The Antonio D'Errico collection is off to a good start

The title is a little misleading as they are already renowned in Europe as a cutting edge fashion house. Not only that but they are also in various other non EU countries, ie USA including Saks in New York, Brazil, and I believe Australia too. The UK is on the verge of something special with them from now on.

The early success we have achieved with the company has been encouraging. Although it hasn't resulted in massive volumes of business due to most shops having already placed all their orders for spring this year, we have opened some significant accounts. Other enquiries for the collection are being dealt with on an ongoing basis, some from Ireland, both north and south. The Scots also seem to like them very much.

The reaction from those who have received their first orders has been very good. We have loaned out styles for some shops to use at wedding fairs and catwalk shows for themselves and the customer reaction has been very favourable.

Top up re-orders have been placed for some styles having sold well so far, and it's encouraging to see retailers becoming excited at the general way the company operates with repeat orders available within 30 days.

Antonio is showing all over the place this year. He was in Rome last weekend, is in Essen (Düsseldorf) this next weekend, then Barcelona Bridal and then SposaItalia at Milan 22 to 25 May. He's even doing Sao Paulo, Brazil, in August after Moda

We have been invited over to the Milan exhibition as they will have all of their 2016 styles on show so we are really excited at seeing them early. We will have a chance to see what's coming to MODA in August. I'm told Antonio is also considering doing the PURE Womenswear too.

I was sent the following picture from Teresa (Antonio's wife) today of the stand at Rome. I think you'll see they don't hang about in making themselves known, And why should they? They're as good as you'll see anywhere else.

Have a good May Bank holiday folk and keep your eyes on the blog for updates from the Essen show from where Teresa is sending me more photo's.

An opportunity for a "Buy one - get two free" deal

Most retailers will know that the collections they stock for the spring and summer have generally been ordered around August to September the previous year. This is par for course.

Having been awarded the current fashion house contracts we now hold far too late in the year to make the sales for this spring - summer we always knew things would be slow until the next exhibitions in August. This has been the case as expected. Too many shop-owners are saying they don't have any budget left to buy further stock, and that their shop is bursting at the seams already.

I empathise with them and know from experience that they are telling it the way it is.
What is happening every day though, is that the customer who visits a shop today was in the one down the road yesterday looking at the same collections. Tomorrow they will be in the next shop up the road, also looking at the same things.

It's one big merry go round. Every potential customer visiting a shop is presented with all "the usual suspects" they have seen elsewhere or will see later. There's little in the way of individuality. There's little difference in prices, one shop to another either. Sometimes I think a customer spends hours trying on things just for a day out. Let's face it; if they try on all the styles in one shop they won't see much more in the next one but they rarely come back to the earlier shop do they? I think they often just buy in exasperation more than preference.

So many of them have fictional sisters they need to consult, and the coffee shops must do a roaring trade from them as that's where they supposedly go to mull things over before they come back to buy. Which is how often?

So, Maggies Boutique (fictional name of course) down the road which has the same collections as you, was visited yesterday. That means you have little new to offer that they haven't already seen.

Then comes Antonio D'Errico. OK, you don't have it in stock but they can be ordered and delivered within 30 days. No commitment to a large order is needed either as the collection is in production all year so you can take it steady and buy to top up as the season progresses.

So, what about the" buy one - get two free"

Quite simply, we get quite a few enquiries for an outfit directly through our agency emails that we cannot fulfil directly. An agency really isn't the point of sale to an end customer. We always prefer to pass on sales leads to the nearest retailer who has the stock enquired about. That's what the business is all about isn't it?

So, taking an example from today, we had an enquiry from a lady asking about a full outfit including hat and bag. She had seen the style in Italy and was seeking the nearest UK retailer.

The style she asked about wasn't one that had been bought yet by any UK retailer though. The price of the outfit in Italy was very much the same as in the UK for a normal retail business.

