Running a fashion shop
Introduction
I worked for five weeks at Deploy demi-couture, a women’s clothes shop and company in London, for my industry placement. For the first three weeks I worked in the company’s shop learning skills required for running a successful fashion shop. This included smaller details like good customer service, organising displays and social media management, and larger aspects like how the shop and company is run. The final two weeks were spent working more in the studio helping a designer to cut patterns and repair damaged clothes, which gave me an insight into the design and production processes. The report will analyse my learning experience on personal and professional levels, showing it can be used in the future and how I can improve, as well as the company, its structure and operating processes.
The company and its brand philosophy
Deploy is a small London based company with a single full functioning shop in London that also sells online internationally to countries including the United States and Taiwan. The company Seamsystemic Ltd., trading as Deploy, was founded in 2005 by Bernice Pan and Eleanor Yeh. Bernice has experience in education and fashion and Eleanor has background in finance and international markets. There are two shops, one is Deploy Boutique in Marleybone where I worked and Deploy Atelier in the City of London, which only can be used by appointment. Tosin Trim a member of the management team is a specialist of bridal and accessories and created Hennumi, a line of bridal accessories under Deploy, with Bernice, and Deploy Choreograph Bridal and Bespoke service (Deploy, 2014).
Deploy makes clothes that are haute couture and highly sustainable. They are fine tailored and aimed at modern feminine women. Haute couture is a style from France and was popular in the interwar years in Belgium and France. French couture closely guarded its designs, models and prototypes. Belgian bourgeoisie thought it showed good taste, prestige and luxury (Blaszczyk, 2008, p. 63). This quality can be seen in Deploy’s design processes, products and prices. Clothes are produced by skilled staff, designed in-house and are sold at premium prices. At the same time it is better for the environment and more sustainable by being less wasteful (Deploy, 2014). This kind of style and philosophy means products are more highly priced because they are high quality, specifically designed and ethical which some customers are happy to pay more money for. Environmental awareness has increased in recent years and will keep growing, and it is affecting people's shopping habits. The shop’s competition will be other small independent high quality clothes shops as well as high priced chain brands, and not really high street shops. Their customers will be young adult to middle aged women who have high salary and care a lot about their style. They will feel the quality of their clothes shows something of their personality and success in work and life. They will also like that Deploy is a unique brand clothes shop and not a chain, so they will stand out from others.
Deploy has a management team ran by Bernice Pan and Eleanor Yeh mentioned. In addition there is Tosin Trim who specialises in bridal accessories and is in charge of Hennumi and Deploy Choreograph Bridal and Bespoke Service. There is also Claudia Simms who has lots of experience in marketing and sales for big companies and will help expand Deploy with this. Also Ermelinda Shuka is in charge of business admin (Deploy, 2014). The manager team is not very big but because it is a small company, the ration of manager to staff is bigger. Most managers have lots of previous experience which should help the company grow faster than if they only learned when working there. I found that staff at Deploy have their own responsibilities which is good because they can focus on certain aspects they know most about. Also, many of the staff are part time workers. This is useful because they are more flexible.
Supply chain
The company is small so they don’t have a large scale supply chain. However, production and sales take place across the world. From the beginning, samples and patterns are made in-house. This adds to the shop’s position as one for unique clothing. It also helps protect the designs from being copied before they are sold which shows its haute couture heritage. After this, most production of clothes happens in London and Poland, and some eveningwear is made by a small designer sewing unit in Taiwan. Production in London and Poland will help make sure quality is kept high and also the method is more environmentally friendly because of less transport distance as the brand philosophy requires. Production in Taiwan is specialist because of the designer sewing unit and only some of the clothes are made there, keeping down environmental impact. Many fabrics used in the production process are supplied from the UK, for example Harris Tweed. This again reduces environmental impact. Some fabrics although are sourced from Europe and some silks from Taiwan. Links between the owners and Taiwan are clear from production, fabrics sourcing and selling. The personal contacts may help reduce costs and help in competition as other shops will not have them for their quality and costs. The high quality and high price materials used are common in haute couture clothes and associate with wealth and high standards which suits the style of the company.
