Posted by When stay-home mum Christina had an opportunity to start @Bash_PartyStore in 2020, she thought of Carousell immediately. “I have always been selling all my preloved stuff on Carousell. It is very concentrated in Singapore and the platform is the easiest to test the market and start selling stuff,” she shared.
This was her second attempt at starting a party e-commerce business. She was originally working in the financial auditing industry, and left her job in 2014 to pursue her entrepreneurial passions. Before her business idea came to fruition, Christina found herself pregnant, and decided to focus on taking care of her child. Two kids and a few years later, she found she could carve out some time and revisit her party business idea.
In February 2020, Christina started to launch her business offering customised kids goodie bags for various occasions, such as birthday parties, Children’s Day, Christmas, and also related gifts such as for teachers’ day. The pandemic was both a challenge and blessing in disguise.
“During the Circuit Breaker period, business was definitely slower, but as parents are stuck with kids at home, they were desperate in looking for assorted activities to keep their kids busy and we try to promote our goodies that way. With my husband working from home, he is also able to help me out more in his free time. We believe with our goodie bags and gifts, they have brought a lot of smiles and happiness to many many kids, parents and teachers alike during this period. And we love that we are spreading much joy from doing the things we love,” Christina shared.
Bash Party Store currently operates only on Carousell, with a social media presence. Clients can customise the contents and packaging of the goodie bags. “We source our goodies carefully. As I’m a mum myself, I want the goodies to have some sort of value-add to the children, such as building sensorial/motor skills, consisting of learning and development features, or keeping them engaged for independent play so parents have some time for themselves. I also make it a point to not offer snacks and sweets, because we highly don’t want to encourage snacking with kids,” she shared.
Christina has come a long way since trying to figure out how to reach more customers. “We discovered that the CarouBiz Bronze Package was just $600 to start using coins to promote our business, as we have very little budget. A year after starting the package, we have grown our business by about 200%. I am most proud of being able to start a business revolving around an area I love, from the comfort of my own home while still being able to arrange my schedule to care for my kids full time, and the joy that we bring to many kids with our goodie bags,” she said.
Christina was recognised for her efforts with the Best in Carousell – Lifestyle Products and Accessories award in the inaugural Caroupreneur Awards. View the list of other winners here.