Studio

Twenty years across design-led retail — most recently as Co-Head and Chief Merchandising & Creative Officer at HD Buttercup, a PE-backed home and design retailer within the Coco Republic Group. Before that, roles spanning buying, merchandising, store operations, and category strategy across the industry.

I've always worked across both sides — the creative direction and the operational nuts and bolts. Design sensibility, margins, and what the customer actually feels in the room: all the same conversation.

What I've come to believe, after all of it, is that how a small business communicates can matter even more than what it's actually doing. Small businesses get overlooked all the time — not because their ideas aren't good, but because they aren't speaking the language the rest of the room is listening for. Helping founders make that translation, without losing what makes them theirs, is the work I love most.

You don't have to choose between vision and viability.

In late 2025, I left to start Surroundings Advisory: strategy and business planning for the people building design-led brands. My work spans business planning, investor decks, customer strategy, retail and wholesale positioning, merchandising structure, store experience, and the operational pieces that help a small brand actually grow.

If any of this sounds like the chapter you're in right now, I'd love to hear from you. My best work starts with a conversation.

— Kalli Constable, Founder