direct sales

You'll notice a link to my designs on ebay/facebook/the website etc and asos marketplace to the left there, this is a relatively new extension to the already remarkably successful asos portfolio, the idea with marketplace from what i can gather is that it gives you the individual, (designer or not) the opportunity to market your designs/your garments direct to the public, and as a wise old industry insider once told me, this is the way forward!!

Never before has it been so 'easy' to sell to the public, once constrained by having to sell into a retailer and thus meet their price requirements, cutting your profit considerably, now you can keep your prices as such that the customer is happy and make a reasonable profit at the same time.

With outlets such as Asos Marketplace, Ebay, Etsy and folksy if your product is hand made, there has really never been a better time to give it a go!

Being an independant designer is hard work, the work you need to put in to achieve small goals is tremendous but ultimately rewarding, what designer doesn't want to see their clothing on real people! Each time i recieve a piece of positive feedback it makes me smile, I did that, i made that woman feel good about herself, there's nothing quite like it.

So for young designers coming through university, or having worked in the industry for a time and wondering what's the next step, you can do it, you just have to keep a sensible head on you, keep costs low, remember that customer service is paramount, if you don't keep your customer happy they won't come back! and someone once told me 20% of your customers will make up 80% of your business!.....and use every avenue available to you to get your product and your brand out there!

good luck xx

bag of goodies

arrived today filled with things for making fascinators/hair accessories, now if only i can find the time to sit and play with them i may be able to create something pretty to go along side the dresses, but i think it may still be a while!!

i want to make floral fascinators and accessories mostly i think, i keep forgetting that ideally they should go with the dresses i'm making so that's the other half of my plan to try and coordinate my creative efforts, but for the least organised woman on the planet this may be a task in itself!!

wish me luck!?

Baby betty and I have been off on our jollys

and celebrating the best that centre parcs has to offer, 5 days in beautiful whinfell forest, i can't say i've been on many uk holidays, i'm a massive fan of travelling but tend to go by plane somewhere! but with a little one in tow this can prove more stressful than it's worth! well for me anyway! so when a good friend and her little boy invited the two of us away to centre parcs we jumped at the chance, we had a whale of a time!! I can't wait to go back!!

But for now i'm looking forward to a couple of more inspirational breaks away from good ol blighty! with trips planned to bruge this month and paris in may, the creative juices are sure to be flowing!

xx