Familiar face with new shop and coffee on the side

Endessa Schrader was a mainstay of Maclean business for 24 years, and after a short break is back in a slightly new direction.

Maneesha Davis with Endessa Schrader at Happy Creations in Maclean

A FAMILIAR face has returned to Maclean’s main street over the past month, in a role which may surprise many.

Endessa Schrader ran Endessa’s Beauty Spot for 24 years, and after closing her salon 16 months ago, she’s back with a new gift/coffee shop in what she thinks will be a thriving business district.

“I called it Happy Creations, named after my dad … and I still love beauty and we’re offering make up and skincare,” she said.

“Beauty is the core of what we do, pushing makeup and we do coffee on the side, and then we’ve got all the goods, candles, wallets, necklaces.”

Ms Schrader said it was a love of customer service that pushed her back into her own business, with niece Maneesha Davis back from Brisbane after COVID stopped her theatre work there.

“We were doing makeup parties at home, and thought why not, and the shop came up and we took it on,” Ms Schrader said.

“It’s totally nerve-racking, especially with COVID, but we’ll see how it goes.”

Happy Creations in Maclean

Ms Schrader said she already had a lot of tourists through the shop, and the quiet nature of the pared-back coffee-shop offering was an attraction.

“Everyone keeps saying Maclean is going to be the new Bangalow, and we’ve had more tourists through than locals and it’s not even school holidays,” she said.

“We sell more gifts than the cafe, and we wanted to keep it quiet – even after COVID we won’t increase the number of tables. The ladies come in and say it’s nice to sit in here in the quiet – and that’s how we like it.

“We’ve been open six weeks, and it’s been going really well.”

Ms Schrader said for many of the tourists Maclean was becoming a meeting point, with the highway access so close.

She

said she was keen to push more make-up and treatments, and direct people to getting onto organic skin care.

“A lot of people have bought online and bought wrong stuff, and I want to be able to show them the right colours, the right creams and more,” she said.

Happy Creations in Maclean

And while many expressed surprise at her slight change in retail direction, Ms Schrader said she was enjoying being back with customers.

“I have to learn to sit back and have quiet times,” she said. “With beauty it was constant appointments and never quiet, and now it’s a readjustment and using that time.

“Once the school holidays hit, I think we’ll really see more people coming.”

Originally published as