Dress rehearsal
Thinking of going into fashion because you love design? Fashion Startup shows why you’d better love business too.
Fashion Startup (2016- current) is a fashion-focussed business development reality series a la Shark Tank (2009- current). And this American show is a wake-up call to local creatives that you can’t afford to turn your nose up at the thought of business. Even the most innovative, dazzlingly original designer is just a snack in a world of financially oriented sharks. Fashion Startup gives style and beauty entrepreneurs the chance to pitch their ideas to four industry leaders and potential investors, who then go through the pitches to expose the practical costs of what they want to do and what they will need to commit in terms of research, time, labour and financial backing to turn dreams into realities.
WHO ARE YOU TO JUDGE?
Fashion Startup’s panel of four mentors is on point when it comes to modern fashion and beauty distribution and marketing. Just taking note of the range of skills they have is sobering if all you’ve been doing is sketching and sewing or playing kitchen chemist with beauty products… 1 Katia Beauchamp is the co-founder of Birchbox, the grand success of make-up and beauty subscriptions. Birchbox accesses free samples from beauty companies and sends a select batch to subscribers for a reasonable fee each month. Katia has hands-on experience in everything from negotiating with suppliers, to leveraging influencers and building a solid online web sales presence, to product packaging and design.
2 Gary Wassner is a mentor for the CFI (Chicago Fashion Industry) Incubator program. The CFI mentors designers through the process of launching a fashion career that won’t end in having a flea market stall. He’s also an advisor on the CFDA (Council Of Fashion Designers Of America) board and he has been nicknamed “fashion’s fairy godfather”. 3 Designer Rebecca Minkoff heads a global fashion brand. She knows how much money it takes to launch a business from nothing but an ugly T-shirt design. She and her brother and business partner Uri spent their savings, mortgaged their house and maxed out credit cards to keep their business running in the early days. Since then, they have won entrepreneurship, retail and fashion innovator and design awards. Rebecca has insider experience in surviving fast-track growth and sourcing manufacturers and materials.
4 Christine Hunsicker is in a similar field to Katia but found a completely different niche market with her brand Gwynnie Bee. It’s a fashion subscription box targeted at the plus-size market, an enormous, unexploited audience. Like Katia, she has a firm grasp on the negotiations involved in sourcing and distributing her products and publicising her product via influencers and reviewers. Each design team or individual who comes through the doors has to sell their idea to those four. It can be a hard sell though, especially when you stand in front of them with dubiouslooking proposals like… • Hideously overpriced neon plastic
festival headgear (episode 1) • A lunatic who thinks that snuggling into your hoodie by pulling your arms out of the sleeves is revolutionary (episode 1) • A fashion website on which university students can sell used clothes (episode 3) • A subscription-based sock of the month company – it’s a seriously overcrowded market (episode 3) • A handbag with a sealed compartment that you can stuff your stinky shoes in (episode 4) • A bra fitting company that will come and measure you in the sanctity of your own home (episode 5) • A business that recycles fabric scraps
from fashion companies (episode 5) • And a mobile company that fits ballet dancers properly for pointe shoes (episode 8) But while any of the ideas and products might turn us off, it’s incredible to see the fab four spot the diamond in the rough in each idea, then step the wannabe entrepreneur through everything they need to do to polish it and make actual money.