Our Big Announcement x3!
It’s finally here, friend! The day we can FINALLY reveal our big news to you (and make sure to read all the way to the bottom for a fun way to get involved!).
My goodness, to think this all started as a uniform delivery truck turned boutique on wheels that we launched in 2015 as “The Flourish Market” is crazy pants.
The past 8.5 years of going from fashion truck to brick + mortar store to moving our shop to Downtown Raleigh to what we get to announce today has taught me one thing: it takes a village. And I’m ridiculously grateful you’re in ours.
Okay, friend, buckle up for this fun news because it’s actually THREE announcements in one! You know we love sharing the behind the scenes with you, so it's been so difficult to keep all of this a secret.
We’ve had our ears to the ground over the past few years and months as we chatted with you in the shop, read every single thoughtful response you submitted in our January and July surveys, as we chit chatted on social media with you, and through our relationships that have formed because you’ve never been “just a transaction” to us.
We deeply care about you, and spend so much time as a team digging into where your heart / mind / soul is, and how we can best serve you. You’ve always stood by us and are the lifeblood of our business.
Did you know we’ve never spent a penny on ads for The Flourish Market? It has been you - yes, you - who has built this business into where we are today. You’ve told your friends and coworkers about us, you’ve hosted in store parties, you literally built the furniture and hung the fixtures when we moved to Martin St. - you’ve held up our arms when we couldn’t hold them up ourselves.
And before we jump into our announcements, I just want to mark this moment by reminding us all that you pulled us through a global pandemic. A global pandemic. You got on Zoom focus group calls with us, you showed up curbside to encourage us, you reached out to us to ask us how you could support us because you wanted to make sure we stayed in business. Ugh, I have tears running down my face writing this.
We have been through so much together. I will never forget standing on the porch at Kendra’s house - one of the 94 porches we had the honor of standing on during the pandemic - looking out at her neighbors shopping from our make shift pop-up shop and thinking “I want every woman to feel what it’s like to be this supported.”
(Four years later, Kendra - right - and her friends Danielle and Natalie came on our customer trip to Bali! We are planning two international retreats for 2025. <3)
As our team has planned this big next step, we’ve anchored our plans in your survey responses from over the years. You poured out your heart, and in turn, gave us a renewed heart and vision for how we could serve you.
You’ve shared with us many things, but the common theme we’ve heard throughout the years has been your deep desire to feel supported, and to find authentic connection and deep, meaningful relationships with other values-aligned women.
And this January when we asked you what topics you want to hear discussed more - by us and others - you wanted to have words put to the hard things we come up against as women and have it put out into the open. In a world where highlight reels are on full display, you wanted acknowledgement of what we’re up against as women, and to be equipped with tools (+ safe community!) to navigate your way into your greatest alignment, purpose, and joy.
This year, you'll see our social media bring in additional components to represent these topics, and we've used your input as an anchor for what's ahead.
That leads us to our big news, broken up into 3 different announcements!
Announcement #1: We’re Moving and Expanding our Footprint + Vision!
It’s true, it’s true! We’re moving to the new Raleigh Iron Works development - just 7 minutes from Downtown Raleigh - and our (temporary) shop opens on March 15th! Yes, that’s ridiculously soon so please send us all the t's and p's as we have a LOT to do in the next 2 weeks.
This will be our *temporary* home for the next several months, although we will be staying at Raleigh Iron Works permanently. Put a pin in that until Announcement #2. ;)
We are ALL IN for the vision of this new development just a few minutes outside of downtown. While we’ll share more about the vision in the next installment of “holy cow, we have hit the absolute jackpot,” know this:
Raleigh Iron Works is a partnership of Raleigh-based Grubb Ventures and Atlanta-based Jamestown. Jamestown is behind Chelsea City Market (NYC) and Ponce City Market (Atlanta), and their short-term and long-term vision for Raleigh Iron Works is values-aligned with our mission and vision for our beloved city.
Let me tell you this - we have worked with all WOMEN from Grubb Ventures, Jamestown, and their support teams. What a joy! From the brokers to the Operations lead to the PR leads to the architects - all women. Let’s give it up for females in seats of leadership!
