Interview with Ivana Ojukwu, Co-Founder of See Fashion
Ivana Ojukwu, COO & Co-Founder of See Fashion gave a confident and detailed pitch about how See Fashion is empowering many fashion brands through technology. They use a pre-order crowdfunding system to launch new items from fresh designers into the marketplace. After Ivana pitched we manage to catch up and go through a few questons about the story of See Fashion and her take on the FashTech industry.
Why did start your company?
We started the company because we saw first-hand our hard it was for young designers to start their fashion businesses. Aaron, who had previously run an ethical fashion company for 4 years, experienced the pains of sourcing suppliers, high upfront costs and difficulties in establishing market demand. We decided to leverage his experience and existing connections to help others going through the same process. With London being home to 5 of the top 10 fashion schools in the world, we have access to some of the best designer talent. We want to give these graduates and designers the opportunities to build their brands and strengthen London’s position as the fashion capital of the world.
How did you go about building your team and other parts to support your idea?
We identified the skills that we needed to develop our vision and used it to source marketing, graphic design and tech talent. It is really important to know exactly what you want before you start hiring, as it will help you sift the good candidates from the great ones. It is also essential that any new people you bring into your team understand and believe in your vision. We made sure we were consistent in our message of empowering young designers throughout our recruitment process. When someone joins a start up, they know that they are taking a significant pay cut. However they will be willing to make this trade off if they believe they are going to be part of something new and groundbreaking. I am so grateful for the team we have built over the past few months. There are ups and downs but because they believe in our vision, are incredibly talented and are great characters…its all worth it!
What do you feel were the key tipping points which contributed to a successful launch?
a good plan, a good team and passion.
If you could give a piece of advice to people getting into FashTech industry what would it be?
Do your research! Once you have pinned down what your vision is, identify and research your market (i,e who are your competitors? what’s the market size?) After you have done your research, make a plan — What will my brand be called? what is my starting budget? What problem am I solving? Finally, build a team. You can’t do this on your own. You may have to do the initial start-up process like company registration, financing and market planning by yourself but it won’t be long before you will need an extra pair of hands to see your ideas take off. My best advice to finding those core team members is to network. There are great events across London run by start up communities such as Google Campus, Innovation Warehouse and WeWork to help you find the perfect co-founder, CTO and design wizards. Be bold, mingle and find the team who are as crazy and passionate about your business idea as you are.
What do you feel is the future of your industry, what changes and opportunities do you see in it?
The fash-tech industry will grow exponentially in the next 10 years especially as brands are finally understanding the importance of big data in identifying new markets and increasing sales. I also believe wearable technology will make a stronger resurgence. Gone are the mad-looking google glasses, enter the stylish Snapchat sunglasses. In addition to smart watches, we will see companies using technology to create new forms of fabrics out of coffee, fruits and compost. Augmented reality will also play a key role in the fash-tech industry. There is a need amongst fashion houses to get clothes from the catwalk to their stores quicker. I think AR and new payment processes will turn fashion shows to a live shopping experience where people can purchase what they see there and then.
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For more information on See Fashion:
Website: www.seefashion.co.uk
Twitter: @seefashionnow
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We are hosting more FashTech Talks monthly, If you are in Fashion or in Fashion Technology, get in touch as you may be able to tell your story at our next event!
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Twitter: @risetapp
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