Today we’d like to introduce you to Sarah Barstow.
Hi Sarah, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I moved to Moab from Hartford, Connecticut in the beginning of 1997. I have lived in a lot of beautiful places, but no place as striking as the desert landscapes of Moab. I fell head over heels in love with the desert, but also with the community of people who call Moab home. After working the typical (for a newbie in her 20s) 3 jobs at a time (restaurant, bookstore, domestic violence shelter), I decided to open up my own clothing & jewelry boutique in the winter of 2003. I ran The Rave’N Image until the pandemic hit and I lost childcare for a year. It was hard to let go of something that I had built from the ground up and was so proud of, but it was a blessing in disquise because it led me to getting a job with the Women’s Business Center of Utah in the spring of 2021. In my time with WBCUtah , I have grown from part time business advisor for women in Southern/SE Utah to Full time statewide advisor, to both a full time advisor plus business advising manager. The work we do at the Women’s business center of Utah is so important, and so rewarding. We help women all across the state start and grow their businesses, by mentoring them through every step of entreprenurship and providing them with the tools and resources they may need. In 2025 we won by regional and national awards for excellece, and our state director travelled to DC to recieve our award from the SBA. I love working with women all over the state, but am especially proud of my work within Moab/Grand county. The amount of strong women here who own their own businesses is astounding! Just in the time I’ve worked for WBCUtah, 2 Moab business owners have won our Southern Entreprenur of the year award, and I’m meeting more women in the business community every month. I revamped a Moab Women’s Networking group, and we meet monthly to discuss business needs and to help support one another. Work aside, I am married, have 2 kids (one about to turn 9, one about to turn 21) and have self published 3 children’s books about some of the challenges of parenting babies and young ones. In my free time, I love to hike and explore the Moab desert, travel around the world and curl up with a good book.
I’m sure it wasn’t obstacle-free, but would you say the journey has been fairly smooth so far?
I would say that the transition to business owner to business advisor was a pretty smooth transition, but there is definitely so much to know and I’m learning more all of the time. I didn’t know that these free resources were available when I was running my own business, and I definitely would have benefited from them. I was pretty much winging it as a business owner (learning as I went), but now as an advisor, there’s also the pressure to know all of the things about all of the kinds of businesses. The work is incredibly rewarding, but it’s also demanding and time consuming. My days are full. I enjoy some of the challenges, though, and appreciate putting effort into finding out answers to questions I don’t yet know. I’m proud of creating the WBCs first ever SOP for advisors, where I add every new bit of business info and resources as I learn of them.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
I’m a business advisor and manager for the Women’s Business center of Utah. Day in and out I advise women all over the state of Utah on starting and growing (& sometimes selling) their businesses. (it’s worth noting that we are Women focused, but actually don’t turn anyone needing assistance away).
I am most proud of my work within my own community (Moab). Because of my presence here and my reputation in this small town, the impact WBCUtah has here is much higher (per population/women business owners) than anywhere else in the state. I am often contacted by women who tell me that a friend said they had to reach out to me, and I have revamped a monthly meetup of women business owners (Moab Women’s Network). The support we give each other has been empowering, and I’m honored for the ability to pull these women together each month.
Within WBCUtah I have moved from PT just for southern/SE clients, to statewide FT and now also the business advising manager. I’ve received praise from women at the SBA and governor’s office, and was nomiated for the national business advisor of the year award in 2024. The team I work with is like family, and I can’t imagine doing anything else.
How do you think about luck?
That’s a good question, and something I haven’t put too much thought into.
Growing up I was lucky to have parents who were both educators (I thought everyone had summers off) and who both valued travel more than tangible things. I was able to live and study abroad 3 separate times (1st grade, 8th grade, Junior year of High school) while my parents taught. I’ve always been cognizant of what special & unqiue experiences we had as a family, which has shaped the person I am now. I’ve also been very aware of how lucky we were to have the financial means that we did. Middle class, but still much better off than many. This was lucky for me and my sister, but not lucky in terms of my parents , who worked hard for what they had and spent their money quite intentially.
Professionally, it was not luck that made me start my own Boutique in Moab. I saw a need in my early years in Moab (everyone I knew drove and hour and a half to another state to do their clothing shopping) and filled it. (I still have people tell me regularly that they miss my store). Although, I saw the “need” for stylish, yet affordable clothing in town, I didn’t really have a passion for clothing, so I curated the shop with unique jewelry and fun accessories. The boutique continued to evolve over time, and I self-taught myself everything I needed to succeed as a business owner (now equipped to help my clients through their entreprenurial journeys- even if I need to learn something new to help them with something specific).
It was not luck either that landed me this job with the women’s business center of Utah. But it could have been luck that I found out about it in the 1st place (still at home with a 4 year old during the pandemic, my husband told me about an online course on working remotely that led me to the job posting with WBCUtah).
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.wbcutah.org
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/wbcutah
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/WBCUtah
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sarah-barstow-596261201/
- Other: https://sarahbarstowbooks.my.canva.site/
