La Dee Dah Boutique is about to grow beyond Hay River.
Paul Bickford/NNSL photo
This month, the co-owners – sisters Dayna King and Nikki Ashton – will be opening a second La Dee Dah Boutique in Yellowknife.
"We've had a lot of customers from Yellowknife that have come in and they're excited to be here," said Ashton. "We always thought it would be nice to open a store there. And we have friends that live there."
King noted that La Dee Dah Boutique also features brands that aren't offered in Yellowknife.
"So people like a certain brand that they may not be able to get there," she said.
King stressed that La Dee Dah Boutique is not hoping to go to Yellowknife and compete with anybody there.
"We're not trying to just see what other people have and duplicate it in a different way," she said. "We're trying to fill a different gap. I don't want to go up there and be in competition with somebody and try and take their business."
King noted that, in the North, there isn't enough room for every retailer to do the same thing.
"We've talked to all of our suppliers and ensured that they don't sell to someone in Yellowknife already," she said.
The La Dee Dah Boutique in Hay River has been open 12 years as of Nov. 6.
It started with a vision of selling clothes and other items for women, but changed to selling items for children and men, and added promotional wear featuring things like embroidery and silk screen.
"Yellowknife is going to be completely different," said King. "It's going to be just women's wear and for girls. It's a completely women's boutique. There won't be men's wear and stuff like that in Yellowknife."
The co-owners noted that both stores will offer plus-size clothes.
"We just feel like every woman should be able to feel good in what they wear," said Ashton.
The Yellowknife store will use the same name.
The goal is to open the new store on Nov. 23, if all goes as planned.
It will be located in the Center Ice Plaza.
Both King and Ashton are very pleased with that location, describing the Centre Ice Plaza as nice, fresh and bright.
Ashton said an expansion to Yellowknife has been talked about over the years.
"As a businessperson, you're always looking to expand a little bit and try to create more revenue," she explained. "As a small business owner, there's lots of challenges. So we've talked about it, but the timing wasn't good for us."
King said the expansion to Yellowknife is happening now because more businesses are moving into the Center Ice Plaza.
"So we kind of thought it was a good time to put our store there," she said. "Even more traffic in that building."
Ashton added that they also wanted to do something new.
"You want a little challenge," she said. "The time seemed right, I guess."
The two co-owners have hired a manager for the Yellowknife store, and also plan to occasionally travel to their new retail outlet.