Meet Our Bloggers
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Alyssa Williams Alyssa started at Urban Barn in March 2011 as an intern and began working as the Marketing Coordinator in June. She keeps the stores up to date on all the current products and promotions, creating product tags and signage. She also works on the website and coordinates store events and media opportunities. She would be best described as “a middle child”. Although she is very easy-going and quiet she loves to play sports – soccer, baseball, volleyball… anything competitive. Some random facts about her: she speaks fluent French, knows almost any commercial jingle you could think of and doesn’t like fruit (she realizes that that’s weird). Her favourite thing about Urban Barn is the people. She is really enjoying working at Urban Barn and looks forward to the years to come. |
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Brianna Doolittle Born and raised on Quadra Island, BC, Brianna is an island girl at heart. She has been with Urban Barn since May 2009. As the Marketing Manager she works hard to make Urban Barn known to people like you. She and her team are responsible for the website, social media, email newsletters, advertisements, events and charitable initiatives. In her spare time she loves to ride her bike, drink wine and host dinner parties . Her favorite thing about Urban Barn is the products we carry. “It is so much fun to see how we interpret the trends in home décor and furniture.” Since working at Urban Barn she has developed a love for interior decorating and has since altered that passion into a skill. |
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Erika Koestner Starting out as a sales associate at the Vaughan Mills location in 2006, Erika has spent the last 5 years growing and moving up the Urban Barn ladder. A self-proclaimed shopaholic, her frequent trips to various stores allow her to truly gauge how to create a “right at home” experience for anyone walking into her store. She is a culinary junkie, and loves to cook delicious food for her family and friends whenever she can (and is always looking to share recipes!). Her passion for all things beautiful and her love of design aesthetic makes Urban Barn the perfect fit for her. “What I love most about Urban Barn is the freedom they allow to build something amazing – whether it be creating a gorgeous in-store display, designing a living room plan for a fabulous client, or the friendships that I have cultivated with all urbanbarnites, from Head Office to store associate.” |
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Hollis Barnsley Hollis has spent a combined total of 10 years in different roles with Urban Barn, and now works as the Digital Marketing Specialist. She’s our graphic designer with lots of web marketing mixed in. When she isn’t whipping up promo materials she likes to dance to loud music and play instruments badly. She is left-handed, near-sighted and really good at Charades. “What I love about Urban Barn is all the wonderful people I’ve met over the years that have become my great friends.” |
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Jesse Davidson It has been a six year love affair with Urban Barn for Jesse. Starting as a part-time sales associate with Urban Barn in Alberta, Jesse has continued to grow with the company to become a purchasing assistant at our head office in BC. While the rest of the buying team travels the world, you can find Jesse working hard in the office holding down the fort. Working in the purchasing department as an assistant to the buyers, Jesse puts his organizational skills and business education to good use. Jesse embraces change with open arms and loves each new season of Urban Barn. He is one of the few people we know who changes his artwork with each season and holiday colour scheme every year. On the weekend, you can find Jesse shopping the boutiques of Vancouver, in his kitchen perfecting his favourite cookie recipes or planning his next weekend project. Three things he couldn’t live without are colour, sweets and Pinterest. Jesse is proud to call Urban Barn his employer, Vancouver his home and looks forward to a bright future in the purchasing world. |
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John Palliser John has worked for Urban Barn for a combined total of 12 years. He is our furniture buyer “spending all the money we make on new things to sell and make more money so we can buy more new things to sell.” John likes to play the guitar. It is his back-up career if his furniture gig doesn’t work out. As many of us do, he enjoys exploring the outdoors – “the more remote the better!” He’s always owned a cat as he used to live in an apartment. He has just bought his first house and can now have what he’s always wanted; a dog! What he loves about Urban Barn is the people he works with. His biggest reward has been the friendships he’s made. |
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Kimberley Kim As part of the team that opened the King Street location in Toronto, Kim has been with Urban Barn since the summer of 2010. Though the shortest on staff, she makes up for it in volume, so if you ever hear laughter from the floor above, it’s a good chance it’s her! When not at the Barn, Kim likes to waste the hours away playing Cranium and Settlers of Catan with friends, and taking relatively unplanned road trips (the best was a 500km bike ride in Japan on her “mama-chari”). She loves meeting new people as they walk into the store, and always finds it satisfying when a customer finds their blank slate turning into a home. |
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Kora Pridy Kora has been with Urban Barn for over 11 years now. She works with the Visual Team as the Creative Design Coordinator – otherwise known as the person who makes things look sexy. When she isn’t working in the stores making them look gorgeous, she loves to be outdoors and has a passion for photography. This artificial red head loves to dress up in costume, she’ll try anything twice (unless it hurt really bad the first time), and she’s also a self-taught accordian player. She loves that she has made lifelong friends working at Urban Barn. |
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Sebastien Fauteux Another one of our long time employees, Sebastien has worked for Urban Barn for 15 years. He grew up in a small Quebec town and moved to BC in 1994. As the General Merchandise Manager he does a lot of travelling (which he loves!). He loves to soak up all the cultures and experience being a foreigner in a different country. His favourite city is Hong Kong. He says he would try any kind of food at least once (having tried crickets in Thailand and chicken feet in China). He loves music, particularly soul, jazz and R&B. Call him old fashioned but he still buys and will always buy CDs. He says he will be the one that single-handedly keeps the music industry alive. What he loves about his job is that he gets to be creative as well as analytical. Creating a relationship with a vendor, working on that project and then seeing those products in someone’s home is what drives him. |
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Stacey Grasty Happily married with 2 children, Stacey loves to spend time with her family. Living in BC she loves exploring the outdoors and everything it entails. Stacey has worked in retail for over 25 years – 9 years being an accessory buyer. She has worked with Urban Barn as our accessory buyer since May 2010 – buying wall art, decorative pieces, foliage, bed linens… basically anything that isn’t furniture! A great portion of her job involves travelling around the world, searching for new and unique items to add to Urban Barn’s product breadth. “My goal is to keep them curious and excited about what we might bring in next. The possibilities are endless and our challenge is to find something that’s different but that everyone will love”! |
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Stefano Spensieri Born and raised in the Greater Toronto Area, Stefano has been working for Urban Barn for over 2 years. He is a recent graduate looking to get into project management and marketing, all the while working as part of the Urban Barn sales team. While not attending school or working, Stefano can be found skiing, biking or out watching and playing hockey (though he is a much better viewer of hockey than an actual player). He is also an avid reader, amateur interior decorator, foodie and lover of music, especially while traveling with his friend’s rock band across North America. Stefano’s favorite things about Urban Barn are the customers and staff. Whether interacting with customers, or joking with fellow staff, he truly enjoys the variety of fantastic people he encounters on a daily basis. |
Alyssa Williams, has been a great help too us everytime we came into the store for pick-ups for business’s in quesnel. It will be sad to see her leave the store, since they are closing it down, the one on 818 Howe Street. We shall miss her smiling face when we come to town now. Hoping we have more great pick-ups for the business’s here in Quesnel.
Sincerly Yours:
Andre k.