Today we’ve been at the Designer Business Support Seminar run by the British Fashion Council in London. The event puts selected emerging and established designers in touch with the right people to help them build hugely successful businesses.
We encouraged designers to capitalise on data, to consider trends as more than just commercial garments and to embrace social forums as a way to connect with and understand their customer. With the talented audience present, one of our key points was that creative integrity doesn’t have to be compromised in order to be commercial.
By looking in depth at pricing and monitoring the market, designers can navigate the commercial minefield successfully. To illustrate this, we profiled Marc Jacobs, whose product range stretches from the premium-priced runway garments right down to very-accessible fragrances, keyrings and handbags. His brand has mass-attention and broad appeal, which is capitalised on so well.
We reckon we’ve equipped the designers with some food for thought! With London Fashion Week fast approaching, it was great to see so many designers take time out of their busy schedule to attend.
It was a privilege to be invited to share tools and techniques with such an incredible group of designers, alongside Sarah Curran of My-Wardrobe, Rachel Bremer from Twitter and Barbara Wilson from UKTI.
Thanks to the audience, who asked some brilliant questions which we’ll be investigating on the blog soon, so stay tuned! Thanks also to David Watts, the BFC and team for organising a great day.
Katie Smith
