The New BFFs (Business-Founding Friends)
Friends in biz
Never mix business with pleasure right? It’s an age-old adage backed by statistics all saying going into business with a friend spells disaster. But three Wilmington businesses and one nonprofit organization are proving that theory wrong. Each one is successfully run or owned by friends.
WORKING FILMS
ANNA LEE & MOLLY MURPHY
624 South Seventh Street, Wilmington
In 2013, tragedy struck nonprofit film group Working Films when its director lost his life to cancer.
Co-workers Anna Lee and Molly Murphy suddenly found themselves thrust into leadership going from co-workers to co-directors overnight.
“To experience facing such a challenge and then accomplishing so much together strengthened our friendship,” Murphy says.
Working Films partners with nonprofit and grassroots organizations nationwide to impact communities through the use of documentary films.
“A lot of people may think having a co-director role could be really challenging. I find it to be completely opposite, someone always has your back,” Lee says.
Lee, more of a behind-the-scenes critical thinker, and Murphy, the action-oriented extrovert, say their skills blend so nicely together clients often view them as one.
“People call us Molly-Anna. We talk at the same time a lot,” Murphy says, as the two laugh.
Both BFF co-directors also became mothers at the same time, each having sons who are also best friends, go to the same school, and hang out with each other on the weekends.
Working Films focuses on the environment, social justice, equality, and opportunity.
“This is not just a job for us,” says Anna Lee of Working Films. “These are issues near and dear to our hearts. I think that also binds us together.”
CAMILLE’S OF WILMINGTON
ANGELA WOODCOCK & JOANNE MIRANDA
7134 Market Street
Angela Woodcock and Joanne Miranda, owners of Camille’s of Wilmington, say the secret behind their success is they are complete opposites.
“She’s from the North; I’m from the South. She’s the social one; I’m back here building things,” Woodcock says.
“It works,” Miranda adds. “She’s better at power tools than I am.”
The two met while working at Independence Mall’s bridal gown shop Camille La Vie before it closed. Later, it would become the inspiration for their own bridal and formal gown joint venture, Camille’s of Wilmington. Business life together includes shopping at buyer markets in New York City and Atlanta where having opposite tastes in dresses, they say, comes in handy.
“I’m definitely more streamline and less fluffy. She’s the bling girl. We bring them both in and have a good variety for our customers,” says Camille's co-owner Joanne Miranda of her business partner, Angela Woodcock.
Woodcock, with a pageant background, and Miranda, the bridal expert, make the perfect fit.
“Our vision is the same, and when we handle situations, we agree on it,” Miranda says.
BOTTEGA
ADDIE WUENSCH & BETHANY ROSS
723 North Fourth Street
Mix together art shows with poetry readings throw in some dance, some drumming, some beer, some wine, and, oh yeah, massage therapy, and you’ve got yourself Bottega.
“It’s like all the things that make you happier,” says Addie Wuensch, Bottega’s savior.
Wuensch and her best friend of eighteen years, Bethany Ross, are the ones who kept Bottega, a popular, downtown art and wine bar, from shutting down when Wuensch recently bought the business and Ross co-signed.
“She’s the most trustworthy person I’ve ever met,” Addie Wuensch says of fellow Bottega co-owner Bethany Ross.
The women moved Bottega from its Princess Street location to North Fourth Street, renovating a 2,000-square-foot space.
“We work really well together. I’ll have a vision all in my head, and Bethany knows how to do all of that construction stuff. She knows how to rip up carpet,” says Wuensch, as Ross says hello from a ladder while painting, as they prepped for opening late last year.
Wuensch runs Bottega’s bar, visual, and performing arts events and its store. Ross heads up Bottega’s healing and massage therapy spa.
KICKSTAND EVENTS AND PLANNING
COURTNEY STONE & SALLY LINDROOS
221 North Front Street
With a thriving floral design business on her hands, Courtney Stone knew she needed something, she just didn’t know what. In walked Sally Lindroos, intern extraordinaire.
“Typically, interns just go with us to events, but she was so good at taking care of the clients and keeping everybody on track. She ended up filling a role we didn’t know we had,” Stone says.
In 2012, right after graduating from University of North Carolina Wilmington, Lindroos went from intern to full partner of Kickstand Events and Planning.
Today the two, twenty-something-year-old Kickstand owners and their staff are in charge of the floral designs and the planning of thirty to thirty-five weddings a year, totaling more than 200 events so far.
“Courtney handles all the flowers and design, all the pretty stuff. I handle all the logistics and coordinating and planning, so we tag team it,” Sally Lindroos says of Kickstand partner Courtney Stone.
And when it came time for Stone, then Lindroos to get married, each worked the other’s wedding.
“Courtney designed my flowers. I made sure she got down the aisle on time,” laughs Lindroos.
“Sally is type A. Sally always says, ‘Let’s put it on the calendar!’” Stone says. “She keeps us all in line.”
To view more of photographer Erik Maasch's work, go to ejmphotography.org.
