TIPS FROM THE TOP
With bespoke shirtmaker turned scrub-maker Emma Willis, MBE THE SHIRTMAKER TO CELEBS, 57, ON HER JOURNEY FROM COLD-CALLER TO ELITE CLIENTS, AND TURNING PRODUCTION TO SCRUBS FOR NHS WORKERS
How did you get started?
I loved drawing as a child so winning a place at the Slade School of Fine Art in London aged 18 felt like a wonderful achievement. But I joined a punk band, didn’t do enough work and left. I felt I’d blown my dream. The only job I could find was in the back pages of the paper, selling clothes door to door. The women’s clothes were pie-collared-style dresses, which I didn’t like, but the men’s shirts were good.
One day I went into the pub, rang my boss and suggested
I target the City firms. I made an appointment with a company, turned up at
8am before the markets opened and sold 100 shirts. Standing in the boardroom watching them fight over the shirts felt too good to be true.
Are you glad you did the cold calling?
I’m always polite to cold callers now because I’ve never forgotten that was me.
I had no choice, this was the 1980s – there was no social media, you couldn’t make a website. To sell your product you had to knock on a door and pick up a phone.
How did you start your business?
I made lots of friends in the City as I sold the shirts and they introduced me to their friends. Somebody kindly gave me the Stock Exchange directory and the Sunningdale Golf Club directory so I built up a network. Six months after I started selling in the City I was asked to set up a direct selling arm of a shirt company – and two years later I came across a small bespoke shirtmakers in New Cross, south-east London, which I took over. There were three in-house seamstresses, a cutter and two ladies working from home but they were the most incredible bespoke little shirtmakers. I launched Emma Willis bespoke shirts in a recession in the UK, so I kept my costs low by sleeping on sofas in friends’ flats, and I ran the business from my own flat. Through recommendations, Prince Charles became a customer as well as names like Benedict Cumberbatch, Daniel
Craig, Kenneth Branagh and
David Gandy.
Mistakes – you’ve made a few?
Mainly letting my heart rule my head and not listening to advice, instead only listening to what I wanted to hear. I used to spend too much money, buying too much. Also, I was always told to take legal advice – twice I haven’t and twice I’ve regretted it.
So things were looking good?
Yes, we had our shop in London’s Jermyn Street, our website, wholesale clients and collections on Net-a-Porter, Mr Porter, MatchesFashion Men’s and MatchesFashion Women
– all high-end online sites. I had dreamed to be on all four of them and 18 months ago it happened.
And then… lockdown.
I was all lined up to buy the lovely 18th-century townhouse we work from in Gloucester and then, a week later, boom – the dreaded Thursday when sales literally stopped. It was March 19 and I put in the diary ‘sales stopped’. It was horrifying. The business had been like a beast, galloping along for 25 years with me feeding it – and then it suddenly lies on the ground and there’s nothing you can do. Then one of our cutters told us her mother is lead vascular scientist at a hospital and they were desperate for scrubs. I asked my head seamstress if we could retrain everyone to make scrubs, and she and her son delivered sewing machines at home to everyone who wanted to help. I spoke to the Gloucester Royal and they needed three pairs of scrubs for everyone working in their critical care wards. We aimed to make 750 pairs, and we had to use all the luxury cotton we had in stock. Dozens of nurses, doctors and medical staff have emailed to say it’s the best thing to wear under heavy PPE. I was taking scrubs to the hospital in the evening, meeting the lead in infections control and they were giving me the sizes they needed for the next day. They were so grateful and that’s kept
us busy.
How many scrubs have you made?
We’ve made about 800 for Gloucester Royal and Cheltenham Hospital, and we’re also making for St Mary’s Paddington, Guy’s, Warwick, Luton and Oxford University hospitals. I set up a JustGiving page called Style for Surgeons and sent an email to all our customers, who have been incredible and helped raise money for the fabric while we fund production costs – £30 provides enough material for one set of scrubs. Reiss, the fashion brand, has donated 1,000 metres of beautiful poplin. Benedict rang to ask about the scrubs and donated £11,000 for material. For years I’ve been making clothes for injured service personnel through my charity Style for Soldiers. They risked their lives for their country – like NHS staff are doing now.
And one of your staff is a Syrian refugee who’s making scrubs for free…
We employed two Syrian refugees who are incredibly talented and, when lockdown happened, one of them said he’d work from home for free. His young daughter was saved by the NHS and he refuses to take any money.
What’s next?
As a country, we have to get our business back to normal as soon as possible. It’s devastating and it’s hard to lead a business with confidence but as an employer that’s what you have to do.