Tuesday, December 22, 2009

The Fashion Industry Insider by Nicky Harris

Working as a Fashion Agent and since last July as a blogger means I have one foot firmly in the next Season and the other fixed in the present

Working as a Fashion Agent and since last July as a blogger means I have one foot firmly in the next Season and the other fixed in the present. Selling Fashion a season forward means that by the time the clothes hit the shops I am already finished selling the following Seasons ranges. If that sounds confusing it’s because it is! Right now as I struggle to get all the gifts and all the last minute cooking sorted for Christmas I find myself continually looking at my calendar for January. I see already that I have a range meeting early in January in South Molton Street, London where we will preview the next Autumn Winter Falke hosiery range. It’s a meeting I can’t miss as it’s really important to go through the range and predict what the strengths and weaknesses are before I see my first customer. I also have a Yummie Tummie range meeting in London later in the month plus a Jaeger meeting. A Nicowa meeting in Munich is sandwiched somewhere in between. It’s just my luck that the meetings aren’t concurrent which means that I will be spending huge amounts of time in that horrible tunnel hanger in Heathrow and the last time I went to Munich I got lost from the Airport and arrived in a bar with thirty Germans playing poker in an Industrial estate miles from my hotel at one O’clock in the morning! I won’t survive any of the travel without a good book and my Iphone. In between all that I will be planning and sending out invitations to all my retailers for the selling season which will start in earnest at the end of January. Organising the ranges as they arrive into the showrooms, ringing customers, talking and making appointments are all part of the lead up. Doing a spot on ‘Off the Rails’ another on Tubridy and writing a daily blog are just on the side…. Phew I’m getting tired just looking at the list.

Oh by the way if any of you great Irish boutiques owners are reading this and don’t have a website I’d like to know why? Ireland is a small country going through what can only be described as a torrent of difficulties. Don’t hide your particular unique brand under a bushel. Shout it from the rooftops and put yourself out there…

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