SAKS Guyana re-launches PR Photo Shoot for growing businesses in spectacular fashion

Jun 23, 2024 News

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Kaieteur News – Local beauty brand, SAKS Guyana Inc. on Wednesday held its 5^th Public Relations photo shoot at Parc Rayne, with about thirty growing business in the cosmetology industry —in addition to several others— which were represented by their owners.  The event has returned for its fifth installment after three years hiatus owing to the global COVID-19 pandemic.

The force which brought the event together was none other than Susan Ibrahim, owner of SAKS Guyana Inc. The brand initially started as a makeup/cosmetology company, but has since expanded its operations into the marketing sector.

Ibrahim, as she is known in the industry, has leveraged her knowledge and experience in marketing to elevate her own business, which has a notable social media presence and following. However, rather than attempting to hoard that wealth of knowledge and skill, she has worked tirelessly over the last several years to put it to use for the betterment of Guyana’s makeup artistry industry, focusing on growing businesses in the sector.

These efforts started in 2016 with the first SAKS Guyana Inc. PR Photo Shoot, which was the first initiative of its kind in Guyana, and set the tone for the future of the makeup industry in the country. A core tenet of the photo shoot is collaboration; the idea that multiple entrepreneurs in an industry that didn’t always have much attention placed on it could come together and elevate all of their businesses, instead of competing with each other, is quite impressive and has done wonders for the industry .

It is important to note that this is an industry that is, for the most part, female-dominated, and that initiatives like this also serve the function of uplifting Guyanese women entrepreneurs and highlighting their hard work and dedication to their craft, while aligning them on a path of collective success.

She recalled “When we started in 2016, nobody cared about makeup artists, hair stylists or even the career to begin with, but when we did our first photo shoot, we got such beautiful feedback, there was positive feedback and then the negative there was lots of criticisms around it.”

She noted too that “What happened is when people saw that they were like, ‘Oh, you’re putting people in spaces where they don’t like each other’ .Now I just want to be clear about this, this is a collaborative event where you’re putting people who are like-minded and thinking of their businesses, not about whether they’re getting along with a friend or two, this is about them wanting to grow their businesses, getting it out there in a positive way and also focusing on their legacies. Now the positive of it is that everybody that collaborated with us, they either opened up their studio [or developed otherwise] because they saw their potential and they believed in themselves and started thinking bigger, because we never saw it as something that we were just doing for the fun of it,” Ibrahim said during an interview with The Waterfalls.

The objective of the event is to promote positive, professional, and refined social media presences for growing business, considering that we are currently in the midst of the social media age, and the public perception of both individuals and businesses hinges heavily on their social media presence. As such, in an industry that is all about visuals and beauty, social media presence is even more important. By building a presence in this way, growing businesses can put themselves in a position where they can have increased visibility to potential customers and investors.

Speaking to the importance of a strong social media presence, Susan Ibrahim stated, “from my experience with my business, before I was even good at makeup, marketing on social media was the one thing that actually helped me to get my clientele to build from that and I think in 2024 it has evolved, especially around the world so its super important to be out there and be representing your brand in a very tasteful, respectful, and professional manner because anything you put out there people will always find it, no matter how many years from now, so why not put out proper content for your business.”

Last Wednesday’s event saw a good turnout, with about thirty different growing businesses being represented by their owners, an impressive gathering of Guyanese beauty  entrepreneurs, including makeup artists, hair/wig stylists, lash technicians, and nail technicians, along with entrepreneurs in some industries that SAKS Guyana had not partnered with before, like doctors/pharmacists, spa technicians, health food restaurateurs, and more.

Additionally, Kamini Persaud, an established entrepreneur and the wife of politician, Robert Persaud, was the guest speaker at the event. In her remarks, she emphasized the need for a focus on breaking down barriers and hindrances to the success of women in business.

“Even while I highlight these challenges and opportunities for improvement, I am humbled and inspired by what can be accomplished through collaborative efforts as is evidenced here today. I have the full confidence that through such initiatives you will continue to support each other by embracing your diversity even as you build your unique brands to make a meaningful contribution to the Guyana economy. I would urge you to be part of finding solutions to national and global challenges,” Persaud said.

The photos from the event will be used in tandem with short bios about the entrepreneurs and their businesses as an initial step in building or expanding the kind of social media presence emphasized by SAKS Guyana, and there will also be a magazine that will be distributed to the entrepreneurs, which ensures that any supporter or customer of one of these entrepreneurs has the possibility of finding a new service to support in that network.

Stay tuned to the SAKS Guyana Inc. Instagram and Facebook pages for the photos and bios from Wednesday’s event: @saksguyana (IG) | SAKS Guyana (FB)

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• beauty, entrepreneurs, fashion, PR Photo Shoot, SAKS Guyana

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