Simplistic beauty, it's our favorite. Sharayah Dancer and her business Pop of Joy is embodying this concept to it's fullest. Pop of Joy is a pop up wedding company in Salem, Oregon that provides intimate and affordable weddings. You pick the place (your backyard, a park, etc.) and they come to you with everything you'll need for a small, stress-free event.
If you are interested in booking a pop up wedding you can contact Sharayah on her website, Facebook or Instagram.
Tell us about yourself. My name is Sharayah Dancer and I live in Salem, Oregon. I’m married to my super talented husband (he builds my design ideas for our business) and I’m a mom to a sweet little girl. Even though I’ve traveled all over the world and lived in many places I am a true Oregon girl at heart and was born in Eugene, Oregon.
I am passionate about event design and believe that everyone deserves a lovely wedding with their family and friends at an affordable price. In my spare time I love shopping in the city, dining at new restaurants and helping my loved ones design/plan their parties and small events. I have been very blessed these last few years to have worked with some incredibly talented wedding artists and have my design work featured in The Knot, 100 Layer Cake, Aisle Society, etc.
I know people often have hobbies outside of their work but my work really is my hobby because it is my passion in life.
How did you get into your business? I was so blessed to be able to fall into the wedding industry. I was waitressing my way through college and waited on a lovely couple who owned a wedding venue and asked me to come work for them. I did secretarial work and marketing for them for over seven years until I had my daughter. During that time I truly fell in love with wedding design and decided that I needed to find a way to work from home so that I could still spend time with my little one. Interestingly enough, my friend and roommate in college ended up in the same field of work as myself! We reconnected and decided to start a wedding planning company together. We had fun and worked in our company for two years until my partner moved to central Oregon and we closed the company.
My husband and I then opened Pop of Joy because we wanted to offer gorgeous weddings for budget brides. Being a budget bride myself with years of experience in the wedding industry, I saw a real need for this.
What has been your biggest challenge?
Getting the word out about our business. Pop-Up weddings are a fairly new concept to this area and we are the first and only Pop-Up wedding company in Oregon. Many brides don’t know that a pop-up wedding is even an option for them. They often think that they have only 2 choices: a traditional wedding & reception -OR- an elopement but we want them to know that they can have the best of both worlds with a pop-up wedding. They can celebrate their special day with those closest to them, in style, stress free, and for less than $3,000.
What do you wish you’d known when you started?
I wish that I would have taken some basic bookkeeping classes and had an established marketing plan in place for the first year.
If you could narrow your success down to one thing, what would it be?
Building relationships with other vendors is the best form of marketing.
What are your top three tips for women starting a business?
Forget perfection and learn that you can’t do EVERYTHING.
Building a successful business takes time so don’t give up!
Have a business building & marketing plan.
What’s your business motto or quote you live by?
Live your passion.
If you were starting your business over again, what would you do differently?
I would make sure to have a detailed business plan and all details in place.
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