Greetings...

...from Bubble London. Spent the last two days introducing buyers (mainly UK independents and some large internationals) and press (WGSN, Telegraph, Stylesight and more) to the "integrative brand concept" of Baby Issa - more on that tomorrow.

Am wearing an Issa dress that is also available for children from Baby Issa called Baby Ella. Can't wait to rock this look matching with M!

Also, how cute is our wallpaper?!
And I know you can't see it properly, but our hangers are covered in the fabric of the dress / PJs / bikinis hanging on them. - I spent every free minute spacing them out evenly. I know the people at the opposite stand thought I suffer from OCD, but it's these minute details (merchandising, presentation) that elevate to / position your brand's image in peoples' eyes instantly as luxury.

Proper update tomorrow...before we leave for Pitti Bimbo in Florence, where launch Baby Issa officially and proper madness will ensue. Hopefully!

Bedbug xx

Photo (B)log

"Learning on the go", "Jumping into the deep end" and "Having your work cut out for you" are some of the idioms that describe the whirlwind of a week I've had - amongst the most hectic in my life, ever.

Between thursday and tonight,
I have organised, shot, edited (with the photographer), and helped to retouch a studio photo shoot of 30 dresses, bikinis, pj's and shorts.
Compiled, art-directed, burnt on CD, dropped off, proofed, organised to be printed and picked up the first Baby Issa Sales catalogue (for Spring/Summer 2011).
Organised 100 misc errands - from mannequins in Paris and Florence, delivery of our logo and mannequin plinths from the designers' workshop to our offices, to Florence; to finding the best and cheapest purchase order forms.

Prepared our stand at Bubble London Kidswear trade-show, which I will be manning tomorrow (Sunday) and on Monday from 9 am until 6 pm.

Printed and photocopied line sheets, created home-made purchase order forms with the help of Photoshop, printers, and carbon paper.

As I write this it doesn't look like much, but believe me, I have not slept much, eaten much or had time to think. I am high on adrenaline and I am a bit worried about neglecting my daughter.

But I also feel so excited, challenged, and grateful to have the opportunity to try all this for size, make mistakes (forgot to get business cards printed) and learn from them.

Despite being exhausted, I feel light, free and my skin is glowing.
- I don't think I can keep this pace up over time, and I think my biggest challenge in the long-term will be to organise Baby Issa in a way that defies the "last-minute is normal" mentality of the fashion industry. But for now, this is amazing!

(I must mention that none of this would be possible without the support of my family, friends, my wonderful nanny, as well as Mira's grandmother and her aunt Carlotta (yes, that Carlotta), who are kindly looking after her tomorrow and on Monday, so she doesn't get lonely.





Thursday, 17th June, 6:20 pm in Aldgate East
Sonia, our lovely long-legged photographer and Carlotta, our 5 year old new "house (super) model"



7:45 pm
Carlotta and her aunt Putzi (and self-proclaimed model agent), who kindly drove her to and from the shoot looking happy and excited at the end of the shoot



Friday, 18th June, 1.30 am in Westbourne Grove
The final .pdf for the catalogue is on this CD



9:00 am in Covent Garden
My corrections (in red ink of course) of proof at the Printer



9:15 the final proof that I signed off to be printed!



Saturday, 19th June, 8:01 pm in Angel
Our completed stand (just needs to be hoovered and decorated with our logo before tomorrow's start) at Bubble London.



Notice the print on the walls: we had one of the prints printed on huge sheets of paper, cut them to size at the fair and velcro'ed them to the walls ("Dear Exhibitors, please DO NOT use double sided tape, blue tack or staples. Any damage to the walls must be paid for by the exhibitors").



Sugar(high) Mommy

Getting Carle-d away...

There is so much I want to share, but can not yet... All I can say is: this has been one full-on day!
Plans have kept changing, and as we struggled to make do, better people, options, solutions and ideas have been entering our brains and lives. It has been amazing and inspiring, and I know I sound like a hippie, but in my experience, it is best to let go of things that aren't working, because it makes space for things, people etc that will. Maybe, it's kind of like magnetic energy - you just need to remove whatever is blocking it to make way for the right piece to find you.

I am feeling very very satisfied, I love being challenged and giving my best, consciously being present in every moment, focusing on the positive, and getting s*** done.