For sales, Deploy is supported by UK Trade & Investment (UKTI), a government organisation helping businesses export to foreign countries. Through this Deploy has been helped to sell to countries including Japan. Deploy also attends trade shows and uses agents to get international buyers in countries such as Japan and United States. It can be seen that Deploy, although just a small shop, does not only look at selling in its shop in London. It also wants to increase international sales. This is good for business because it increases sales without increasing many costs such as more shop rent and storing stock. As international selling is more common these days, the costs of sending products abroad is lower. It also means competitor shops and companies will also be doing the same and so is essential to compete with them. For the future, it helps support growth of the company because the clothes and brand image spread around the world, helping find and prepare markets in other countries than can be targeted more specifically. If I own my own jewellery shop in the future I will make online shopping at least as big as in the shop. Costs are lower and the potential customers more. The profits would help run my shop. Also, I would use services as UKTI and agents to help find customers abroad and help export products in big amounts.
I learned from how even the one shop gets orders from other areas like Taiwan and America. I got some ideas about this that I can use in my own business in the future. It taught me how to observe customers trends, choose what kinds of customers and how to satisfy customers’ needs. I learned how to do research and use Photoshop to make pictures nicer to attract more people. I can use these skills in my own business to make a good website to sell and target audiences to find who would like to buy my products.
Because designs and samples are made in-house, it is good for the company’s uniqueness. They can control their own themes and styles without looking like others or being copied easily by others, at least until after production. It also adds to the uniqueness of the clothes which customers will like. Also, staff are skilled in design so know how to make and change the clothes unlike in most high street shops. This means a higher standard of service and knowledge. Customers will feel they are buying the service as well as the clothes, which justifies the premium price more.
Personal responsibility and learning
While working in the shop I took on the responsibilities for assisting customers, managing the shop layout and displays, and helping promote the shop and its products online through social media. I would have to open the shop and organise the clothing displays according to colour and style. Although the task appears simple, the importance is in organising the clothes in a way that shows them in their best way and makes them appealing to the customer. Therefore, I arranged them into colour groups and styles that were complementary. Although this does not alter the look of the individual items, the display as a whole is better looking and more likely to attract customers. The style of the display also affects the brand image of the clothes and the shop as a whole. A tidier display that appears to itself have been designed and is not cluttered gives the impression of a brand and products that are displayed this way because they are also designed with care and not mass produced, but more selective and unique. Shops with high value clothes almost always pay close attention to the way their products are displayed, with some shops having their own well-known display styles. An analysis of Hollister shops can be applied to the practice, as it aims at 'transporting consumers... to somewhere else entirely' (Murrell, 2012). This boosts the brand image of the clothes and supports the customers’ belief they are buying a high quality product.
This skill was further used when I had to assist in changing the shop’s entire window display. Once again the selection of clothes and how they appeared to customers had to convey an image to people walking past that would match the brand philosophy and encourage them to come into the shop. I think I worked well at organising displays, keeping them looking appealing. However, I could learn more about ways certain types of clothes can be arranged and even further learning about lighting and customer psychology related to the appearance of clothing displays. On my last day I put skills I learned into practice. Deploy had a stall at a market which I set up displaying dresses and hats in a way to show they positively and attract customers. The display was well made and attracted attention from people walking past.
When customers bought clothes online I would have to pack them and send them to be posted. Despite having customers around the world, clearly the company is still small enough to not need a larger packing and delivery section of its supply chain. This gave me an insight into the simplicity of international shopping. Also, in support of this online selling I worked on the shop’s social media management. This involved contacting other companies to inform them of new products and collections. Most significantly I created an Instagram account for the shop, took photos of products and posted them on the website. This was important for a number of reasons. Potential customers are likely to be regular users of social media, smart phones and tablets. The use of Instagram would therefore allow the company promote its products directly to customers and encourage them towards the website or even the shop. Second, the appearance of products is one of the strongest influences on a potential customer and so an image focused social media network can allow the company to spread images of its products easily, allowing potential customers to see the products before they even visit the website or the shop, encouraging them to do so. Finally, using Instagram is essentially free but has the potential to spread images widely and, when correctly tagged, to a specific audience of women interested in fashion who are most likely to buy from the shop. The potential then for an increase in sales for no costs is significant, particularly when compared to traditional marketing and advertising campaigns.
