The number of small businesses owned by women has increased dramatically over the past few years. Women tend to have a different business sense from men, and their untraditional style of running a business has been a success, and has given many women a range of possibilities and opportunities. Many women begin with a small home business and then expand to open a store.
Rawdah street recently has become one of the hippest shopping streets in Jeddah with dozens of local fashion boutiques and home interior shops up and down its length. Jasmine Box, a boutique that opened in September 2006, presents fashion and luxury lifestyle items. It introduced Saudi Arabia to a new retail concept, offering customers a superior selection of fashion choices, furniture and wonderfully feminine home accessories all under the same roof.
Faye Behbehani, a Kuwaiti married to a Saudi, and Sara McKinnon, offspring of an Australian father and a Kuwaiti mother, who is married to a Saudi, together opened Jasmine Box.
Five years ago they both found themselves living in Jeddah and immediately noticed a gap in the market for intimate fashion and lifestyle boutiques. Faye’s background in interior design and Sara’s love of fashion were put to work and Jasmine Box was born. The two women have known each other since they were children. “We decided that we wanted to have fashion and furniture under one roof. That was the beginning of Jasmine Box,” said Faye.
Jeddah has many boutiques for clothes and furniture; however, Faye and Sara believe that Jasmine Box is different, “I think what makes Jasmine Box unique is the idea of the lifestyle concept. Basically, we try to connect everything so that it is a way of life,” said Sara.
Unsurprisingly, Faye and Sara, did find the red tape involved with opening a business to be a challenge on its own. “The difficulty was there were no set rules for opening the kind of business we envisioned,” said Sara. “The Chamber of Commerce did not provide us with any guidelines and when we did one thing and thought the paper work was right, something else invariably popped up.” In the end, of course, they did succeed.
Jasmine Box features a collection of women’s apparel, swimwear, handbags, jewelry, home accessories and a small baby section. It stocks over 50 international brands from Australia, and Germany to the Far East and from the major fashion capitals of Paris, London and New York.
Sara believes that women have a sense of uniqueness. “We do a season or two from one designer and we move on the next season to new brands and new designers to keep things fresh and exciting,” she said. Faye added, “Last year we designed a lot of clothes and exhibited them in Busat Al Reeh Bazaar, an annual event in Ramadan. This year we are going to do it again. These are the only things that we design ourselves.”
Faye, who took a course in interior design here in Jeddah, handles the furniture in the store. “We don’t have a lot of big pieces and all our furniture is imported. Long lasting scented candles, funky cushions, ornate vases, and small sofas is what we offer,” she said Faye.
According to the two women, the name “Jasmine Box” was chosen because of their love of the scent of the jasmine flower and the surprise of opening of a box, “Jasmine Box came from the idea of a box of surprises; you walk in and you don’t know what you are going to find. And you don’t know what are you going to like when you come into Jasmine Box,” said Faye.
“That’s the idea of the box, unsuspecting,” added Sara.
