Felicity Brown developed The Homestead Hub to connect people in rural, regional and remote areas with suppliers who genuinely understand their needs.
The aim of her “mini Google for Regional” is to quickly link customers from rural and regional Australia with the people, products, services and resources they are looking for.
One of the biggest problems, according to Felicity, is the inability to quickly identify those suppliers who are able to respond to the unique requirements of people living on the land, particularly in remote locations.
“There’s so much search engine clutter and you get taken down so many empty rabbit holes – a search that should only take a few minutes can take hours” - Felicity Brown.
Felicity is an internationally acclaimed milliner who runs the Broome-based business, Hats by Felicity, and has exhibited at three New York Fashion Weeks. She also writes the Milliner On The Move blog and operates a small accommodation bungalow and a project development business.
The Homestead Hub is the culmination of Felicity’s direct experiences as an outback artist and business owner, as well as growing up on a NSW sheep property, and several stints working on remote stock camps and cattle stations in the Northern Territory and Western Australia over the last 30 years.
Felicity came up with the idea for the website after the arrival of COVID-19 severely affected her existing businesses. She mapped out the concept for a “pandemic-proof business” on butcher’s paper on her kitchen table.
“When I looked at the business concept I’d drawn up on the butcher’s paper, it made perfect sense because all my life I’ve been the go-to connecter for my friends, family and workmates across rural and remote Australia” said Felicity.
From early beginnings in rural New South Wales, Solopreneur, Felicity (Flic) Brown, is an Australian country girl at heart.
Since moving to Western Australia 25 years ago she has worked in the beef, agriculture, pearling and aquaculture industries as well as in remote aged care. Her career journey includes working with ASX-listed and private companies and businesses, federal and state government and individuals, before leaving salaried income and launching her own small businesses.
Flic’s commitment to fundraising began at 19 years of age when, through the Miss Australia Quest, she was awarded runner-up fundraiser for NSW, for her fundraising efforts for cerebral palsy, and her energy has continued. She has supported the Cancer Council with fund-raising events for more than sixteen years and for the past three years Flic has worked with Variety, the Children’s charity, and participated in the Variety Bash.
Over the years Flic has featured several times in the RM Williams Outback magazine, including the special edition ‘Great Australians’ profiling ‘20 living legends of the bush’, along with the Spring 2016 edition of Graziher, the magazine for women of the land, and Airnorth Cable Beach Polomagazine 2018. She was a feature on ABC TV’s Landline in 2018 entitled ‘Outback Milliner: The international success of a former jillaroo turned hat-maker’ and a podcast guest with Central Station in 2019. Flic also featured in the Julia Bradbury Australia series aired with BBC and SBS and her journey and life achievement from Broome to the Big Apple is told through a documentary entitled MadHattan – from the Kimberley to New York, released in 2017, a film by Carolyn Constantine, narrated by Claire van der Boom and purchased and released by Foxtel.
Recently, at the Broome Chamber of Commerce Business Excellence Awards, Flic was awarded Winner for Best Home Based Business and Runner up/Highly Commended for Best Small Business with 0-5 employees, for her business Hats by Felicity.
Flic’s philosophy on life is: give and grow and just have a go. Her energy and positivity are infectious and she embraces every day with excitement – and a huge, magnificent smile.