Have too much stuff to do to post a proper entry - preparing for my first (non-family-skype-get-together) CONFERENCE CALL with LA and NYC! Feeling super excited, might whip on a power shoulder jacket just to look the part. No, they won't be able to see me, it's not video conferencing, but who cares. It's not about that!

What I shall post here though is my major find of the day. It is not directly work related, but it is definitely related to childhood and magic and memories. And it's giving me lots of ideas for complementary products to our clothes...

I have to admit, I am baffled at how mesmerisingly beautiful and entertaining these illustrations, this story and the book's tactility still is to me, 20 some years on...

.

(copyright Eric Carle - The Very Hungry Caterpillar)

(Also love this book, because - any one who has spent time with me during the day knows this - I am ALWAYS hungry / eating..)

Really feel like Baby Issa is in the cocoon stage now - it's a super busy incubator - actually more like a bee hive!

Another photo shoot tomorrow.
We're shooting every look on the super cute Carlotta - aunt to my daughter M - at my friend Sonia's photo studio. Although our photographer dropped out at the last minute, we'll be able to do it anyway, because luckily Sonia is a photographer, too!!!

Update tomorrow!

Fingers crossed the photos will be a butterfly NOT a caterpillar!!! ;)




xoxo Not a Girl, not yet a Woman.

Under Pressure (Is-sa Baby)

It's only Tuesday and I have aged 10 years from exhaustion while feeling like a 16 year old on an adrenaline-high!

I think I'm starting to get to grips with what needs to be done and have figured out where we stand (where the two girls that were running Baby Issa before I arrived had gotten to) and slowly slowly, I'm starting to instinctively do things my way...

My vision for Baby Issa is to treat it like a very very small start-up with very very big dreams.

By this I mean, as much DIY as possible. Not just because that keeps costs as low as possible (always a good move when you have zero budget), but mainly, because that makes it as "us" as possible... I think it is evident when you look at any issue of The Face or old ID or Dazed, enter any designer's studio who is just about to hit the big time: the energy is INCREDIBLE. TANGIBLE.
And that is because everyone is involved in everything. Communication is flowing, everyone knows what everyone else is doing, gets involved and helps wherever possible. Nobody is ever bored. Exhausted yes, bored never.

Once you become a big company, it is easier, cheaper and more efficient to outsource a lot of things - most things in fact that aren't your "core" activities... This is a mentality which is obviously prevalent at Issa, which today is a large company.

Baby Issa on the other hand, is not.

We luckily have access to a lot of their infrastructure, but apart from printers, stationary, contacts and the kindness and help of their staff, I feel it is better to ignore everything they can offer us and instead "make do" - because that is when magic happens.

It is also when you learn how what needs to be done in your company, the energy involved and what kind of results can be expected - and I am sure this is invaluable knowledge and experience, when one finds oneself in the position of hiring someone or managing people...

To give you a little idea of what needs to be done at this stage in production / press / sales, I'm going to lazily post my To Do List and let you imagine the rest for yourself.


Pipi Stinki (told you I was feeling juvenile)

To Do Tuesday

1. TRADEFAIRS

• find cheap / make own Orderbooks (go to ryman / viking etc - try different options with carbon paper, lighter than 80 gsm paper / get quotes for that special carbon-style paper in yellow and pink)
  
• contact buyers for Bubble London, Pitti Bimbo Florence, Playtime Paris, ENK New York, Kidsmarket LA
• Convince Playtime to give us a space (ask Saskia or Mark to charm them in their best French)
• organise cheap and good quality mannequins for Paris (no freaky looking ones! see image)

(copyright 2ememain.be, 3B scientific, Puces d'Oc)

• get design company's budget for display plinths for mannequins and vinyl stickers for stand personalisation approved - find own shipping company, their quote much too expensive!!
• try and get an answer from Pitti whether our design is okay (find alternative phone / fax numbers to the WRONG ONES provided in their email!! ARGH!)
• decide on pricing for all dresses (include ribbon and packaging and tissue paper in cost)
• find showroom to take on our collection at kidsmarket (they don't rent out temporary space)
• make appointments with buyers to see Baby Issa

1. LOOKBOOK

• write contacts page for press and sales inquiries
  
• write accompanying text including all style names and numbers
• find studio to shoot individual looks
• burn all print files on a CD (too big to email)
  
• and send to Philippe to add to the lookbook
  
• compare all quotes from printers and decide
• contact cool friends for "mother & daughter" shoot next week
• find location for "mother & daughter" shoot
• send pics of collection to NYC showroom
  
• ask Alice to send all pics to her press contacts (Vogue, vogue.com, style.com, vogue bambini, Junior mag etc)
• ask Philippe to make prints on dresses stronger in pics
• Return all unused goods bought for photoshoot (can do any time next week)
• Thank all mothers for their patience, kindness and help with our photoshoot!!

