ESTEVAN - V.S. Style Boutique opens a new avenue for fashion shopping in Estevan and beyond.
This online business, catering to women of different ages, styles and walks of life, offers a unique collection of affordable clothing pieces.
The business idea, started by Estevan residents Irina Vlezko and Oksana Sych in summer 2021, took off fast.
"Oksana came to my place, we were talking, and she suggested, 'Let's try it,'" recalled Vlezko. "We both really like shopping, we like clothes. And Oksana is a real expert in it."
It took Vlezko 24 hours to make a decision, and in a day, they started brainstorming their future small business. Once the two long-time friends decided to put their expertise in fashion and online shopping to good use, the next stage was to get their husbands on board.
"My husband supported me; he said, 'You always liked fashion, you are all into it,'" Sych recalled. "Everything happened very fast."
"Our husbands support us a lot, and it is really important," Vlezko said.
Once the idea was formulated, Vlezko and Sych reached out to South East Business Start Up for help. For both of them, starting a business was something new, and they said Jeff Taylor at Start Up was very helpful with many issues.
They knew from the beginning that running a small business will take a lot of time, but only down the road, they realized to what scale it will keep them busy. Paperwork; the search for interesting and trendy, but also affordable pieces; procurements; development of an online presence; and promotion were all new.
"It takes a lot of time," Vlezko said.
"You have to be in love with what you do," Sych added.
About a month later the V.S. Style Boutique was officially registered as an online store with a warehouse located in Estevan, and the owners started curating the collection. Another month later, in mid-August, they received their first shipments.
V.S. Style, which are the first letters of the owners' last names, reflects their approach to selecting the items.
"We are trying to bring in what we like, what fits our style, something unique, exclusive, not something every store has. So that's why we decided to call it V.S. Style Boutique," Vlezko explained.
The price of the items also plays a big role for them, as the goal is to keep everything affordable.
"We spend a lot of time selecting pieces because we want to keep it affordable," Sych said. "We judge by ourselves; you can't spend too much on one piece when you have family and kids. So we want to offer items that people could afford, but they also are trendy and good quality."
The V.S. Style Boutique offers a wide variety of shirts, dresses, jeans, leggings, jackets and more. They try to bring in different styles and collections that would serve the needs of customers. With the Christmas season just around the corner, some festive dresses are already coming in.
Go Digital Sask, an initiative from Community Futures Sunrise offering free digital consultant services to businesses in southeast Saskatchewan, helped the owners with their initial digital needs, but Vlezko said there is still a lot to learn and to do to make it better.
The Estevan warehouse sees new arrivals coming from different parts of North America every week. The boutique offers free try-on delivery within the city limits and Canada-wide shipping. The owners said that most customers they had so far were locals, and they are very grateful for the support they receive from the community.
"Thank you so much, we already have a few of our regular clients in Estevan that support us," Vlezko said.
They've been participating in different markets in the area, plan on joining Estevan Christmas Farmers Market this winter and hope to bring in some pop-up stores soon.
Sych said that their big dream is to one day open a real boutique in Estevan, where they'll be able to work with their clients' fashion needs in person. But for now, they decided to start with an online store, and there are still a lot of learning curves, which keeps it interesting.
The V.S. Style Boutique collection can be viewed on their Instagram and Facebook pages, where they also live stream try-ons of the latest arrivals.
Items can also be found at their website at vsstyleboutique.ca.
