Life & Soul Boutiqe Bunbury's Shelley Burrows shares secrets to online success

The best friends and business partners grew up together "like sisters", and it was Ms Hutchinson's dream to own a women's clothing shop - one into which Ms Burrows bought.

"It's grown from something we thought we would have a go at to something that became successful. It just kind of grew, more than we anticipated," Ms Burrows said.

"We get told a lot, 'we love that this is here in Bunbury, otherwise we would have to go to Perth'."

Life & Soul Boutique has over 12,000 Instagram followers, which is huge for a shop in a small city in the country.

For Ms Burrows, it's the diversity on offer in-store and online that sets the shop apart from the competition - as well as the friendly customer service.

"We don't put ourselves into a box of being ultra-formal, or ultra-casual. We have so many different brands and labels," Mr Burrows said.

"We get told a lot that 'we love that we can come into your shop and there's such a wide range, a mix of brands'. A mix of smart casual and going out somewhere nice - that's what makes us a little bit different.

"We're not just street-wear, not just evening-wear - we try to make sure we have a little bit of everything."

Like any business, success didn't come overnight.

"It's been a slow burn," Ms Burrows said.

"We wanted to make sure our followers were an organic following. There were a lot of times when we could have gone into competitions and paid money to get 'x' amount of followers back, but we wanted a really organic following, so we stuck it out over the years.

"We never once swayed to that temptation, because you could end up with all sorts of followers."

When COVID-19 hit like a truck, the team "panicked" - but having their website up-and-running with an online sales platform already in use, made things easier.

"We had a quick meeting like everyone, wondering if this was the end of the world as we know it," Ms Burrows said.

"Our website had been up-and-running and had a strong back history to it before COVID, so we didn't have to scramble to make a website and create an online presence - it was already there."

Their website was already functioning well, too. These days, the company has a website manager to take care of online sales and take the pressure off monitoring social media - which Ms Burrows does a bit of herself as well.

"We have a main person that runs our website for us and is basically on call, someone close to us - which is important, because the person who is involved has a vested interest in it, almost like family," Ms Burrows said.

COVID-19 only strengthened what was already a strong website and online presence.

Both were already functioning well and the team began to mix up what they sold to suit what customers wanted - lounge-wear and more casual items.

"We just diversified and went in a different direction to suit how life was at the time. We were winging it from week-to-week," Ms Burrows said.

"When we realised [the pandemic] was long-term, we tipped everything out, changed our stock.

"We offloaded our event-wear, all our good going-out wear, we had a massive sale and went into casual, stay-at-home-tracksuits - and we sold them by the truckload, your sports luxe. We changed to buying to suit how the world was and how everybody was.

"Even I was wearing leggings and a blazer when I went to work."

When the pandemic worsened, Life & Soul Boutique closed its doors temporarily - not because the owners had to, but because it "felt like the right thing to do" - and continued selling online.

"Our social media person at the time, we increased their hours, and our online sales really took off," Ms Burrows said.

Casual clothes lines are still in-store today. COVID-10 made luxury active-wear "acceptable" to wear outside of the gym - but now the store once again sells event-wear to cater for the increase in weddings, engagement and birthday parties.

Keeping a thriving Instagram page running and making sure sales are booming online is a fast-moving game.

"You've got to stay present and fresh," Ms Burrows said.

"You've got to change - everything is evolving all the time. What's new is old tomorrow. Sometimes you have to jump on things and go, and then you've got to jump off them too.

"With our social media we've tried to keep it as real as we can as well. We don't use a lot of brand imagery, because the models aren't real as far as we're concerned. We have always tried to make sure we showcase our clothes that we pick.

"Our shop is literally about Sal and I and what we like - a combination of what we like and what's trending, what's in fashion. We like to showcase it on real girls, real models. The one thing we make an emphasis on is we have local girls that model our clothing. We make sure they're local - that's a big thing for us."

A range of ages in models is important as well, to showcase a realistic cross-section of the community wearing the clothes Life & Soul Boutique is selling.

The youngest model is 17, they have a model mum in her forties, and a 60-plus-year-old model, "to show that age is just a number - you can still wear nice, beautiful stuff and look stylish and comfortable".

"We've had a really vast age group of models to show that anyone can wear our clothes in good taste," Ms Burrows said.

Being "authentic" is a really big thing for the ladies at Life & Soul Boutique, and Ms Burrows classes "staying true to your own self" as one of the biggest challenges of doing business in an industry that forces you to "stay current and up with the times".

Dealing with major stockists and competing with the big department stores and retailers is another huge challenge. Sometimes, stockists will give their stock to the bigger players weeks before smaller stores like Life & Soul can get their hands on the new lines.

The ladies have a loyalty program in place to help people support local.

Another challenge is balancing family with work. Sometimes on a weeknight or Sunday Ms Burrows will be answering customer questions online.

"In order to capture a sale you have to be present. All our social media is monitored 24/7. If someone messages something about a dress - would it fit a size 12 or whatever - you have to [answer them straight away] because they can Google it and buy it somewhere else," Ms Burrows said.

Ms Burrows handles all the after-hours social media and Ms Hutchinson handles the ordering - but it's Ms Burrows' husband who is the golden ticket.

"My husband is our accountant so he handles all that for us. We are so lucky," she said.

"That's been a huge part of our success, having our own accountant and accounts manager. He picks up things like, we might have paid a deposit on something and he remembers - if there's a credit notice on faulty stock, he's all over that.

"We always joke that if it wasn't for him we could've gone broke in the first year.

"We're a three-way team, the three of us bring all different components to the business."

Ms Burrows' residential address is in Perth these days, but she still owns an apartment in Bunbury - which is critically important to her and the business.

Business partner Ms Hutchinson lives in Australind where the duo grew up.

"I'm still a South West girl. It's really important. At Christmas-time or birthdays, if I'm buying something for my kids, I'll look in Bunbury first, or research if I can buy it there before Perth," Ms Burrows said.

"I have a strong history there all my life. I think Bunbury is a great place, the most underrated place."

What's Ms Burrows' parting message?

"Shop local, support local. If you want the town to keep being what it is, you have to support it," she said.

"There are a lot of ways to support local business and one way is social media, giving things a positive comment, and if you've had a positive experience shopping, share the love - it's just as important as purchasing something from us."