Meet Christine Abdelmalek of Pink Papyrus

Today we’d like to introduce you to Christine Abdelmalek. Them and their team share their story with us below:

Christine was born and raised in New Orleans, Louisiana. Good food, good music, amazing city, and a great life until the destruction and devastation of Hurricane Katrina. Christine, a freshly turned 19 at the time, and her family, like countless many other New Orleans natives, lost nearly everything they had in the storm. Down but not out. Resilience is bread into the people of Southern Louisiana.

Nearly a year and a half after Katrina, Christine’s family finished reconstruction on their lifelong home, and Christine began her first year of pharmacy school at Xavier University. The four years of graduate studies became a pivotal time in her life, and simultaneously, as she engaged in the pursuit of a doctorate of pharmacy, the wheels in her mind began churning. Perhaps a career in pharmacy would not be the pinnacle of her achievements in life. Though she longed for a creative outlet, Christine put her thoughts on the back burner and immersed herself into the world of pharmaceutical sciences. In the years after successfully graduating as a Doctor of Pharmacy, Christine engaged in the practice of pharmacy, moved and lived in Washington DC, experienced life, and eventually met, fell for, and was quickly engaged to her best friend, Kirollos.

Christine and Kiro (as everyone calls him) were married in November 2014, and she moved with him to his hometown of Orange County, California. It just so happened that Kiro was a well-loved veterinarian in the OC. It wasn’t long before Christine’s creative itch and newfound appreciation for the life and work of a veterinarian collided on none other than a very ordinary trip to Costco.

Observing a woman walking her dog with what appeared to be a very mundane leash suddenly sparked a thought in Christine’s mind. Why dog accessories could be as fabulous as human ones! Why should pups and their humans settle for ordinary just because ordinary was the norm? She immediately spilled her thoughts out to Kiro, and in a rushed parking lot conversation, with a mix of glee and giggles, the concept of Pink Papyrus was born.

Maintaining her full-time day career as a pharmacist, Christine began tirelessly working throughout the nights to plan, strategize, and dream Pink Papyrus into reality. Soon enough, their duo became a trio, and Christine and Kiro found themselves expecting their first child. After a dangerous and life-threatening delivery for Christine, Isabella Mona was welcomed into the world on Valentine’s Day 2017. Long work nights turned into longer nights with a sleepless newborn in the house. Still, Christine persisted despite all odds stacked against her.

Things are tough, but Christine is tougher.

Since its inception in 2016, Christine and Kiro have focused on building their brand in the same way they build their lives, always together, in it for the good and the bad. If you were to ask either Christine or Kiro about how far the brand has come, they will always tell you to lookup. It’s not about how far they’ve come, but how far they could possibly go. Which, if you ask the southern girl from the land of good food, good music, and good times, all the way up is as far as your mind can take you, and that’s just where she intends to go.

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
No road worth taking is ever going to be smooth. That’s just the chance you take when you start out on a new adventure.

We’ve experienced both personal and business-related struggles. At one point in time, I was working as a full-time pharmacist, a pharmacy business consultant for another pharmacy corporation, and full-time grind mode with Pink Papyrus. We had an infant in the house, and things were crazy.

With Pink Papyrus itself, we’ve had some seriously insane experiences. At one point, a manufacturer that we were working with sent us a partial shipment of product that was completely unfinished, incorrect, not up to standard. This is something we would never actually sell to people. After months of back and forth, the manufacturer never fixed the problems, never completed the order, and ran off with thousands of dollars in undelivered inventory. It was so horrendous. I probably didn’t sleep for months straight during that time. For us, it was way more important to sell a high-quality and durable product to our customers versus making do with substandard items. We took the loss on that and kept it moving. It was an incredible lesson on how cutthroat the manufacturing world can be and also proved to us how much we value our customers and their pups.

It’s really difficult to obtain any kind of financial funding or assistance as a new business. We’ve been through the times where we put every dollar we had on the line, sold our car, and put up our house as collateral in order to come up with the finances needed to drive our dream forward. That’s how much we believed in ourselves. We didn’t let any of the scary circumstances in the interim deter us from where we saw ourselves headed with the brand.

