POSH COLLECTIONS DOUBLES SIZE IN MALVERN

The store’s owner says it was time for a re-branding as well as an expansion

MALVERN >> An upscale women’s boutique is bucking the struggling national retail trend and is instead expanding in the borough.

Posh Collections in the 100 block of East King Street recently opened its freshened store with expanded lines and offerings.

“After nine years, it was time for a change in aesthetics and a design re-branding,” said store owner Tina Corrado, who started the boutique in 2007. “It was time to bring a new energy to the store. I knew we needed a new image.”

Corrado said Posh Collections went from around 1,000 square feet to about 2,500 square feet when it took over the space next door previously used by the Malvern School of Music. With the expansion, customers will find new Posh brands, including Ivanka Trump and Marc Fisher shoes as well as sunglasses and many more clothing offerings.

The store is brighter as well as being bigger now, with four dressing rooms instead of two. Customers will see crisp white gold and black color schemes with a modern golden peacock feather motif.

The expanded boutique is having a ribbon cutting on Thursday and will hold a grand opening in September.

Offerings are from designers such as Diane Von Furstenberg, Trina Turk, James Jeans, Nanette Lepore, Joie and Parker.

“We’re really excited, it was a long time coming,” said Corrado, who took out a loan to expand the store and to upgrade its offerings.

At 36, Corrado already is veteran of the retail industry, having worked 20 years in it. She was 15 when she started and a mentor took her on a buyer’s trip to New York City.

After that, she worked at five or six high-end Main Line women’s retailers and at the King of Prussia Mall.

“I got into this with my eyes wide open,” she said of starting Posh Collections.

Service is the key to high end boutique operations, Corrado said. Regular customers receive flowers on their birthdays and clothes are delivered to their homes after alterations are made. Posh even has a service where employees go to homes and consult with customers on their wardrobes.

“In a specialty store, the level of service is paramount,” Corrado said.

With five employees, the store has a mailing list of 4,000 to 5,000 customers along the Main Line, and caters, generally, to women who are 40 to 65.

“Seventy percent of the business comes from 30 percent of the customers,” Corrado noted.

PETE BANNAN — DIGITAL FIRST MEDIA Posh Collections, at 103 E. King St. in Malvern, has expanded.

PETE BANNAN — DIGITAL FIRST MEDIA Posh in Malvern has expanded.