Meet Drea Williams | Houseplant YouTuber

We had the good fortune of connecting with Drea Williams and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Drea, what’s one piece of conventional advice that you disagree with?
I’ve always wanted to own my own business. There’s something very freeing about having a vision and being able to execute it without having to go through all the bureaucracy you often experience in the corporate world. I’m very much a “Here’s what should/needs be done and now I’m going to go do it” person. Unfortunately, in the corporate world, I find myself getting held back a lot from executing ideas and plans. However, when you own your own business the only person who can really hold you back is you.

Can you open up a bit about your work and career? We’re big fans and we’d love for our community to learn more about your work.
Aloha Plant Life all started with a new house, empty flowerbeds, and a turbulent end to an almost 16-year-long relationship. In an effort to distract me during the hardest days of my divorce, I threw myself into landscaping the bare flowerbeds at my new house, and from there I continued on to greening up the interior of my home with numerous houseplants. Yet it didn’t just stop at buying plants and bringing them home. As always, I dove 100% into learning everything there was to learn about plants, especially houseplants. During this time my therapist was continually asking me what my life worth living looked like moving forward post-divorce, and all I really knew at the time was that tending to and learning about plants was the biggest thing bringing joy back into my life. So I started thinking to myself, “How can I bring the joy and help that plants have provided me to others?”. The next thing I knew, I was propagating plants to sell for charity, starting a YouTube channel dedicated to all things plants, and developing my own plant-related products to sell. Aloha Plant Life is still in the early days of business, but it’s been growing at a faster rate than I had predicted which is pretty exciting. And there have definitely been challenges to overcome. For starters, when I first started the Aloha Plant Life YouTube channel I didn’t have the first clue about producing, filming, and editing videos. I’ve had to teach myself along the way. I actually cringe going back and watching some of the earliest videos on my YouTube channel, but I always set a different improvement goal for my next 5-10 videos so that I’m constantly getting better at what I’m doing. Hopefully, my efforts pay off and the business continues to grow. One of my favorite parts so far is actually getting to engage with my viewers in the video comments and hear about their plant journeys and also help them out with any plant issues they are experiencing. Of course, any of my viewers would probably tell you the real star of the show is resident jungle cat Toby, lol. Everyone loves it when he makes surprise guest appearances in the videos.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Downtown McKinney for sure. I love the vibe down there and there are a ton of great shops and restaurants including Habitat Plants + Coffee which combines two of my favorite things, lol. If they’re visiting when it’s NOT triple-digit heat, then definitely would take them to Klyde Warren Park on a Saturday, and while we were down there hit up either the DMA or the Perot museum (or maybe both!). Once again, depending on the weather, perhaps a little SUP on one of the local lakes. And we definitely would be hitting up Reverie Bakeshop in Richardson at least once for breakfast.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
I want to dedicate my shoutout to all my friends and family who didn’t look at me like I’d completely lost my mind when I turned 40 and told them I was going to start a YouTube channel dedicated to all things plants and develop it into a full-time business, lol. Everyone has been super supportive throughout this entire journey.

Instagram: @alohaplantlife

Facebook: Aloha Plant Life

Youtube: Aloha Plant Life