“It’s important that my customers are well taken care of and look like the princesses they dream of as little girls,” said Ms. Carbonneau.

Seventeen-year-old Jessica Doerfler, a senior at Shrewsbury High School, recently bought a black, strapless dress for her senior prom at the store for $180. Ms. Carbonneau reassured her that no other girl would have the same dress at her prom night.

“I loved my prom dress,” said Miss Doerfler.

Ms. Carbonneau, who owns the store with her parents, Gary J. and Patricia A. Carbonneau, entered the retail business as a teen, learning from her father.

The Carbonneau family has been part of Worcester’s retail industry for more than 80 years. Joseph Carbonneau Sr., Ms. Carbonneau’s great-grandfather, opened a shoe store on Wall Street in 1921. Her grandfather, Joseph Jr., moved the shop to its present location at 315 Grafton St. 35 years ago.

Beginning about 20 years ago, the Grafton Street store began to sell dyeable shoes, a wedding staple. A few years later, Gary Carbonneau developed a wholesale line of dyeable shoes and put out a small catalog, later expanding to include wholesale jewelry, gloves and other bridal-related accessories.

Now the wedding business has moved from Grafton Street to a building at 292 West Boylston St. owned by Ms. Carbonneau, her sister, Laurie M. Carbonneau, and their parents that houses the new retail venture on one floor and the wholesale business and warehouse upstairs.

Lynn Carbonneau estimates that the 2,600-square-foot store, a $2.1 million investment, will generate around $600,000 to $800,000 in revenue this year. Opened in February, the store has six employees who help an average of nearly 100 customers per day.

Upstairs is the 7,200-square-foot warehouse headed by Laurie Carbonneau, who focuses on the wholesale division with her father.

Gary Carbonneau said the new wholesale department “will generate over $1.2 million in revenue,” or 50 percent more than its previous location on Grafton Street, where the shoe-repair business remains under the ownership of Richard Carbonneau, Gary’s brother.

Lynn. Carbonneau is confident about the survival of the family-owned business, even though it faces tough competition from big-name chain stores and at least three other independently owned bridal boutiques in the area.

Ms. Carbonneau’s business strategy comes down to maintaining a high sales volume by offering a variety of dresses — from wedding designers such as Maggie Sottero and Alfred Angelo to Jovani and Flirt by Maggie Sottero for proms to Ms. Carbonneau’s own exclusive collection of dresses — at a range of prices. Wedding dresses are $100 to $2,000, and prom dresses, $150 to $1,200. “We would rather have higher volume at lower prices and the best customer service,” she said.

If she cannot legally lower the price of a dress because of a signed contract with a designer, Ms. Carbonneau will offer “Carbonneau cash” or gift certificates. The customer can use it on anything sold in the store or on her Web site www.mydress4less.com, which showcases her inventory to a wider clientele.

Ms. Carbonneau also relies on buzz about the store — word-of-mouth advertising. When she first opened, she advertised a free prom and bridal gown giveaway. She gave away a $500 wedding gown of the bride’s choice and a $300 prom gown.

“I just really love doing things like this, because I know my best advertisement comes from my customers, so it always comes around full circle,” she said. “I am constantly thinking of new ways to draw attention to our store and make it a fun place to buy dresses.”

Susan Sampson, director of the Prince Program in Retail Management at Simmons College, said the word-of-mouth formula “is key to attracting many customers in a short period of time.”

Shoe dyeing is a service that connects the business to its past. Ms. Carbonneau’s father taught her to dye her first pair of shoes at age 13.

Brides seek out Elegance by Carbonneau to match their shoes to their dresses, a special skill not practiced by many retailers today. Ms. Carbonneau’s store is one of few in Worcester that offers the service.

Janice Kay, a longtime customer of the Carbonneau family, has had Ms. Carbonneau dye her shoes for many years.

“What keeps Lynn operating as a successful shoe dyer is her fantastic eye for color. It is an art that is not as easy as it looks,” Ms. Kay said.

Ms. Carbonneau sells at least 200 pairs of dyed shoes a week for an average of about $35 a pair, she said.She attends bridal and shoe conventions in Chicago, Las Vegas and Atlanta to watch the trends and learn about new styles of gowns. She takes those ideas and designs everything from shoes to bridal accessories. With help from sister Laurie, Ms. Carbonneau submits bulk orders for dresses to factories in China.

It takes the Chinese factories about three months to make Carbonneau dresses and shoes and deliver them to Worcester. China has high minimum orders. Each dyeable shoe order, for example, is around $50,000. The line of dresses is exclusive to her store.

The Carbonneaus publish an annual wholesale catalog of about 60 pages full of Carbonneau products, which the family sells worldwide.

Ms. Carbonneau sells approximately 60 percent of her prom inventory in two to three weeks, reordering after that. But if a dress does go out of style and is not sold, she uses eBay to dispose of leftover inventory, selling some dresses worth more than $300 for as low as $50. She acknowledged that she loses money or breaks even on eBay sales. But they allow her to move her stagnant inventory and free up more warehouse space. “I like to keep things new,” she said.

The Carbonneau family has more than 1,000 retailers in the United States, United Kingdom and Canada selling its products, a number Ms. Carbonneau hopes to increase over the next few years.

“I want there to be a fifth and sixth generation of Carbonneaus to continue on,” she said as she stepped away for a moment to help a young customer who has just entered the store, “and that will only happen if our customers are happy.”