A boutique at Food Truck Friday? Middle GA woman opens shop in big, pink bus

Abbey Patterson of Unadilla travels the roads of Middle Georgia in her unique boutique: a converted school bus painted pink.

The Brassy Peach Boutique, which offers women’s clothing, shoes, accessories and gifts, can be found at festivals and fairs and may also be booked for a girl’s night out and other events.

“I wanted it to stick out like a sore thumb,” said Patterson, who’s accustomed to curious looks from fellow motorists when she’s driving the Blue Bird school bus built in Fort Valley.

The big bus has been remodeled on the inside to house clothing racks, shelves and display cases. The only seat is the driver’s seat.

The traveling boutique includes two changing rooms and is air conditioned.

“I just love the whole boutique atmosphere, and I’ve always had an entrepreneurial spirit,” Patterson said. “I always wanted to have a mobile operation.”

‘Southern girl with a big heart’

Patterson opened Grace & Grits, a gift and home decor shop in her hometown of Unadilla in October 2018 and relocated it to downtown Perry in July 2019.

She had the Perry storefront for more than a year when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and that, coupled with some personal reasons, led her to close the shop and prepare to go mobile.

But it wasn’t the way she expected to open a mobile operation.

“That definitely wasn’t my plan going in to close the store front and only go mobile, but it’s worked out beautifully,” she said. “With the season that I’m at in my life with a toddler and another baby on the way, the timing was absolutely perfect.”

Unlike Grace & Grits, the Brassy Peach Boutique is about 90 percent clothing and 10 percent gifts. It’s name is designed to reflect Patterson who describes herself on the boutique’s Facebook page as “a brassy, sassy Southern girl with a big heart and outspoken personality.”

When you step into her bus boutique, Patterson wants you to step out as a friend.

She also has a passion for helping women feel beautiful in their own skin.

In addition to being an expectant mom with a toddler, Patterson is a volunteer Unadilla firefighter, and she and her husband farm family farms in Dooly and Worth counties.

Their first date

“My husband and I actually had our first date on this bus,” Patterson said while setting up clothing racks outside the Brassy Peach Boutique recently at a Food Truck Friday in Perry.

Heath Patterson, her husband, is a paramedic with Dooly County Emergency Medical Services. They first met on an emergency call.

In April of last year, he asked her if she’d like to come over and hang out with him and some friends, including Eddie Royal who had purchased the bus for storage.

She did, and the whole group went riding around in the bus. It was yellow then, missing about half of its seats and had a futon sofa inside.

Later, she purchased the bus from Royal for $3,500, the amount he paid for it. She closed the storefront in downtown Perry in August 2020.

By then, she and Heath Patterson were a couple, and they started the prep work together on the bus the week after she closed Grace & Grits. They married in January.

The Perry Dogwood Festival in April was the first event for Abbey Patterson and her Brassy Peach Boutique.

Her next event is in Moultrie, but she plans to return to Food Truck Friday and other events in Perry. She’ll take a month off, though, once her daughter is born to spend time with her.

Don’t have to catch the bus to shop

But customers don’t have to catch the bus to shop at the Brassy Peach Boutique. The boutique also has a website where customers may shop 24/7.

Patterson carries blouses, dresses, kimonos and cardigans, T-shirts and other clothing, including plus-sizes, along with accessories like necklaces, earrings, bracelets, hats and bags, as well as sandals, boots and booties, sneakers and flats. Other merchandise includes bath and body products, cups and Koozies, stationary and stickers.

“It’s been phenomenal,” Patterson said. “I have had so much fun and have met a lot of people. It’s a super, super success.”

Melanie Myers of Hawkinsville is among her customers.

“I think it’s amazing,” said Myers, who bought a top, jewelry and other merchandise from the Brassy Peach Boutique when it was at the Dogwood Festival.

“Everything is just beautiful,” said Myers, while browsing a clothing rack set outside the bus at a recent Food Truck Friday. “I just love it.”

Gidget Key of Warner Robins was about to step onto the bus parked along Jernigan Street near Commerce Street for the event.

“I seen the bus walking,” said Key, who pointed down Carroll Street at the throng of people who turned out for the event. “I said to myself, ‘I gotta go check this out.’ “

This story was originally published May 19, 2021 at 5:00 AM.