About Us

Hey friends! We are happy you’re here. We are Bryan and Karissa Willis, owners of Southern Clothiers in Valdosta, GA, where we have proudly served our community since 2013.

It all started in a boutique. Bryan and I met at a boutique where I was working through a mutual friend (Matt here's your credit for introducing us lol). At the time, he was working for a big box retail company and I was in my last year towards obtaining a degree in biology.

In early 2013, I was presented with an opportunity to purchase the boutique I was working at. I thought NO WAY, I’m too young, I’m almost finished with school, I’m going to work in the medical field, I can’t do it…all the thoughts and fears held me back. Fast forward to a few months later, I felt God telling me I could do it. I knew the boutique world, I LOVED the boutique world. I convinced my parents that I could open a store with the promise that I’d take a semester off to get it started and return back to school one day…yeah that didn’t happen lol.

In August 2013 I opened Southern Sensation Boutique. I put my heart and soul into it. I lived and breathed the store. During this time, my now fiancé, was moving up the corporate ladder. Bryan had been working for the company as a manager in many different departments, learning the ins and outs of the business world as well as being taught valuable merchandising strategies from some of the best in the business. The big box company Bryan worked for made him promises that if he would relocated to open a new store, then they would quickly bring him back to Valdosta with a big promotion and a higher managing position.

As our wedding was getting closer, we were disappointed to find out that the company was not planning on moving Bryan back to Valdosta. We were so upset, we were getting married soon. I had just opened my business in Valdosta and signed a lease, I couldn’t relocate. So after many sleepless nights, lots of stress, and lots of prayer, we decided it would be best for Bryan to resign from his job and open a men’s store beside mine. He’d learned so much about men’s apparel working for the company and I had just taken all of the steps to open a small business…we knew together we could do it.

We began preparing to open our second store, Southern Cove Outfitters, while in the midst of planning our wedding. After returning from our honeymoon in May 2014, we opened Southern Cove.

We went through many changes, failures, challenges, remodels, and growth until we finally decided to make our biggest change to date in January of 2021 where we combined our two small stores, Southern Sensation Boutique (1,500 sq ft) and Southern Cove Outfitters (1,500 sq ft), into one large store now known as Southern Clothiers (8,300 sq ft). We were so nervous about the increase in size but trusted that God had opened up the right opportunity and felt that all the pieces of the puzzle fell perfectly into place for this move to happen.

During all of this, we were blessed with three amazing gifts from God...Easton, Elleree, and Emerson.

It’s amazing now looking back on the beginning of our relationship and trials, from big changes with careers to searching for years for the perfect store location, to see that God had a hand in all of it and was lining everything up in our lives to be here in this moment now. I love looking back now and knowing that all the things that kept going “wrong” in our lives were really pushing us towards God’s right!

We are so thankful for our amazing customers and we are grateful for your friendship and support of our dream. We truly love what we do and we are excited to start our new online journey with each of you!

📸 Jaycee Norman Photography