We’re joining already announced neighbors of Scott Crawford’s new Italian / Croatian restaurant Brodeto’s, Yoba, Andia’s Ice Cream, Ponysaurus Brewing, Eastcut Sandwich Bar, Urban Pathos, Beatniks, Little Rey, Jaguar Bolera, and several other incredibly exciting neighbors who will be announced in the near future.
(Image by Tzu Chen Photography)
If you’ve been out to Raleigh Iron Works, then you’ll know there’s a 2 story slide and play area for the kiddos, beautiful landscaping, colorful shared community tables and chairs, apartments opening soon, creative office tenants, and a strategic layout from the experts at “place making.”
AND THE PARKING!!!!!! THE PARKING!!!!!!!!!! We have heard from you that your biggest setback in coming to see us downtown is parking. Friend. There’s more than 800 parking spots at Raleigh Iron Works. Yes, more than 800. Come one, come all - we can fit YOU ALL! Ahhhhhh, we have never had a parking lot in the history of our business, and I just want to frolic around in the plethora of these beautiful spaces.
MARK YOUR CALENDARS! Our grand opening will be Friday, March 15th and we want to hug you and celebrate with you for getting us to this milestone, friend. We’ll be throwing down *all weekend long* with special free custom gifts, an on theme cocktail / mocktail, fun tunes, high vibes, and at the top of every hour during our grand opening weekend, I’ll be taking you on tours of…
…our new *permanent* home for The Flourish Market - just across the street - before we kick off construction. This will be a TRUE behind the scenes look - we want you to be with us in our special space from Day 1. ;)
Which leads me to…
Announcement #2: We’re Building a New Permanent Home, and You Get to Design it With Us!
When I first launched The Flourish Market in 2015, I could have never imagined that 8.5 years later I would be signing a lease for a space with no walls, no plumbing yet, no… anything. Lolz.
But let me tell you what it *does* have - huge windows on THREE of the four sides. LOOK AT THOSE WINDOWS. The natural light in this place is unreal. I walked in the door with Grubb Ventures brokers McKenzie and Morgan and looked at them and said “This is our space.”
McKenzie had reached out to us YEARS ago to get Raleigh Iron Works on our radar, and to step into a physical place that I had only seen in a PDF was magical.
Friend. I can’t even tell you how beautiful this space is going to be when we all design it together. Yes, you’ve enjoyed “Be the Buyer” with us over the years, but now we get to invite you to “Be the Designer!”
We’re hoping to be able to open our new space this October on our 9th anniversary weekend, so yes, we’ve got more than 7 months of fun designing we get to involve you in! From instagram votes to online and in person focus groups, we think you’re going to have a blast making our new space feel like HOME! And we also think you'll love meeting values-aligned women in these Zoom rooms and in person gatherings. :)
We’re looking forward to being able to expand both our clothing *and* our gifts selection in our new home, while also preparing to host fun special events! Our team Pinterest board is already full of imagination.
We’re going for lots of COLOR and unique-ness in this design; here are some peeks from our inspo board:
This perfect space we found at Raleigh Iron Works has *quite* the big, beautiful footprint which leads me to our third announcement…
Announcement #3: Introducing Flourish Coworking: A coworking space + community hub for the women of Raleigh
We are ABSO-FREAKIN-LUTELY THRILLED to announce the Fall '24 opening of Raleigh’s first coworking space for women.
While we have run a coworking space + incubator program for female entrepreneurs since 2019 (shout out to all of our amazing Locality members!), you have begged and begged and begged us to create a space that could welcome all women.
Well, friend. Let’s do this thing! Whether you’re in Corporate, are a nonprofit change maker, are an entrepreneur, work from home / remotely, are a freelancer, or simply want a place where you can come and “touch down” and be amidst like-minded women courageously going after their goals, who will champion you towards yours…
Flourish Coworking is for YOU! We’ll be sharing a wall with The Flourish Market, and Flourish Coworking will have its own entrance and footprint. You’ll get to be loved on + supported by the friendly faces of Team Flourish because this will be our work space too!
Take a look at our mood board - all founding members will actually get to design our coworking space alongside us! :)
And it’s not just a coworking space.
We believe that you deserve be supported + championed far beyond a pretty desk and chair.
As you share with us in the shop the absolute shenanigans you’re up against, you’ll walk out the door, and 5 minutes later a woman you’ve never met will walk in and share with us the same thing.
