Community Highlights: Meet Reba Hamilton of Virgil’s Plant Shop

Today we’d like to introduce you to Reba Hamilton

Hi Reba, please kick things off for us with an introduction to yourself and your story.
I was living in Brooklyn, NY back in 2018 when I decided I needed to finally pursue my dream of opening a small business and I had settled on opening a plant shop. I would regularly take trips upstate to a small town called Beacon, NY and fell in love with this particular boutique plant shop on the main strip up there, which after many stops in, and chats with the woman who owned it, I finally got serious about opening my own shop. I decided to move back home to Kansas City in December 2018 where my family still lived and got to work on opening the plant shop. My initial plan was to open a cafe/plant shop, but determined a better way to get to know the community again, and let them get to know my business would be to start as a mobile shop. I bought a mini school bus in April of 2019, flew a friend out from San Francisco and together we converted the yellow school bus into the green plant bus that it is today over the course of two separate weeks in my parents barn out in south KC. I got all the final details done and opened the bus for the grand opening of Virgil’s Plant Shop July 2019 in front of Blip Roasters in the West Bottoms with a couple other friends that are local makers.
Due to tropical plants not loving the cold, the bus was clearly going to be seasonally operational, so when in December 2019 I was put in touch with Kate (owner of Seven Swans Creperie) who was looking for someone to fill the small storefront connected to the creperie over on the Westside, I jumped at the chance to set up shop. I signed a 3 month lease as her hope was to have a rotating storefront, and we had a joint grand opening mid January 2020. Knowing I wanted to make a more longterm move, I signed a lease for a new space over on 27th and Troost in March 2020, which was slightly larger. Right as I was preparing to move, however, the world shut down with Covid which felt like it would be devastating for my brand new business but it ended up being extremely fortuitous. Houseplants boomed during the pandemic and I was busier than I had ever been running deliveries all over the city. This boom really helped me to save up enough money to move into a larger space come April of 2021, and is where we are still over on 28th and Cherry. We had our 5 year anniversary party this last summer, and at that time we unveiled the grand opening of our expansion to the space next door which is dubbed ‘Virgil’s Palm Springs: An Arid Plant Oasis’!

Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
I have to believe that no small business owner has had a smooth ride their entire business journey, if so, I want their secrets!

That being said, overall I would say things have gone fairly well. I have tried really hard to make sure I was taking leaps that I felt would pay off and were not too big to where I could fail.

Being a small business owner is to know a rollercoaster life. It feels as though the business will live and die by a good or bad sales day. One week, sales are stellar with every customer excited about the shop, having a great time and leaving 5-star reviews about how much they love the shop, the next there’s snow or rain or a Chiefs game and out of nowhere a 1-star review hits and it feels like I’ve been gutted, believing that will be the norm from then on.
The key is to know that it will improve again, but telling oneself that and actually accepting it can be difficult.

Appreciate you sharing that. What should we know about Virgil’s Plant Shop ?
Virgil’s Plant Shop is a neighborhood houseplant shop specializing in rare and common tropical and arid houseplants. My aim when opening the shop was to create a warm and inviting space where people felt comfortable asking questions no matter their experience level, and would leave the shop feeling better and more informed than when they walked in. We are a space that values community and a personal touch. While of course people can possibly get plants a bit cheaper on Facebook Marketplace or Home Depot, what I feel like we offer is the helpful personal touch where we are happy to, and in fact excited to help people find the perfect plant for their homes and lives. We will walk someone through the store and tell them specifics on every single plant, if they want, and will be honest about what will and will not work in their space along with making sure they are confident on the care of the plant(s) before they leave. We also inform every customer that our help doesn’t end when they walk out of the shop, we have a shop iphone that people are able to text with questions about plants, whether they got them from us or not. Our hope is to be the plant friend who you can ask all your questions of, rather than a soulless, faceless, often inconsistent Google!

Some of the extra services we offer is plant repotting, both in the shop and if needed in your home or office (call or email us to set up an off-site potting service), free plant delivery within KC (send your loved ones a plant on their birthday or a holiday!), plant rentals for events/weddings, and plant installation for your home or business.

We also have a very fun shop to visit, not to toot my own horn here. There are scavenger hunts, rooms within rooms, multiple photo ops in vintage chairs, a postcard mailing station, prizes to be won when spending certain amounts and polaroid pictures to take!
We also have 3 big parties every year where we host vendors and have big sales, our biggest being our anniversary block party in June where we host over 25 vendors on our block. Our next big party will be coming up in March where we celebrate the birthday of the shop’s namesake, Virgil, my pup. He sadly passed this year but I refuse to not celebrate such a good boy, and we always sponsor the adoption of senior dogs at KC Pet Project in his honor. Follow us on social media for updates!

Have you learned any interesting or important lessons due to the Covid-19 Crisis?
I think every small business owner is familiar with pivoting, so when the pandemic hit it was another opportunity to try something new. I, like many others, focused on online sales. I used Instagram to post plants I had in, and offered free delivery within 20 miles of the city, which kept me extremely busy and gauranteed the longevity of the business. People loved the chance to receive plants at their door, and found that bringing the green indoors made being trapped inside a bit more tolerable.

Pricing:

• In-Store Repotting Services range from $3-$40 depending on pot size
• Off-Site Repotting Services start at $40
• Contact us for plant rental inquiries 816-305-1510
• Free plant delivery within 10 miles of the shop with a $35 minimum purchase
• $10 delivery fee for deliveries 10-20 miles

Contact Info:

• Email: www.virgilsplantshop@gmail.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/virgilsplantshop/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/virgilsplantshop/
• Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/virgil-s-plant-shop-kansas-city?osq=virgils+plant+shop