So, my offer to a local shop who hadn't seen the collection, was that she buys the outfit the lady needed along with another two styles to make a first order of 3 pieces. The second and third styles would be free depending on her taking the sale of the 1st outfit.

Simple. Take the sale for one, buy three, deliver the one that has already been sold and the shop is left with another two for nowt. That's a damn good deal in my books.

2nd and third styles chosen for free:

This deal depends on someone asking for an outfit not in a location already serviced by an existing retailer of Antonio D'Errico so won't happen to more than a handful, but if I come knocking on your door you can bet there's a good opportunity awaiting.

Good luck with the rest of the season ladies.

Some sad and some glad

After spending months of negotiation with Granditalia where we were promised a full sample set for spring 2015 we have reached the end of the rails with the company.
They have frustrated us in many ways from making vain promises to send stock, in allowing us agency rights then actually wanting us to become the UK distributor which is a completely different thing and very expensive for us.

We can't work with that sort of company and without sample styles we had nowhere to go with it.
We send Antonella our best wishes for her lovely creations and if she has some change of heart on future agency requirements we may well pick this up again.

On the subject of lack of sample styles I must also say that lovely as Alejandro de Miguel's styles are, we just can't sell them from a lookbook and material swatches. It's like trying to sell a Lamborghini from a photo and paint chart. 
No-one is going to commit to a purchase like that especially since this is a far pricier collection than most here in the UK.
So we have also decided to desist from offering this in the UK. The fact that we haven't actually sold any due to lack of samples to show retailers is a deciding factor.

Franc Sarabia is also close to a similar fate. They won't commit to more than 5 sample styles and a look-book and material swatches. This is a more useful collection for the UK as it embodies all that most special occasion shops would like to stock. They won't commit to any exhibitions here, except for at the White galleries in Battersea where they are showing the wedding gowns and a selection of special occasion styles. The wedding gowns department don't have a UK agent and any chance of making much progress in that particular market in the UK will be extremely difficult due to the large designer list they have to compete with.

Far better to promote the Special Occasion collection which is represented here by ourselves, show at MODA and gain a foothold in a market lacking much in the way of different styling. I think they are going about this the wrong way and I will need to assess the situation after the White Galleries exhibition to see whether or not it will be any use in going forward with it. What frustrates me more than anything though is that they are supposedly showing around 19 styles which are on our portfolio but they are then taking them back to Spain instead of leaving them with us to show retailers. OUCH.... That's a good slap in the face.

Now the good news
We are steadily building the Antonio D'Errico retail list. It has been a slow start as most shops had already fulfilled their buying requirements for the spring and summer before we got the collection. However we are finding that some shops are looking for something different and exciting. They are also looking for a collection where they don't have to commit to a large forward order which is what Antonio D'Errico is all about. Small orders and frequent top ups is the way to manage the budget and stock in shop.

In our contemplations for new areas to work in, we have found a new company to the UK; or at least to the UK mainland. It has already made inroads into Ireland, north and south.

The company has two collections. The first is Moncho Heredia. This is the higher end fashion collection but the prices are still very reasonable and compare favourably to other brands such as the Carla Ruiz.

The 2nd is Casting Collection. Both are made in Spain and the main difference is in the cost due to the higher specification material used in the Moncho Heredia.

While the summer disappoints in the very changeable weather conditions we understand that most shops will be cautious in taking new collections. They will also be wary of the fact the season is reportedly very slow so stand a chance of being left with stock in a larger quantity than usual.

However, we find that most potential shop customers do the rounds. they go from one shop to the next. They spend hours of your time looking at the same styles they had already seen in the last shop, or will see in the next one they go to.
Something new is bound to get a good reception. We have found that the Antonio D'Errico collection is just the job to take sales from "the usual suspects".

The shops who placed early orders have now got experience of the admiration for these beautiful styles.

With Easter very close, I wish all of our visitors to this blog, as well as our customers, a very happy and relaxing (rewarding maybe?) Easter.