New venue for the wedding-bells set
Long-time retailer set to expand
Brides to be and their entourage of bridesmaids will have a new spot to pick out dresses, match their shoes and coordinate the rest of their wedding look after a new Worcester wedding store opens later this year.
Gary Carbonneau, who with his brother Rick owns shoe repair store Carbonneau’s on Grafton Street, plans to expand that store’s wedding business into a separate venture with his two daughters, Laurie and Lynn, who now run the wedding section of Carbonneau’s.The new, yet-unnamed store will be built at 290 West Boylston St., next to the post office. Carbonneau closed on the land last month and plans to finish the building — a 7,000-square-foot, two story facility with four retail spaces on the ground level — in the fall. One of the first floor spaces will serve as headquarters for the wedding retail business. Upstairs will serve as warehouse space for Carbonneau’s growing wholesale business.
The venture represents just the latest step in an evolution that began over a decade ago at Carbonneau’s shoe store, which Gary owns with his brother Rick. As one of the few stores in the area that offered shoe dyeing, bridesmaids would seek out the store to match their shoes to their dresses.
Realizing the growth potential, Carbonneau’s soon began selling dye-able shoes as well, Gary says. From there the sky became the limit and Carbonneau’s quickly began selling accessories, bridesmaids’ dresses and other wedding related trinkets. The business grew into a catalogue growing the burgeoning business into a wholesale catalogue of 5,000 items, "Elegance by Carbonneau."
Through their store, catalogue and their recently launched Web site, mydress4less.com, the Carbonneaus sell the dresses, gowns, dye-able shoes and accessories they have all along. They also plan to start selling clothing and accessories for proms and quinceaneras – the Hispanic celebration commemorating young women’s fifteenth birthdays.
Carbonneau’s has been a Worcester staple for 85 years. Joseph Carbonneau Sr., Gary’s grandfather, first opened the downtown store in 1921 on Wall St. Gary’s father, Joseph Jr., moved the family store to Grafton St. 35 years ago.
But the growth of the wedding business coincided with the fourth generation of Carbonneaus — Lynn and Laurie, then teenagers — first entering the family business.
The two quickly spearheaded the effort, Lynn taking charge of the retail sales half, and Laurie developing the wholesaling efforts. Laurie says she will head to China later this year to track down new factories and suppliers for the product line. They have more than 1,000 retailers across the nation that sell their products, she says.
Once the new store is completed, the new operation will have ample space to grow the wholesaling portion of their business as well as creating a one-stop bridal shop, Lynn Carbonneau says. They hope the new store will continue to build on the word-of-mouth success they’ve enjoyed for their wedding business so far.
"We want to continue that family-owned feeling, and stay focused on service," she says. "That’s where we think we have an advantage to bigger name bridal stores. It’s really important to brides that they get extra attention when they are planning a wedding. And our goal is to try and offer that."
Kenneth J. St. Onge can be reached at kstonge@wbjournal.com
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