TRUE TO FORM, Julie Holland recounts the birth of her business as if narrating the beginning of a serendipitous story. “One day, we were walking down Hastings Street, and there was a sign on the window saying pop-up,” she says.
Openly ignorant of the retail concept, Julie and her partner Greg Peeler wandered in to quash their curiosity. Inside, they met a man selling his girlfriend’s clothing, who also happened to be the son of the building’s owner. This chance encounter led Julie and Greg to lease the “weenie little shop” in 2010, marking the beginning of their business journey in Noosa – Hearts and Minds Art.
“I’d always been a writer in Melbourne and had various businesses down there. But up here, it was very different because nobody knew me and it was really, really hard, actually,” she says of their move to the Sunshine Coast three years earlier.
Having essentially experienced a reset, Julie sold her inspirational verses at the Eumundi Markets alongside Greg, who initially dabbled in real estate before turning his creative hand to making photo frames.
This modest start was where Julie and Greg got their footing. It put them in good stead when it came to opening Hearts and Minds Art. Well-connected and respected in the local art scene, it wasn’t long before their “little shop” became a big success.
So much so that when the shop next door became available, they knocked down the wall and expanded the space, increasing their stock with as much as they could afford. But they didn’t stop there. When a larger shopfront became available, they moved and grew again, “mainly because of the extra wall space for fabulous art”.
“It’s a very old shop and we’ve kept a lot of that aesthetic. We’re not into doing a complete modern fit-out. We kind of like the uneven floor and the whitewashed bricks; it’s part of our feel and part of our image,” Julie says.
And it is this authenticity and originality that have been key to their success. In fact, they still proudly work with some of their original suppliers, including local painter Maree Welman and furniture maker Chris Leach.
From 2014 to 2017, Julie and Greg also ran a dedicated art gallery, an extension of Hearts and Minds Art, at the Noosa Marina. “After all this time, we’ve kept the same ethos.
“We’ve kept the same business goals – we’re good to our artists, we’re good to our customers, which is why we have so many repeat customers,” Julie says. “But retail small business at the moment is challenging, so we are pretty proud to have such a successful business.
“We’ve learned a lot along the way and there have been stepping stones. We’ve had a lot of assistance, which has been lovely. I believe in serendipity, and I just believe things fall into place when they need to, like us finding that first shop.
“If we hadn’t found that, I don’t know where we would have ended up.”
While Julie and Greg both deeply love the business, it’s not lost on them what an immense amount of time and effort it takes to succeed.
“We work in it 24/7,” Greg explains. “I have three days behind the counter and Julie has three days behind the counter, and we have two great women who work with us as well.
“When Julie’s not working, she writes books, which we stock in the shop. And when I’m not working, I play golf. We’ve often thought, why don’t we sell the business and just do all this – play more golf and write more books? And we might if someone walks in and wants to buy it.
“That’s something we’d look at. But at the moment, it’s just been very fulfilling.”
Hearts and Minds Art has also proven to be an incredible creative outlet for Julie. As an accomplished author and photographer, she often finds that art imitates life – or perhaps it’s the other way around. Her everyday encounters inspire each of her literary endeavours, including her latest release, her fourth book, Full Circle.
“They’re fiction books, but that’s what I write about, the fact that you don’t have to be set in a path, as we discovered. If you get to middle age, it doesn’t mean everything’s over. You know, you can try something different,” she says.
“Everything is so accessible online. If you don’t know how to paint, do a course, go and see somebody who knows how to do it or go to a YouTube channel; it’s so available to you.”
Given her penchant for offering pearls of wisdom, we had to ask: if Julie could go back 14 years and give her younger self one piece of advice, what would it be?
“I think I would say to trust your own instincts, keep in your own lane, do what you believe in and trust your belief that you can do it,” she says.
“We were new to retail and people would say to us, ‘It’s Hastings Street, you won’t last with the turnovers’. But here we are. I think it’s because we did trust ourselves, in that we believed in it. We thought with our heart rather than our mind.”
With history as their guide, Julie and Greg’s blend of heart and mind will ensure that their life story turns out to be a magnificent masterpiece.