Office Tour: A Packed Party

Jordan Jones is the ultimate real girl. She wasn’t afraid to start a company out of a little dream and now she’s running A Packed Party! Read this to see what it’s all about – here’s a sneak “Women being confident enough to start the party for themselves and kind enough to start the party for someone else is what this is truly all about.” Ya, she’s pretty cool, and so are these pretty packages! Send ’em to your friends or get one for yourself! We did 🙂

 

Name: Jordan Jones

Company: Packed Party

Title: Founder + CEO

City: San Francisco, CA

 

A Packed Party is such a great idea! How did you come up with it?

Thank you! I came up with the concept of Packed Party after having recently moved to San Francisco for work not knowing a soul. I called my mom one evening feeling a bit sorry for myself and she immediately told me I was having a Pity Party and to go to bed. Little did I know the Pity Party I was throwing would be the best party I ever threw myself! I awoke from a dream later that night with the idea to send myself a physical Pity Party package, scoured the internet to find there was nothing like it available online. I immediately turned on all my lights, built out a business plan, mapped out package themes, how our logo would look and sold the idea to my father the next day. Packed Party was up and running only a few weeks later after I wrote a Buzz Feed article about myself…yes, you heard that correctly, to pour a bit of fuel on the fire I was about to start.

 

What was your first job and how did that lead you here?

My first job out of college was in Dallas, TX at The Marketing Arm. It’s an awesome agency there in Dallas and I worked on their hospitality and events team. My background was in public relations and strategic media and I sort of realized after a year there I didn’t see my life playing itself out in Dallas. I started searching for jobs in San Francisco and quickly landed myself a position in the heart of Silicon Valley running events for a startup. This position sort of, er, ended itself after they found out about me working on Packed Party. A bit of a mortifying experience being let go of, but it was actually the best thing that ever happened to me – being able to step away from pursuing someone else’s dream and focus on my own.

 

 

 

What does a typical work day look like for you?

Every day is different right now for me at Packed Party because we’re in such a growth stage still. I wear a lot of different hats, I think you have to with any business you start. There’s no saying “someone else will do that”..ever. I wake up early, check emails right away, push out post on our social platforms, start managing customer service and communicating back and forth with our warehouse in Chicago and that sort of determines how the day is going to look from there. Customer Service is huge for us. Very early on when I started Packed Party I can remember saying we would always treat customers the way we’d want to be treated and I think we’ve done a great job of that, but it requires constant communication. I feel like the days go by extremely quickly. I sort of look up every day around 3:00 thinking, “where has the day gone?” Time management is key, but every day is truly different whether I am running around San Francisco shooting photos or behind my desk firing off emails. I love it all.

 

 

 

The packages are so fun and creative! What has been your favorite experience in creating them? 

There have been so many crazy experiences in creating these packages. Each one for me tells a story of something I’ve gone through or needed a gift for. Missing a friend who’s far away, check, breaking up with a boyfriend and having to remember I don’t need him anyway, check, scrambling for a birthday gift, of course – these are all things I have done and want to share with people. I feel like people can relate to that with these package’s themes. I think lending my own personal experiences to others and seeing people from all walks of life sort of come together to start the party for them selves in life or someone else is amazing. Women being confident enough to start the party for themselves and kind enough to start the party for someone else is what this is truly all about. The party, of course, is a navy package, but too simply celebrating life and whatever it is throwing at you.

 

 

Now, on to your cute office! What’s the main use of your space?

Our space is used as a standard office space of course, but it also serves as a huge hub of inspiration. It’s where I keep all of Packed Party’s sample packages, product ideas, and truthfully anything that is inspiring me at the moment. I think I posted the other day a bottle of “Boy Tears” we had on a shelf, so items are quite random, but they’re fun to me and they again work with different themes in our packages. The space gets a lot of natural light too, so we can shoot photos here if we need to, but day to day it’s a regular functioning office…with a little (lotta) bit of Taylor Swift music playing on our record player. This office is the hub of where the party starts, so it has to be light and fun above all things.

 

 

How would you describe your decor style?

I’d say I’m pretty eclectic with my personal décor style, so this office is somewhere in the middle for me. In putting the office together I knew we needed something clean with lots of pops of color and patterns and this is what we came up with. The space is small (hi, we’re in San Francisco) so I wanted to make it clean and complimentary to the brand, but at a closer look a little bit edgy..hence some of the photos on our clean gallery wall being cats that say “feeeelings” and other random things. The randomness gives that element of surprise I love. You’re like, “Okay, I’m looking at this darling gallery wall that is color coordinated, oh wait is that a print that says “WTF?”. Yes, yes, it is indeed.

 

 

Did you decorate it yourself? Were there any DIY projects you undertook to make it come together?

I actually flew my mom into town to help because I didn’t have a ton of time to solely focus on decorating and it’s her area of expertise and something she’s been excited about doing since I started Packed Party. She has an awesome eye for detail, so I gave a lot of input and watched her sort of piece it together! I’m really lucky to have had her helping me. I haven’t taken any DIY projects on yet because we have been so busy. I actually try to avoid them sometimes, our Packed Party’s Pinterest board for DIY projects is labeled “DIY..ikes” if that tells you anything about me and DIY these days…I’ll get better someday.

 

 

 

What business advice would YOU give to young entrepreneurs like yourself attempting to start their own company?

So many people have amazing ideas they won’t execute because they’re scared or, eh, just lazy and that’s the difference between an entrepreneur and anyone else I have realized these last two years. Execution is key. Go for your dreams in a big way, with a plan of course and you’ll see results. They may not be the results you want, but hey, when one door closes (or sometimes slams in your face) another one opens and that is opportunity. Start the company, if it fails you learned something and know better the next time you start a company…because you will if you’re a true Party Girl.

 

 

 

What I wanted to be when I grew up: Vet or a Spice Girl

Beauty secret: Rose Water Mist

If I could work for anyone, it would be: The Bachelor franchise..the travel…the laughs.

What gets me going on Monday Mornings: Almond Milk Latte