stuff to do like i always am traveling for business i you know i always do the curvy fashionista style expo every
30:35
year i'm always there um gotta gotta show up and
30:40
um you know uh you know full figured fashion week there's just so many different plus-size events that i attend
30:46
and do and i speak at and i talk about women entrepreneurship and body positivity and self-love and
30:54
honestly you know it's kind of weird not having as much going on because my life isn't chaotic as it is
31:00
but i thought you know why not create a loungewear line everybody was looking for it
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and um it just it just happened so i was like let's do this so that is
31:11
impressive i'm so proud of you thank you and then you know hopefully next year when things get
31:20
back to normal
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