It’s official: Cheryl Mokaraka-Crump and Shara Mei Crump Jackson are Northland’s most wanted women.

That’s how the Northern Advocate newspaper described them after they won the Women In Work 2012 competition with a staggering 42% of the vote. The contest sees prominent female entrepreneurs vie for top honours with thousands voting in an online poll. When we asked about their win they were rapt but very humble about all the fuss – getting a Multi Kai Cooker as part of their prize pack was a major highlight for these busy wāhine.

They took over running Amber-Lee Florist from Shara Mei’s mum (Cheryl’s aunty), Rawinia in 2009 – 24-years after she’d opened what would become an enduring local business, winning the Regional Small Business Award at the National Māori Business Awards in 1999.

With 10 children between them, it’s not surprising Cheryl (Ngāti Kahungunu, Hinehika) and Shara Mei (Ngāti Kahungunu, Ngāti Ruru) are influenced by their whānau, whakapapa and culture. When it’s time to work the whole extended family mucks in – from scrubbing flower buckets and delivering flowers to serving customers. Amber Lee is known for unique, floral taonga blending Māori and Kiwiana themes.

When BERL studied the Māori economy they found that more than 70% of companies were small to medium enterprises: businesses like Amber-Lee. Both women say when they took over they knew how to arrange flowers beautifully but running a business was another thing.

“We got help with this through the Te Puni Kōkiri Māori Business Facilitation Service and a small business management course at Te Wānanga Aotearoa. Te Puni Kōkiri helped us simplify our systems, set realistic goals and really look at where we wanted our business to go.”

They’ve found keeping cash flow rolling in the hardest challenge. Three years after they took over the whānau business, the benefits are starting to show and they’re proud to have stayed afloat during what have been incredibly tough times for small business owners.

“We’re busier than ever with new customers every day and can see our business growing.”

With clients on their Facebook Page asking if they have branches in Australia, who knows what’s next for Amber Lee Florist? We ask what advice they’d give anyone thinking of starting up their own business and both say: learn about running a business first.

“Have a realistic business plan and actually use it. We spent a lot of time on ours and then once we had it filed it away: it wasn’t until we had our mentoring when we realised we actually have to use it!” www.amberleeflorist.co.nz.