She Asked for an After-School Job. Years Later, She Bought the Store.

“Hey, how about me?”

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Megan was walking home from school when she stopped at the neighborhood coffee shop where her aunt worked.

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Gail, one of the owners of Different Strokes, happened to be there and mentioned that the children’s boutique needed help.

“Hey, how about me?” Megan asked.

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The question surprised even her. She was quiet then, not someone who normally volunteered herself for a job on the spot.

Gail told her to come back at 5 p.m.

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She did.

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What began as an after-school job became a career, a second family and, eventually, the responsibility of carrying a longtime Bayonne boutique into its next generation.

Today, Megan owns Different Strokes for Little Folks, which recently moved from 11 West 22nd Street to 584 Broadway.

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The new Broadway store opened on Sept. 9, 2026, followed by a grand reopening celebration on Sept. 12 and 13.

A job that became a second family

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Megan’s relationship with Different Strokes stretches back to those first afternoons working for Gail and her sister, Joyce.

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As Megan learned the rhythms of the boutique, she got to know the customers who came through its doors and the families who returned for birthdays, christenings, communions and other childhood milestones.

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Gail and Joyce, meanwhile, became far more than employers.

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“They were at my wedding, my baby shower and everything in between,” Megan said. For years, the sisters would joke about the future.

“When are you going to buy the store?” they would ask her. At the time, it was easy to treat the question as a joke between people who had known one another for years. Then Gail and Joyce decided they were ready to retire. “This is it, Megan,” they told her. “It’s the last season.”

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Megan went home, spoke with her husband and began thinking seriously about taking over the place where her working life had begun.

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Bringing big-retail lessons home

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By then, Megan had built a substantial retail career outside Bayonne. While studying business at Seton Hall University as the first person in her family to attend college, she participated in a class project involving Target. Unsure how students were supposed to find internships, Megan approached the company representatives and asked whether they offered one.

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It was another small moment of speaking up that changed the direction of her life.

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Megan secured the internship and was offered a full-time position after graduation. She remained with Target for nearly 14 years, eventually becoming a store director. Along the way, she learned how to manage inventory, understand sales data, track expenses and recognize the hundreds of small decisions behind a successful retail operation.

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After the birth of her first son, however, the long hours and travel became harder to reconcile with the life she wanted at home. The opportunity to take over Different Strokes arrived at nearly the same time. For about a year, Megan tried to remain in both worlds: managing her corporate career while taking responsibility for the boutique. Eventually, she realized that neither was receiving all of her.

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“My heart was in Bayonne, and my head was in Middletown,” she said.

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Leaving Target meant stepping away from a company that had been part of her life for nearly 14 years. But it also allowed her to bring everything she had learned back to the neighborhood store that first introduced her to retail.

Making the store her own

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One of Megan’s earliest changes was also one of the least glamorous.

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Different Strokes was still using handwritten, carbon-copy receipts and relying heavily on pen-and-paper systems. The method had served the store for years, but it made tracking inventory and developing an online business difficult. Megan introduced a modern point-of-sale system, barcodes and a new website. She built the site herself, learning Shopify, e-commerce and search optimization as she went.

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The technology changed. The heart of the store did not.

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Different Strokes remains known for the clothing families select for important occasions: a baby’s trip home from the hospital, a christening, a first communion or a celebration that will be preserved in family photographs. Communion appointments, in particular, involve more than choosing a white dress or a suit.

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Some families arrive with a photograph of exactly what they want. Others walk in with no clear idea at all. Megan and her team help assemble the full look, from the dress and veil to tights, socks and shoes. Sometimes they even help choose the outfit a child will change into for the party afterward.

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Megan describes the experience as a children’s version of Say Yes to the Dress.

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That personal service is part of what she wants to preserve. So is the quality of clothing that can be saved for a younger sibling or passed on to another generation. At the same time, Megan wants more Bayonne families to feel that Different Strokes is a store for them. The boutique had developed a reputation as a place to purchase an expensive gift or a high-end special-occasion outfit.

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Megan has expanded its selection to include a wider range of prices while maintaining the quality and individuality customers expect. The racks combine classic pieces with bold prints, playful florals and unexpected details. Megan describes the store’s style as “timeless elegance with a little bit of funk.” Her goal is not to turn Different Strokes into something customers could find through a quick Amazon search. It is to make the experience more approachable without erasing what made the store distinctive.

A chance encounter on Broadway

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That balance—between preserving an identity and allowing it to evolve—also shaped the move to Broadway.

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The new location entered Megan’s life through another chance encounter.She was walking along Broadway with her sons when she looked through the window of a vacant storefront. The landlord’s son happened to be outside and told her the space was available.

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“Do you own a business?” he asked.

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“Actually, yeah, I do,” Megan replied.

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He called his sister on the spot. Within a few weeks, Megan was discussing a lease and preparing Different Strokes for a new chapter.

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The move from West 22nd Street gives the boutique a visible place on Broadway. It also puts Megan closer to home, her children’s schools and the daily life of the community she wants the store to serve. Like the after-school job that started it all, the move began with a walk, a chance encounter and Megan deciding to speak up.

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After the lights go out

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Running the boutique is only one part of Megan’s day.

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She has two young sons and also handles administrative work for the Bayonne Chamber of Commerce. After closing the store, Megan returns home for dinner and her family’s evening routine. Later, while sitting at the foot of her four-year-old’s bed, she may update the store’s social media, make notes or plan what comes next.

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Retail also requires her to think well beyond the current season. Merchandise is often selected six months to a year before it appears on the racks. While customers are discovering the new Broadway location, Megan is already making decisions about what their children may wear next year.

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It is the largely invisible work of carrying a familiar store forward: preserving the pieces that matter, changing the systems that no longer serve it and making sure a new generation of families feels welcome when it walks through the door.

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Years ago, Gail told a quiet teenager to come back at 5 p.m.

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Megan did.

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In one way or another, she has been coming back ever since.