Meet Christine Berardi of Hiptique in Santa Monica and Malibu

Today we’d like to introduce you to Christine Berardi.

Christine left the corporate construction field for over 12 years before embarking on a mission to create gorgeous, unintimidating boutiques for women of all ages to shop and enjoy the hunt! Don’t be surprised to find her in her happiest of places in a dress, with a drill in hand building a new display or continually redesigning one of her boutiques. “It is what keeps us coming back, never knowing what we will find!”

Has it been a smooth road?
Retail has become increasingly more difficult throughout the past 15 yrs. When Hiptique originated people were not shopping online. Customers still looked for that personal touch of a boutique.

Today, you need to work even harder to make your boutique(s) original by constantly looking for unique designers, creating in-store events and staying in front of your customers. We try to create a unique story in our stores by mixing in home decor, antiques, and objects found throughout our travels. Whether you look high or low in our boutiques, everything is for sale. It keeps our customers always excited to stop by and see what is new.

So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the HIPTIQUE story. Tell us more about the business.
What I am most proud of at hiptique is the curation of products as well customer experience. I have personally designed all three stores with the help of some great people that made my visions a reality. We want our customer’s senses to be overwhelmed from the minute they enter our boutiques. It is important that they are visually and emotionally stimulated, feeling like they are on vacation even if they are a local. Watching customers initial reactions when arrive make me incredibly proud. I will never grow tired of seeing a new store through their eyes. Every day our team works tirelessly to exceed a customer’s expectations regardless of whether are browsing or shopping.

How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
I truly hope that retail begins to take a few steps back and more customers appreciate the value a privately owned boutique. Their selections are edited to provide a carefully curated story for their customers. If you think about the amount of time, hours, a person may spend paging through an online store for a new dress – a boutique owner does that for their customers. They know how everything fits, what fits best on most body types, they can guide you in ways online shopping can not.

The experience of women coming together to shop, to spend time with one another is becoming a thing of the past. I do think women would truly miss the experience if brick and mortar stores ceased to exist. Online shopping is not going away but we do hope the trend reverses and we see more privately owned business opening in the next 5 – 10 years!

Contact Info:

• Address: 2727 Main Street, Santa Monica, CA 90405
  30745 Pacific Coast Hiway, Malibu CA 90265
• Website: WWW.HIPTIQUE.COM
• Phone: 310-399-6106 / 310-399-6105
• Email: [email protected]
• Instagram: WWW.INSTAGRAM.COM/HIPTIQUE
• Facebook: WWW.FACEBOOK.COM/HIPTIQUE

Getting in touch: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you know someone who deserves recognition please let us know here.