The definition of Flourish is “to grow or develop in a healthy or vigorous way, especially as the result of a favorable environment.”
In a world where we as women, Black women, women of color, and historically marginalized folks are rarely - if ever - centered and granted the most favorable environment…
…WE must be each others’ favorable environment.
Community is powerful… and when I think of what our city would look like when women truly connect, feel less alone in their struggles, and are supported in community, I see a future where we are an unstoppable force for good!
(While we had the best time experiencing all things Bali on our customer trip this past October, the conversations we had around the table as a group left the biggest impression.)
As we chat with you in the shop, hear your feedback on our surveys, and have meaningful, vulnerable, and deep conversations with you on our retreats, we hear what you're up against. And you're not alone.
We've heard you feel crazy - and defeated - when you experience things at work (and / or in your personal life) that leave you feeling small, undervalued, and even gaslit.
We've heard you're frustrated by your voice not being heard or valued at work. And that the double standards for women are absolute shenanigans.
"It is literally impossible to be a woman... But always stand out and always be grateful. But never forget that the system is rigged. So find a way to acknowledge that but also always be grateful... " - America Ferrera's monologue in Barbie put words to so much of our experiences.
So, this isn’t just a coworking space. It’s a community hub, here to support you and serve as your favorable environment.
Membership will include the following benefits:
- Monthly Socials: We know networking can feel inauthentic and painful. We'll be hosting fun monthly member socials (for non-awkward opportunities to connect, we promise!)
- Quarterly Workshops: We know how important professional development is to your career, and we look forward to bringing in experts to help you keep showing up in your power.
- Three Summits / Year: These two day summits (Saturday - Sunday) will be personally led by me (+ women from my trusted network), and will focus on rooting you in your personal purpose + joy. They'll be very interactive and help equip you with tangible tools.
And if you’re thinking that you don’t have a job that will allow you to work full time - or even half time - at a coworking space, we believe that most members will find themselves in this position. Even a few hours of time each week in a space away from your every day - and one filled with women out there in the arena with you - can be life changing.
We’ve scheduled our summits over the weekends and our socials outside of 9-5 work hours so as many members as possible can be present and connect in with your new, powerful network.
We need more women in seats of power in Raleigh, and that’s the vision we’re casting over the seats at Flourish Coworking.
You’ll find a video on our newly launched website HERE that explains why building a safe community for women is so important to me as the next step in our business.
I encourage you to head to the website, and submit your interest form if you’re *at all* interested in joining us as we only have 100 membership spots available. We’re starting 1:1 interest meetings in just a few weeks as we want all founding members on board to help us design our space + programming together!
And thanks to your generous support of The Flourish Market, we are able to provide full scholarships for 15 spots for women in our community promoting equity and leading powerful change.
I’ll leave you with this, friend…
We are excited for this move and to join in on the vision for our city at Raleigh Iron Works. And we get to work hand-in-hand with you over the next few months as we - quite literally - sketch out and bring our vision to life.
This is going to take a village to make happen in the next 2 weeks and beyond! So many of you over the years have offered your help, and today we are extending an open invitation with super fun ways to join the shenanigans!
If you’ve ever wanted to eat food on the floor surrounded by a big mess with myself, our team, and other members of our community, this is going to be your chance ha! And if you want to host an in store party at our new location in March or April you would be our absolute HERO.
Click here to see all the different ways to be a part of “The Move to Raleigh Iron Works” and to sign up to be a part of the fun over the next few weeks and months (there’s something for EVERYONE!). Our vision is to have more than 100 of our beloved Flourish Fam come together to make this move fun + successful.
We’ll be open at 307 W. Martin St. until Sunday, March 10th. We invite you to come in for a special goodbye to this space that has held special memories for so many of us. <3
When I look ahead to 20 years down the road, I don’t know exactly what we’ll roll out and who we will continue to become as a brand, but I know this: we’ll do it together with you. In community.
We can’t wait to see you over the next few weeks and months as we write this next chapter together. Click here to let us know how you’d like to jump in and help!
With so much love and gratitude,
P.S. If you are a reporter / newsie / local influencer, please email hello@theflourishmarket.com if you want professional image assets sent over to you asap to support your story or post. We have great ones not used in this behind the scenes post. :)