Leaving Big Business Behind

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Tery Spataro is a well known New York City Silicon Alley veteran, but she recently up and moved back to Chandler, Arizona to start "Accents By Allison" with her mother -- Joyce Spataro. The former New Yorker had it all: the great apartment, a booming consultancy, working with top clients, and a huge network of friends. "New York's great, but with the crash of the dot-coms, and tragedy of 9.11, I knew the timing couldn't be better to explore something new and exciting AND spend more time with mom," noted Tery. "And besides, fashion has always been a passion of mine!"

But in typical entrepreneur style, Tery and Joyce's new venture isn't your run of the mill retail outlet. In fact, this innovative firm decided not to follow retail tradition by opening a store, and to instead focus on the personal shopping needs of its female clientele, one-on-one.

"I've always been an out of the box thinker and way ahead of the trends," Spataro said. "I enjoy shopping; it's my therapy, but I was a busy executive with limited time to really get what I really needed for my wardrobe. I knew I wasn't alone."

Spataro describes business in New York as "fast paced and determined to succeed." In comparison, doing business in Arizona is much more laid back, but it was a great place to make use of her marketing background. She chose the Greater Phoenix Area as a first launch point because it gives a good look at an interesting demographic group. "Though there is some influence from LA, the Greater Phoenix area is a relatively newly forming culture. It's great to tap into a mindset that is pure," Spataro explained.

Accents By Allison is an innovated business concept for area, which makes it a good challenge and great for marketing research intelligence, according to Spataro. "We keep customer care forms on all our clients so that we know what they really need." Over 34 percent of her customers really dislike shopping in malls and don't get the attention that they need to put together a proper wardrobe. We found that our clients enjoy the new shopping experience because of the focus on their specific needs."

Spataro is busy with her new business and recently ran a trial in New York City. "We found that our New York clientele is very verbal about their knowledge of clothing and accessories. They too enjoyed the individual attention," Spataro said.

Serving the customer is really what any business is about. Finding a way to use your existing talents to serve customers is a great way to become independent and leave big business behind.

Visit Accents by Allison at http://www.accentsbyallison.com/.

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