Bridal shop helps beautify community

MT. PLEASANT — Sarah’s Bridal owner Sarah Lauer was honored to receive the Community Pride Award at a ribbon-cutting ceremony with the Mt. Pleasant Area Chamber of Commerce last Thursday.

“It was a huge honor to be awarded it,” Lauer said.

The Mt. Pleasant Area Chamber of Commerce board of directors created the Community Pride Award to honor those businesses and organizations that showcase exceptional maintenance and investment in their properties and to encourage other businesses to follow their lead.

Much like the business of helping brides showcase their inner beauty on the outside, Lauer makes it a priority to keep the outside of Sarah’s Bridal as beautiful as the inside.

“We always try to keep the outside of our shop very welcoming,” Lauer said. “Right now, we have flowers and things outside, but in the next week or so we are going to transform all of our outside to fall with pumpkins and gourds.”

“We just really try to make the outside look as pretty as the inside of the Bridal shop,” she said.

Chamber director Kristi Perry spoke kindly of the award recipient at the ceremony as she pointed out the out of town business the bridal shop brings to the area.

According to Perry, Sarah’s Bridal is a destination bridal store.

“Our customers aren’t always super local and they do travel,” Lauer said. “We draw people from all over southeast Iowa, Missouri, and Illinois. It is good for our community to get people traveling here with the hopes that they’ll patronize other businesses while they are here as well.”

How do they draw customers from such great distances?

“We’ve been here for 21 years and we go to all of the markets in Atlanta, Chicago, and Las Vegas to focus on bringing the very best selection to southeast Iowa,” she said. “It is important to us to have the best dresses and the best selection.”

Lauer also owns Lilly and Grace along the Mt. Pleasant square where she feels she is able to be more involved with the local community, as well.

“The bridal shop might not be really involved with Main Street, but our Lily and Grace are involved in all of the community events like the wine walk and beer walk,” Lauer said.

Mt. Pleasant is important to Lauer, and she is grateful to be recognized as adding to the community.

Comments: AnnaMarie.Ward@southeastiowaunion.com