Entrepreneur’s ‘Suite’ Next Step
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Suite Pieces founder Amanda Peppard, pictured at her most recent grand opening June 24, said her do-it-yourself business has enjoyed rapid growth in the last four years, which includes a new
Huntington Station resident and do-it-yourself guru Amanda Peppard is at it again. On June 24, she branched out with a third vintage furniture and decorative paint boutique shop – where crafty minds can learn the tricks of the trade.
The Massapequa store, at 569 Broadway, joins her shops in Brooklyn and at 1038 New York Ave. in Huntington Station.
Peppard launched Suite Pieces in 2012, when she started renting space in Artists in the Attic, located in the third floor of the Yankee Peddler Antiques shop. She opened her first stand-alone store in 2013 in Brooklyn and signed a 10-year lease in March 2014 to operate the Yankee Peddler, which became home base for her business. The antique shop was incorporated and rebranded as The Shops at Suite Pieces.
In February, she relaunched Suite Pieces’ website as a fully-function e-commerce hub.
Even Peppard, who said she has always been an entrepreneur with dreams of inventing, is surprised by Suite Pieces’ rapid success.
“I had no idea that this is what it was going to be,” she said. “I’ve always had really big dreams for the business; I still have big dreams. I had no idea that it would grow this quickly.”
Suite Pieces features do-it-yourself workshops, regular installments of the popular Pinterest Live! Series, which offers crafters refreshments while they replicate a trending craft; as well as an array of Chalk Paints by Annie Sloan and Miss Mustard Seed’s Milk Paint; do-it-yourself supplies and vintage furniture.
Already, she’s using her new store to do good deeds.
Peppard on June 27 hosted “Designing For Des,” a daylong fundraiser during which she led the overhaul of a bedroom furniture set for a 33-year-old Patchogue mother Desiree Vermeulen, who is recovering from a debilitating stroke. In true Suite Pieces fashion, volunteers and donors joined in, helping to paint the set and create something one-of-a-kind.
She credits a sluggish economy for piquing the public’s interest in do-it-yourself crafts.
“People were forced to become a little bit creative with how they spent their money. People became really keen on repurposing,” she said.
As her business grows, Peppard is preparing to make her television debut. She’ll be featured in a July 26 episode of HGTV’s “Flea Market Flip,” which features two teams in a battle for a $5,000 prize in which they buy from a flea market, transform their purchase and sell it. The biggest profit wins the prize. Peppard teamed up with Homeroad.com owner Susan Stevenson, also a dealer at Suite Pieces.
Peppard is hoping Suite Pieces will be a model for others in Huntington Station as business and town leaders pursue long-awaited revitalization efforts.
“I envisioned that the Huntington Station would be the anchor store for this revitalization and I’m really proud that we have something that’s been successful,” she said.
