Alpaca Suri Owner Grateful and Thriving at 10-Year Mark

Susana Tavara Hasting, owner of the Peruvian handcraft shop Alpaca Suri, has seen ups and downs over the years

She started her Hingham business from scratch after years in the hospitality and human resources fields, and after nearly moving back to Peru when she was laid off by State Street Corporation. 

For a while Hasting did a thriving business in central Hingham. At first she thought the store, featuring clothing and accessories from her native country, might go bankrupt, but she opened at the start of the holiday shopping season and by March had to fly back to Peru to pick up more garments. Customers found them warm, soft, durable and resistant to allergies.

But a few years later, Alpaca Suri was in jeopardy. Hasting needed a new location, and her mother was sick, so she thought of closing the store. She told only a handful of customers about her decision.

She also told a nun back in Peru, who she had been working with to bring gifts to impoverished children every year (Alpaca Suri donates a percentage of its gross profits to Peruvian charities).  The nun said she would have the children pray to keep the store open.

Soon after, Hasting received a phone call from a landlord in the square, who owned the Sherwin-Williams building. He offered her a small space, saying that one of her customers gushed about Alpaca Suri and Hasting to him.

"I know that Karma works big time," Hasting said.

This year marks the 10th anniversary of Alpaca Suri's opening. The store is now a short way down South Street, in a larger space, and Hasting is doing more business than ever. 

She made her last move in 2008, at the start of the Great Recession. But despite the economy, Alpaca Suri has thrived. Hasting tripled her sales and inventory over the last five years, and continues to fly to Peru two to three times per year to purchase clothing made from the lightweight, silky soft Alpaca fiber.

"I want to touch, I want to feel, I want to have contact with my providers," Hasting said.

That contact includes whipping some into shape, like demanding that one woman she saw sewing day and night be provided a day off and vacation time, and also spending time with her family and volunteers in Lima and in the countryside, supporting a church and soup kitchen.

In 2011, Hasting won a Peruvian PRIDE award for work helping children. With such a variety of charities available today, and with many of them donating only small percentages of their funding to those in need, Hasting said it is important to her to give every penny to the children, and document every gift.

In her shop, Hasting keeps photographs of years of Christmas parties, where hundreds of children received gifts through Alpaca giving. She also has a stash of receipts and letters, proving that donated money ended up where it was needed.

Hasting is proud also of how far Peru has come. When she first began bringing back garments more than 10 years ago, the providers had only a rudimentary market for their goods. She helped some make clothing in American sizes, and today many Peruvian Alpaca merchants sell their goods around the world.

"The economy is blooming," she said.

Behind Alpaca Suri's success, through difficult personal and economic times, has been quality products, made and sold with passion, Hasting said. Just recently, she sold one of her own sweaters to a longtime client who loved the piece but couldn't get a new one in the right color.

"I'd rather have one good sweater that lasts forever than five that don't last a year," Hasting said.