Two years ago in one of the worst droughts the NSW Central West region had seen, Dubbo farmer Amee Dennis didn't know how she was going to pay for her children's school uniforms let alone continue running her farm.
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When her husband got sick and had to have surgery, for three months he wasn't able to lift anything heavier then a bottle of milk. This meant that Ms Dennis, who had previously lived on a cattle station in the Northern Territory was left to run the household and do all the farm work.
"My husband said to me one day, 'you need to go and do something that's yours', and I'm an artist by trade so I can make paper out of grass, but it was the drought and we had no grass so I didn't know what to do," she said.
Ms Dennis, who enjoys making wearable art, such as jewellery, remembered they had some alpaca wool in their shed and decided to try and make some earrings from the wool.
She went on to make necklaces and some flowers from it.
"I then put up a post on Buy Bush Business and within 10 minutes I had sold six flower pots and started getting messages from people with their own vases asking if I could sell them a bunch of alpaca flowers," she said.
Ms Dennis got to work adding bunches of alpaca wool flowers to her website at 9pm that night.
The following morning she had 80 orders.
"What we managed on the farm wasn't even paying for the farm let alone doing stuff for ourselves, these orders meant we could get school uniforms for the kids, hay for the alpacas and put meat in the freezer, all things we didn't know how we were going to do," she said.
"I took over the kitchen table, then the kitchen, then the dining room, the whole house, so I really needed a 'she cave' but it just kept growing."
Soon people started finding out where Ms Dennis was located and were asking to see the products in person and to see the alpacas.
The couple started with nine white guards, to try and stop the fox attacks on their lambs and sheep.
"We didn't know anything about alpacas aside from that at the time," she said.
But because alpacas come in 16 different standard colours and she wanted to create different coloured products without dying them, she asked her husband if they could buy some more.
Soon enough, he bought four coloured females and one coloured male.
"But it just kept growing and soon enough we bought more at auction or were given some rescues and so before the first visit we had 36 alpacas," she said.
Now they have over 140.
That's what led Ms Dennis to put up a 'come and meet the alpacas' post almost two years ago.
"It went really, really well, so I decided to do a high tea in the paddock surrounded by the farm animals and that is now one of our signature sell out occasions," she said.
That was when Ms Dennis decided it was important they install a toilet so people can feel more comfortable when they visit. Once the toilet was installed, they decided they needed a sheltered area as well as some tables and chairs.
"It was about six months later that we opened up this gallery space, and turned the original bathroom and laundry into a kitchen," she said.
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The next step for the couple is opening up their café, where their special VIP members will test out the new menu and provide feedback.
"We are really excited, we've also converted the shed into an all weather event space so people can host events with their own mob of alpacas roaming around," she said.
All the money they make goes back into what the next thing could be for the business.
The business which now provides hands-on experiences with the alpacas or browsing the gallery of their products or just sitting and enjoying some food surrounded by the animals, there is something for everyone.
"We didn't have a goal at the beginning, we never thought we would be open five to six days a week," she said.
"Essentially we have spent six months building our business and employing people so that I can continue to look after the farm if something happens, but we needed to get to a point where we could afford to employ someone and not do that irresponsibly.
"Everything we have done has exceeded any expectations from where it started and has turned into this beast of its own."
Strategically Ms Dennis has kept her marketing local.
"We don't want 400 people coming through the gates each week, for us it was about getting a few in and we wanted every single person to leave a champion," she said.
"It didn't matter what their expectation was when they walked through the gate however we wanted them to have best time ever, that person needs to walk away thinking this was the best thing they'd ever done in their whole life."
The business which saw a 305 percent growth from its first year of operation is continuing to evolve, putting on birthday parties, weddings, school trips and senior home visits.
"We want to evolve, it's what we've always done and sometimes you just have to say yes and figure out the rest later," she said.
"At the end of the day we want to have a connection, be hands on and get involved."
Ms Dennis said she really enjoyed when the older citizens came to visit the farm.
"The seniors may have worked on farms and are retired now in a unit or house in town or are in assisted care and spent entire lives on the land and are now in a shoe boxes, so to give them the opportunity to come out and sit in open air, laugh with us about life on farm or as questions is amazing," she said.
It isn't about the money for Ms Dennis, but rather the connection through animals or art.
"I don't necessarily want a million people through the door or a million dollars in the bank it's just about giving and having opportunity to showcase cool products, and show the process of how it all comes together," she said.
Ms Dennis's advice to other people who want to start their own business, is to just go and do it.
"You don't know where it will take you, you just have to be open to saying yes," she said.
"We have a really cool team with some awesome dogs and alpacas and some pretty cool humans who love what they do."