Nay’s Closet is a rare independently-owned boutique in Atlantic City

ATLANTIC CITY — Even as a teenager, Shawnea Byrd’s room was the place to go shopping.

Curating her purchases with care and style, she displayed them on the walls of her little bedroom in Sharon Hill and invited friends to come over to pick out the outfit they needed or just check out her latest finds.

Her vision was always to make that personal walk-in closet experience she’d shared with friends into a full-fledged boutique.

And it was in Atlantic City, along a stretch of Atlantic Avenue that once was part of a busy hub of fashionable shopping, where Byrd, who also works full-time at nearby Caesars as a bartender, has made that vision into a reality: Nay’s Closet.

With its cute French Eiffel Tower motif on the front door at 2724 Atlantic Ave., Nay’s Closet stands out for its ambition and style, and for being a rare Black-owned store in a city whose shopping experiences are dominated by casinos shops, discount stores, and national outlets.

It’s across from the city’s police station, next to the recently-opened Green Apple Fresh & Natural smoothie & juice bar, a half-block from Tony’s Baltimore Grill and the new Union Hall Arts studio, and in the shadow of the Tropicana. A few blocks away at 3111 Atlantic Ave. is My Fashion Style, a new bridal and quinceañera shop. Entrepreneurs are trying.

“After I got here and I saw someone open a wedding dress shop, I thought, ‘What if this is a chain of events where a lot of people open up shops in this area, and it turns into a street, like South Street in Philadelphia?” Byrd said in a recent interview and tour around the boutique. “You can come to Atlantic Avenue and go shopping.”

Nay’s Closet is still the only Black-owned independent clothing boutique in the city, Byrd said. It is an adorable and stylish, whimsical and fun boutique of clothing, shoes, and accessories, with selections for women, men, and children, with a tag line of “Add something different to your closet.”

And to Atlantic City.

“Something like this can encourage all people,” said Byrd, who has three children, and whose mother is Angelita Byrd, a Realtor and success coach who goes by “Miss Realtor Philadelphia.” Her mother’s motto, clearly embraced by her daughter, is “going from P.O.O.R. (Passing over opportunities repeatedly) to R.I.C.H. (Realizing it can happen).”

And happen it did for her daughter.

But it was not without its challenges, past and present. Her mom was just 15 when she was born. She split her youth between her mom’s home in Philadelphia and her grandmother’s home in Sharon Hill. Both she and her mom are self-made success stories.

Even before the boutique, Byrd said she would often cart around her “items” in a bag, or jewelry in a case, promoting her business, always looking to sell her collection, while working as a bartender in a series of places. It was the casino job, though, with its union stability, paycheck, steady tips, and benefits, that gave her the final lift to open the shop.

“My story is rare,” said Byrd. “A lot of people who have children don’t get an opportunity to be entrepreneurs. This is something for me that did not happen overnight. This took time for me. Along the way, I had to go through struggles and roadblocks. My story can be very inspirational to a lot of people.”

She hopes it will inspire other entrepreneurs to look to downtown Atlantic City to locate their business. There are a handful of independently-owned shops at the nearby Outlets, including City & Cole children’s boutique and two Black-owned businesses, SwapzAC and Vegans R Us.

At Caesar’s, she has access to a lot of visitors to town who she hopes will make Nay’s Closet a regular stop along with the casinos. Ultimately, she’d like a bigger shop, and wouldn’t mind landing at the Outlets herself.

Locals have begun to find her, she said.

“A lot of locals come here and shop with me,” Byrd said. “They love the shop. They actually said, this is something that they needed. I felt like I needed to be here.

“There should definitely be much more of that in Atlantic City,” said Byrd. “I feel like I’m making history being the only Black-owned boutique. I hope it will start some chain of events, with others having the courage to do the same thing.”

As for the store itself, she’s stocking it in her signature eclectic way that allows people to shop the boutique to come up with their own sense of style.

“I think that moms can shop here. I think teenagers can shop here. I think dads can shop here. I think the transgender community can shop here. I think anyone who is Pride can shop here. I feel like anybody can find something suitable that they like in Nay’s Closet.”

Recently, she noticed a green button-down cinched blouse she sells being worn by a character on the P-Valley television show. “I thought, did they get that from Nay’s Closet?” she said.

She’s also stocking sneakers from the locally-owned FN label, with a symbol that means justice, and its latest hot-selling FN 1 sneaker release, the popular “salmon on rice” model.

On one wall near the entrance are a series of sayings, including Be Bold, and You are Really Pretty. “I want to remind women they can be bold. They are pretty. They can dress in something fancy.

“They can pick their styles: classy, sassy, chic, or rebel,” she said. “The point of this is to uplift women.”