by Taylor Weber
When Katherine Bock was working as a nurse in Southern California, she never thought that she would become a business owner. But when she moved to Reno in 2014, she saw a gap in her new city’s fashion market, and she was determined to fill it. When Bock opened Sierra Belle in November 2015, it was one of the first women’s clothing boutiques in Reno’s Midtown neighborhood.
“I think, first and foremost, our target demographic is the UNR girl,” she says. “She’s fun, and trendy, but I also think women of my age group would be our secondary audience,” says Bock, who’s 35. “I know a lot of women around my age are moving from California to Reno right now and just don’t have as many options when it comes to shopping.”
A study by the Reno Gazette-Journal found that Reno’s population has been steadily increasing since 2011 with as many as 25% of the new residents moving here from the Bay Area and even more from California overall. Bock had a good sense for what a California woman wanted but on a Reno woman’s budget.
Bock describes her boutique as trendy, hip, and a little “boho.” She and her “belles,” as she calls her employees, help over 100 customers a day. While Bock declined to disclose the exact numbers, she did assure me that the business is thriving.
However, things were not always so easy: “Starting out I had only one employee and I was at Sierra Belle seven days a week,” she says. “Most days I would open and close the store by myself and spend between 12 and 15 hours at Sierra Belle. It wasn’t easy but it was what I wanted, so I worked hard for it.”
While being an entrepreneur is not easy, being a female entrepreneur is even more difficult. While the number of female-owned businesses has grown over 58% since 2007, a study conducted by The Women Business Enterprise National Council found the ratio of male-owned to female-owned businesses is still 2:1. Also, the study said that women are more likely to make emotionally-driven decisions and ask for more advice, while men will not ask for advice and will make decisions based on facts.
For her part, Bock attributes her store’s success to her personal relationships: “I owe 100 percent of my success to my ‘belles.’ Well, my ‘belles’ and my awesome customers. I think in the beginning, when I was at the store every day, I built some really close relationships with some of my customers.” Those connections could begin simply with a friendly face and a smile at the door from the boutique’s owner.
A creative approach to holding special events has helped distinguish the store, too. “The little events we do, like Mother’s Day mimosas or Super Bowl parties, the decor, the location, everything we offer sets us apart from the competition,” Bock says.
When ask about the competition, she seems unfazed.
“When we first opened, we were one of the only fashion boutiques in Reno. Now, there are four in the same shopping center. We choose to completely ignore the competition. I don’t want to know what they are selling, how they are marketing. I don’t even look at their social media. I focus on myself and my business. There will always be competition in anything you do so focusing on bettering yourself is the way to be successful.”
Bock wears several hats at Sierra Belle, and one of her roles is marketing manager. Fortunately for her, when they first opened, Midtown was becoming a trendy destination. Customers could see her business from the street, so she never had to spend much money on marketing.
“We focus most of our marketing on social media,” Bock says. “That is where our audience is and we get a lot of content from our actual customers that we can just repost. We find that Instagram is where most of our audience is and use that to communicate. It has worked really well for us so far.”
Bock now has eight employees, and she has promoted one of her sales associates to store manager. That’s freed up Bock to do more travelling to shows and to work on her online store. “The website is still, to this day, a work in progress,” Bock says. “Right now, our website and the store are two different entities. We are working to fix it, but it’s not as easy as I thought it would be.”
When asked where she sees her business in the next one to two years, Bock describes her big plans for Sierra Belle: “I first off need to fix the website. While the website is functioning, it could be so much more. I also want to expand our style of clothing. We want to be a boutique for all different types of fashionistas, and maybe even start carrying makeup or home decor. Who knows, maybe in a couple years we will think about opening another location.”
Running a business isn’t easy, but Katherine Bock is an outstanding example of how hard work, paired with a good idea and nearly perfect timing, can end in success.
Sierra Belle boutique is at 726 S. Virginia Street, Reno, or shopsierrabelle.com.