I was surprised then at the shop’s lack of an Instagram account. Perhaps if they continue to utilise such free social media tools they can boost online sales which in turn would lead to the need for a more efficient process of dispatching products. For example, their Facebook page on has over 200 fans, it is not a lot. Getting fans on social media will help keep customers interested in products by keeping them aware of the shop. This will mean there are more repeat purchases which companies depend on (Easey, 2008, p. 5).
For experience in clothes production I help cutting designs and learned about making hats. This was useful to know more about the production part of the supply chain. Being a small shop with clothes of its own design, the design studio aspect is still very important rather than being mostly mass produced machine made products. Because of this, the company requires skilled designers and clothes makers who may have a lot of experience and skill. Although this may not be the most efficient method of production, it allows for high quality and well-designed products. This also contributes to the brand image as customers know they are buying unique clothes created with a deep level of thought and attention to detail by people will a great knowledge of style, which helps justify a higher price. I could apply such a model to a jewellery business in the future, focusing on high quality hand produced and uniquely designed products that be sold at a higher price. Customers will not only be buying the physical product but also the effort put into the design and uniqueness. However, with jewellery it may be easier to create a more efficient production process, through the use of machinery, compared to Deploy Workshop. But on the other hand, many customers may prefer the ‘hand-made’ aspect of jewellery so there are pros and cons to both options.
I too worked on the logistics of the shop. I recorded new products information like size, colour and material. I made these into a spreadsheet. For bigger shops this is probably to be done automatically with scanners. Because the shop is smaller, it is done by person which takes more time but is cheaper. This part of the work is still important to learn. Even though I am interested in jewellery and fashion, a shop would not work well without these things being done properly.
Conclusion
My time at Deploy demi-couture was very useful learning experience and will help me in my business in the future. I learned the important parts of running a shop, organising a business and promoting it online. The useful parts of running a shop are making high quality unique products which are more competitive because there are few like it. Also if they are high quality they can be sold at higher price which can mean more profit. Aiming these unique products at a specific audience will help increase sales rather than making a general product for a general audience. High skill is needed to make this kind of product so I would need to be skilled myself and hire people who are also skilled. Deploy examples this by hiring skilled designers to work in their company, skilled dress makers in Taiwan, Poland and London and skilled managers with lots of experience in the management team. This mix of skills means there is a good mix of strengths in the company and it can succeed in all areas. In the future I too would try to hire people like this. Social media and online selling is another important technique in the business. It helps reach a bigger market around the world, more important as people in more and more countries have more money to spend on expensive clothes like this and are interested in quality fashion. I learned about social media marketing and helped improve that for Deploy by creating their Instagram account. However, I think they need to improve their social media. They only have a few followers. Social media is used by people of all backgrounds, countries and wealth and is a good way in which trends spread and people find out about what they like. It also keeps customers coming back. For my future business I would use it to find my target audience and show them my products to encourage them to buy. Finally I learned about displaying clothes and organising a shop. The appearance is more than tidiness, it shows the philosophy of the company. Also it is not only about the shop but useful for online selling too. Overall, I experienced lots of aspects of business when working at Deploy, seeing how they work well and how they can improve. I also learned a lot about myself and what I need to do in the future for my own business.
Blaszczyk, R. L. (2008) Producing Fashion: Commerce, Culture, and Consumers. Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania Press.
Deploy. 2014. “About”, (accessed 10/06/14) <http://deployworkshop.com/pages/about-us>.
Easey, M. (2008) Fashion Marketing. 3rd ed. London: John Wiley & Sons.
Murrell, A. (2012) "Analysis of the Hollister in-store experience", Daily Slandered (accessed, 17/06/14) <http://www.dailyslandered.com/2012/05/analysis-of-the-hollister-in-store-experience/> .
