The Story of Southern Hospitality Company

Well, hello there! We’re Ashlyn Walters and Julie Pederson, the mother-daughter duo behind Southern Hospitality Company. If you’re wondering how two ordinary women turned a passion into a thriving lifestyle brand, grab a cup of coffee (or cocktail) and settle in—this is a tale of resilience, a pinch of sarcasm, and a whole lot of love.

Picture this: nine years ago, we were just two ladies with a dream, a handful of creative ideas, and a shared belief that life should be celebrated. Our mission? To invite you into our family through product design, entertaining, and making every moment memorable. And boy, did we jump in with both feet! All the while pulling you into that celebration of life, supporting you with ideas and products, and praying for you the entire way.

Yes, you read that right.

From day one, we made it a point to pray over each of our customers by name. Each order, no matter what the dollar amount, came with a heartfelt, handwritten thank-you note. We wanted you to know how much you mattered to us. It wasn’t just business; it was personal.

The first year, we set up an Etsy shop and we practically begged for orders. Our price for a set of tags was $10 and took us at least 30 minutes of hard work to create. We did what we had to do to get our name out there, even if it was ten dollars at a time. We would do little ‘happy dances’ if we were lucky enough to make twenty dollars in a day. Still both working in corporate America, we’d come home in the evenings to fulfill any orders we had received. With each daily Instagram post, we gained a few new followers that also would comment and tag friends on our pictures. Word of mouth became our best friend, and soon we stayed up until 3am printing, cutting, and gluing only to then wake up at 5am to get to work. 

Our little Etsy shop was booming. We worked tirelessly to grow our social media following to over 50k, and orders flooded in like we had struck gold. It felt like magic—posting a photo of our monogrammed stationery sets and selling a dozen in under an hour was the norm. Sleep? Who needs it when you have a thriving business and a mountain of orders? We continued to work out of Julie’s basement and added a few decorative home pieces to our inventory to take a little heat off our production of paper goods.

We thought we were ready for the big leagues. We moved out of Julie’s home and into a real office space to start housing our expanding inventory line. What could go wrong?

COVID-19.

People were scared. The uncertainty about what was happening kept their spending at minimum. We had thousands of dollars invested into new inventory and were terrified nobody would take it off of our hands. We learned to trust God more than ever before in those first scary weeks.

The pandemic may have turned our world upside down, but as luck would have it, it tripled our sales. With everyone stuck at home, online shopping became the new normal. Our business was busier than ever, and we couldn’t keep anything in stock. I remember posting a photo of chinoiserie salt and pepper shakers and selling out of 70 sets in one afternoon. Talk about crazy. Each order continued to be prayed over and our hands felt like they’d fall off with as many notes as we wrote to customers.

We moved into an even bigger warehouse in year six. Rent was the least of our worries when we were coasting through the ‘big leagues.’ We continued expanding our product lines and the variety of items we sold as a result of the supply chain problems. We designed our own products with incredible businesses and made new friends through collaborations. It really felt like we were starting to come up for air. Nothing could go wrong. 

But then, as if the universe had a twisted sense of humor, Instagram decided to change its algorithm. If you’re unfamiliar with the way social media works, Instagram has an algorithm that dictates what shows up on your feed centered around what you interact the most with. It’s like a magical fairy that decides what you see based on your deepest darkest secrets – like how many pictures of your dog you like, or whether you’ve commented on your niece’s latest picture of avocado toast. So, every time you scroll, this all-knowing algorithm is watching you, saying, “Hmm, let’s show them more of what they definitely don’t need to see right now!”

So, we shifted gears again. We hit the holiday pop-up markets, which turned out to be a bit of a mixed bag. We spent months prepping for these in-person markets, loading up the cars with as many things as we could and standing for hours for sometimes hundreds, sometimes two people to show. We also began researching ways to become more efficient, trying to lighten our load both from a personal physical labor requirement and from a physical inventory and overhead perspective. For two years, we held onto the hope that things would bounce back. We didn’t want to flood inboxes with daily emails and scare everyone away, so we patiently waited for the algorithm gods to smile upon us again… and are still hopeful things might change.

Our mission? To create a space where everyone feels welcome, inspired, and part of our family. For our brand to encompass everything that we’ve learned over the last nine years of highs and lows, including the understanding that life isn’t meant to be Instagram perfect all the time. For us to share what we love most and at the end of the day be rewarded with a ‘Well done, good and faithful servant.”

So, here’s to new beginnings! Join us as we embark on this exciting adventure together. Thank you to those of you that were there with us from the beginning and bought those $10 tags. Those of you that followed us and couldn’t always purchase but liked and commented on posts. Those of you that spread our name like wildfire to your friends, families, and coworkers. Those of you that stayed for the witty captions and comments. Each of you has played such a valuable role in shaping our business- we couldn’t have done it without you. Cheers to resilience, creativity, and the love that binds us all! We hope you’ll continue to work, live and play with us in a celebrated way of life.  As we share with you, and you share back with us.

Ashlyn Walters & Julie Pederson

Co-Owners, Best Friends, Founders, Children of God

Lifestyle: SouthernHospitalityCo.com

Gift Shop: SouthernHospitalityCompany.com