1. LOGO

• what is our final logo??

1. M

• take M to doctor re cough
• find a new nanny as new one wants more money :(

Like mother like daughter...

Loving this shot from Tommy Ton's style blog (copyright JakAndJil.com)

Shooting babies. And children.

..is what we did yesterday. My wonderful "mother-in-law" / grandmother of my daughter M lent us her beautiful grounds and yes, her DOUBLE DECKER ROUTEMASTER BUS to photograph the Baby Issa collection on the incredibly well-behaved and charismatic babies and children of our friends and friends of friends who all kindly volunteered to drive out to Windsor on a Saturday morning. But more on that later.

First let's get down to business - the nitty gritty of planning a photo shoot.

As i stated in my previous post, before anyone can buy your product they need to be made aware of its existence. This can be done multiple ways and take endless variations and use endless mediums. What I think is as important to your brand image as your product and service is to FILL A SPACE IN THE MARKET. What is not being done, or what is not being done well. Every single business that Richard Branson has ever started is built on that premise. I'm not saying we should all do business like Virgin, but we should all be very aware of what is out there, what isn't and what the market (our potential customers) is looking for / not getting. This does not mean "provide what people need" more provide what people w a n t. They don't need to know they want it, that's your job - see the iPod for example. There were plenty of mp3 players on the market. But they made us want, actually, scrap that, they made us NEED them. Remember when every subway / tube train was awash with white headphones? When every billboard that wasn't a black silhouette dancing against a solid colour background was boring? When we all wanted to be in the same club - and the signifier was the white headphones?!

THAT is good marketing.

CREATING a space in peoples' minds (and hearts and budgets) for your product / service.

1. The Concept

When we researched what other baby and kids brands were doing in terms of marketing, we realised that there was definitely a massive space out there. A space called "FUN". Most baby and kids' ads (esp in the luxury market segment) are bafflingly bad. They fail to make me connect. The babies and children pictured leave me cold. That is a feat to pull off in itself!

My daughter is 18 months old and what I experience over and over again with her is that we get on the bus, or find ourselves in a given public place, and random strangers that would ordinarily pass me by, will make eye contact and smile, laugh, make silly faces, in short "embarrass" themselves. When it comes to babies, people do not feel inhibited. They connect and instantly form a relationship, no matter how fleeting. This relationship is innocent, it is trusting, it is beautiful. It's similar with animals. Very few people do not connect with animals or babies. And yet, most ads out there groom and tweak the kids to a degree that they are unrecognisable as innocent, innately beautiful and trusting and turn them into mini mannequins, airbrushed to "perfection", posing for the cameras. If anything, they become slightly sleazy, a bit too self-conscious and in some really bad cases, uncomfortably "sexy".

- Sorry, RL. (copyright Ralph Lauren kids)

So we make the obvious our target: create a campaign and catalogue that allows viewers to connect with the subjects. Like Issa, Baby Issa is all about ease, about having fun, about making the ordinary special, about living "the lucky life" on an everyday basis.
That is the premise of the business, that is what Daniella had in mind when she designed the dresses and that is what we want to communicate with our images and promotional materials.

2. Planning

Next, we did two things

a. start collecting images, video, and ideas for our photo shoot...
These were as varied as pages ripped from magazines - for instance Marc Jacob's campaign for Daisy - as scenes from movies - the most unlikely being one of the last scenes from Knocked up (!), when they are preparing a birthday party and the light is streaming through the womens' and childrens' hair .

(copyright of Marc Jacobs)

b. start compiling a team...
Who was the best photographer to capture children at play in their natural state? Who could help us evoke a world that the viewer would want to enter? What was the most versatile location that would provide a sense of safety for the kids to let loose as well as being a beautiful backdrop for our images? Which kids would we use? Models? Kids scouted at the park? Our own and friends' children? Etc etc. Once we had compiled our images and assembled out team, it was most important to communicate as much as possible to create as distinct an idea of our dream result as possible and to avoid any unneccesary difficulties. For most of us, this was the first time we were working with kids and we were unsure what to expect.

