April 14, 2021 – Naperville Sun
Business: Little Barn Baby
Address: 123 S. Washington St., Naperville, IL
Phone/Website: 630-857-9360, www.littlebarnbaby.com
Owner: Sylvia Torres, 44, of St. Charles
Years in business? Opened in December 2020.
What does your business do? “We are a baby boutique, so we sell clothes from zero to 5T, that’s 5 Toddler (or) basically 5 years old,” Torres said.
How did you get started? “We have a home décor store in Geneva, IL, Little Red Barn Door. A local artisan was making our signs. She said she made onesies. They were cute. We tried it, and got a pretty good response, selling hundreds. We started (selling) different baby items. … We decided to start Little Barn Baby (in Geneva) in December 2019.”
Why Naperville? “People were telling me to bring the home décor (store) to Naperville. I came down here when the pandemic started. It was really busy. It was a Sunday but it almost looked like a festival. I was totally amazed. … I started looking at what kind of stores were here. I noticed some of the big hitters like The Pottery Barn. I didn’t know if my home décor store could compete with that. … Then I said, ‘Wait a minute, let’s see if there’s any baby stuff here.’ … I was, ‘OK, there’s not too much (competition).’”
How’s the business going? “We did really good in December. … January, February, March, every month we get more sales. We’re definitely going in the right direction.”
How did the virus impact your business? “At the beginning it was a little tricky, more so in Geneva because this wasn’t open yet. People were not having baby showers, were not going to visit the baby. …. But now there are a lot of ‘COVID-19 babies,’ so a lot of people are coming in. … People are starting to shake it up a little bit. Maybe have a baby shower of some sort.”
Do you enjoy being in Naperville? “I like it. I can’t wait to see what it becomes after more people are vaccinated, more people aren’t scared to go outside, maybe some of the restrictions aren’t there.”
Read more at Naperville Sun.