‘HONESTLY, I WOULD LOVE TO BE 25 TODAY’

five from the last series). Dressed today in black skinnies and a leopard-print blazer – both by Nasty Gal, a US vintage-inspired site that Boohoo snapped up last year, along with Pretty Little Thing, which focuses on eventwear – she lives and breathes her brand.

The company’s HQ is a converted mill in an area of Manchester that bears a resemblance to downtown Manhattan. Inside are rails of sequined frocks, animal prints and graphic athleisure wear (key trends for 2019). Walls are adorned with the company hashtag #DoYourThing and promos for the upcoming Paris Hilton x Boohoo collaboration. Celebrity tie-ups are a huge driver of traffic to the sites; Justin Bieber’s new wife Hailey Baldwin, The Greatest Showman actress Zendaya and British pop star Charli XCX are just a few of its collaborators, all chosen on the basis of their being on-message with Boohoo’s fanbase.

Seventy per cent of workers in this groovy space are female. ‘Basically, we employ our customers,’ says Carol. ‘Although I’m on the business side, I’m very vocal about product. I need to be surrounded by it to feel inspired. When something new comes in, I want to be the first to see it.’

A designer by trade, Carol grew up in the North East with her father, a builder, and mother, who worked in the menswear shop Burton, where the tailors would give her swatches of fabric to play with. As a girl, she dreamed of being an artist. But, after art college, she found herself working in the rag trade, which is how she met Mahmud, whose family have long been in the industry. The two previously ran a wholesale business together. They speak every day, even at the weekend. Carol now lives in the Staffordshire countryside – ‘surrounded by farmland, a great antidote to my hectic life’ – with her husband Mark who works in interior design. The pair have been together for 32 years but only married a couple of years ago in a low-key ceremony and don’t have children. They do have four jack russell terriers, which are one reason why Carol – who drives over an hour every day to the office, leaving home at 8am and returning at 8pm – says she does not socialise much in the evenings, unless she has to for work.

Carol was a winner at the recent NatWest Everywoman Awards for being a role model for young women. She feels proud to be bringing value to ‘the youth end’ of the market. ‘We are giving great fashion to those with fewer means. Here in the UK especially, we have a huge student following. Because of us, that young girl can have something new that won’t cost her the earth.’ Prices have ‘trended down’, thanks to competition from the likes of Primark, and ‘it’s only right that we pass on what we can of our profits to the consumer through discounts and promotions’. (One of these is the Meal Deal, whereby customers get a three-part outfit for £30. The comparisons to fast food are hard to avoid.)

As for talk about the death of the high street, Carol says she is as sad as anyone about this. But she points out that the wild success of Primark – along with H&M and New Look, Boohoo’s biggest competitor – suggests that maybe those ailing bricks-and-mortar retailers just ‘haven’t got their proposition right’. There’s no denying the data showing a big shift to online shopping, though – ‘I feel so pleased that we never opened a shop. Even a pop-up shop, though a good marketing tool, is an awful lot of work.’ Carol believes there is hope for the high street. ‘Today, it’s about destination shopping,’ she says. ‘In Manchester, we have a huge Zara and a huge Primark, plus Selfridges and Harvey Nichols. Those are all destinations and so they get footfall.’ She thinks that the high street will have to evolve to be ‘more about social experiences: cafés, gyms and meeting spaces’.

She cites the Gen Z love of travel and the fact that they prioritise spending on ‘experiences’ over ‘stuff ’ as another reason for her company’s success. ‘They’d rather go off round the world and buy their clothes from us! I wish Boohoo had been there for me when I was that age. Honestly, I would love to be 25 today.’ 27,000 STYLES ON THE WEBSITE 130 NEW ITEMS UPLOADED EACH WEEK 7.2 MILLION SALES IN A SIX-MONTH PERIOD 6.5 MILLION ACTIVE CUSTOMERS