- The lovely Alice (Issa's PR girl, who has been working over time to help out with Baby Issa) and Rob (producer of the photo shoot) manically coordinating babies, parents, transportation, cameras etc on their bbs.

3. Organising

The third stage is getting it all ready, AKA

• choosing which products to shoot
• choosing which "model" would wear what
• buying, customising and making accessories to create a complete "Baby Issa look"
• meeting, telephoning and emailing endlessly about ideas, locations, call sheets, contact details etc - of course this includes liaising with 20 pairs of parents about what where who why and how.
• deciding on and staying within the budget
• setting a time line for everything - aka photo shoot, post production, printing, binding etc

- my notes..

In the end, we decided to ask our friends and acquaintances whether they would kindly bring their kids to Windsor and let us photograph them in Baby Issa clothes. It just seemed the most natural thing to do and it worked brilliantly. There was a real sense of community, if not family, at the shoot - the parents were incredibly helpful, patient and kind, the kids were all incredible personalities, including their appearance, and our photographer Philippe Kliot gamely ran around with them all day, capturing their energy, spirits and innocence.

4. Editing and Post-production

As we're under time pressure to compile a preliminary look book for the childrens' trade fair Pitti Bimbo in Florence, where we plan to launch Baby Issa this month, Philippe stayed up til 3 am editing and roughly photo shopping the images, playing with different light and colours.
He, Daniella and I all met in the afternoon to finalise which images we want to use for the look book and we were all incredibly pleased with the result. Not only do the dresses and little boy shorts, polo shirts and hair accessories look beautiful, the images are incredibly evocative and really create a sense of the "Printed World of Baby Issa"!!!


The Baby Whisperer.

Shooting babies.

So you've got your products and are ready to sell them. All you need now is someone to buy them.
Right?
Kind of. First you need someone to be aware of your product and then, they can decide whether or not to buy them.

The power of word of mouth is not to be underestimated, in any business, but especially in the fashion industry. And of course in regard to consumers.

I think one of the best ways to build loyalty (and repeat purchases) is to give your customers a forum to voice their opinions about your products and service and then to l i s t e n.

Pampers' website for example, allows customers to post feedback on their products. One of their new nappy ranges is meant to provide dryness for longer while allowing increased freedom of movement for the toddler. More than 10 customers have raised the issue that the new products do not fulfill their function - that the nappies leak and that they suspect that the new range is just a ploy to get them to buy more nappies.

While reading these comments, I felt very sorry for the mothers describing the mishaps they had experienced due to Pampers' faulty new product, but could also tell how unhappy managers at Pampers would be if they read these comments.

It doesn't seem like anyone is reading them, though, as there is 0 reaction on the comments feed from any official Pampers representative.

This is a massive blunder.

It would be almost as bad, if they just removed the comments section, which surely would be the first reaction they would have, if anyone made the effort to read it in the first place.

What the Internet really enables us to do is interact with our customers. It is perhaps the most valuable tool ever invented for businesses. And I don't mean that just in a PR / Marketing capacity.

Imagine if Pampers read these comments, and REACTED.
Imagine if Pampers apologised.
Imagine if Pampers let their customers know that they had heard their complaints and were working on finding a solution.
Imagine if Pampers kept them posted on what they were doing to rectify the situation.
Imagine if Pampers offered those customers new products, their money back or a voucher for free shipping or a discount on their next purchase.
Imagine if Pampers then came up with a better product and let their customers know that this product was borne out of a reaction to their feedback.
Imagine if Pampers made it a collaborative process and gave their customers credit.
Imagine if Pampers became the brand that actively worked with parents.

Now that would be powerful stuff.

Pampers would become the brand REALLY trusted by parents, as they would have shown transparency, accountability, and as importantly, made a transaction that was purely financial (money for nappies) and elevated it to become a social relationship!

That would be brand building on a level that no advertising, celebrity endorsement or money could buy.

Anyway, I digress.
What this blog post is meant to concern, is the Baby Issa photo shoot.
I think I'll just start a new post... Sorry, as I said, I'm still new to this.

Slummy Mummy xx

PS: you can delve deeper into the whole financial transaction vs social relationship aspect of business in Behavioural Economist Dan Ariely's fabulously entertaining book Predictably Irrational.