We’ve been impressed with Pink Papyrus, but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
We are inspired to create beautifully designed products for modern pups and their people. A combination of luxury, functionality, and affordability are at the forefront of everything we bring to you.

Gone are the days of boring pet products. We are obsessed with every detail. Whether it’s deciding on the perfect color blue amongst 50 different shades (yes, it totally happened!) or testing different zippers to find the smoothest one, we take every aspect of the design process seriously. All our materials are hand-selected to bring the best to you and your pup.

Our motto is quality over everything. We don’t entertain and develop products that look cute but break, fray, tear, or rip shortly after use. Because, what would the point of that be? Who would appreciate buying a good-looking low-quality item? No thanks.

Something that sets us apart from other brands is that we actually design every item in-house. This results in our brand being known for incredibly vivid colors, unique and fun prints, coupled with high-quality textiles and hardware. Most of our items are also made by hand. It gives our brand a very intimate and unique feel.

When you purchase a Pink product, you’re purchasing an accessory that instantly upgrades your pup’s accessories and puts them much more in line with your own. We feel strongly that walks aren’t a chore, they’re a VIBE. You should be able to express your pup’s personality, your personalities as a duo, in a way that is functional, fabulous, modern, and fresh.

We’re proud to have been featured in publications such as British Vogue, Forbes, International Business Times, Marie Claire, Yahoo! Finance, Newsweek, LA Weekly, Gotham Magazine, just to name a few. Pink Papyrus has also been blessed to be able to expand our retail footprint to PetSmart (online and in-store throughout all stores in the United States and Canada), Chewy, Target (online), Bed Bath and Beyond (online), amongst numerous independent retailers and boutiques.

We are constantly working on expanding our line and our offerings. With us, it’s always a Pink Pawty!

Can you tell us more about what you were like growing up?
I always knew from the time I was probably 4 or 5 that I was meant to do something BIG. I didn’t know what it would be. I couldn’t sing. I didn’t act. I wasn’t a dancer. I wasn’t into sports, but I just knew deep inside there was some sort of path that I would eventually get on that would lead me to that right place.

I did very well in school, which eventually lead me to becoming a pharmacist.

And personally, I think I was (and still am) HILARIOUS. LOL! I spend most of my time making other people laugh. I’m not afraid to put it all out there for the giggle, the chuckle, or the full out belly laugh. I often hear that I missed my calling a stand-up comedian, or that I need a you-tube channel, or better yet to start a podcast. I’ve just always been that way. A southern Egyptian girl with a big heart, big eyes, and a really big personality. I never say never to anything, so a podcast could definitely be happening in the future. You just never know.

I always loved the idea of business. I was just telling my husband the other day that in college, I used to spend free time looking up different franchises to see what it would take to franchise one personally. I was always into business without ever having had any formal business training of any sort.

A little known fact about me is that I’m always reading. I read every single day and have done so for years. I read anything from magazines to news articles to books. With my books, I love to switch it up between fiction, non-fiction, autobiographies, historical books. You name it, I love to read it. I’m an extremely curious person. If I don’t know something, I’ll look it up. I’ll research it until I’m satisfied with my answer. I really believe this is probably one of the key reasons why we’ve been able to successfully navigate the branding and retail world. When I come up against a roadblock (which is nearly every single day), I don’t allow myself to be defeated. If there’s a question in front of me, that means there’s an answer somewhere. I may not have the luxury or accessibility to just ask someone around me, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have a brain in my head to go and seek out the answer.

I don’t accept no for an answer, and I never take defeat lying down. I’ve always been that way. I get knocked down, sure, but I guarantee you, I will always get back up.

Contact Info:

• Email: support@pinkpapyrus.com
• Website: www.pinkpapyrus.com
• Instagram: www.instagram.com/pink_papyrus
• Facebook: www.facebook.com/thepinkpapyrus
• Other: https://www.pinterest.ch/pink_papyrus/_created/