Today we’d like to introduce you to Ashley and Raven Alston.
Ashley and Raven, please share your story with us. How did you get to where you are today?
As a little girl growing up, I never thought of owning my own business. My sister and I was too busy playing dollhouse and building a dollhouse out of a cardboard box, but my main career goals were in the medical field. I pursued my medical career and I have been in the field for five years now. Once the 2020 Pandemic hit the United States, we became desperate and determined to do something about it. We were both out of our jobs and looking for any work we could do to be able to support our families. We were talking one day at my our mother’s house and my younger sister, Raven, suggested we start our own beauty shop online. That’s when we became business partners.
Once we started the process, it was all a life-changing experience for us because we didn’t know how easy it was to start a business. We did a lot of research and asked around to entrepreneurs who were already successful doing the same thing we were trying to do via the web and on our social media. We thought about things that we loved doing and things we love buying. We thought of things as if we was a customer to someone else and we came up with ProGirlLash LLC. We built and empire during a pandemic.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
It is not always a smooth road when going on a journey to success and it has not been. Some struggles we faced was building trust from vendors who we knew nothing about, trusting that we will get what we asked for, having the money to start our business and taking risk, not knowing if we would make enough to provide for our families who were already struggling with money during a pandemic, and making our first sale was a struggle as well.
We’d love to hear more about your business.
ProGirlLash is a lash business that specialize in providing beauty enhancements to all you feel that are not beautiful enough to be themselves. The name “Pro” comes from being a “pro” or professional at anything you do. Some women who have low-self esteem or issues dealing with being comfortable with what they wear and how they look, we have eyelashes that will enhance their beauty and make them see that you are beautiful and that you can wear whatever makes you have confidence. Each lash name we came up with describes all that and more. We also have other items to accessorize their looks such as sunglasses, cute face mask, and lip gloss, and more. What sets ProGirlLash apart from others is that we have a meaning behind what it is to “Becoming a ProGirl” and purchasing beauty products that will make you feel a certain way about what you bought. Its not just about selling and sales its about buying from a company that has a meaning behind the brand.
What were you like growing up?
Growing up as a little girl my younger sister and I was always together. We are only a year apart so we liked to do the samethings. We played dollhouse and “school” a lot. I was always the teacher and she was the student. When we would build these dollhouses out of cardboard boxes, we always put our ideas together and came up with something we both loved. During my time of middle and high school, I had a desire to help others and over-do certain task. It was just my personality and I had no way of controlling it. In high school, I studied health and human services. It was a program I was in that allowed me to earn my certification before I graduated. I was a girly girl but I never thought I would love being a business owner wearing things that I already wear on a day-to-day bases.
Contact Info:
- Address: 225 Glenrose Circle SW
Atlanta, GA 30354 - Website: www.progirllash.com
- Phone: 4705358931
- Email: progirllash@yahoo.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/
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