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Maternity wear designer Isabella Oliver hits £1.5m in first year
Isabella Oliver, the maternity clothes designer, has been developing a fast-growing niche in the maternity clothing women’s apparel market. The company, which started trading in 2003, has exceeded sales of £1.5m in its first year of operations, of which 70% is being sold via the Internet.
Isabella Oliver was founded by two women who noticed at first hand the lack of stylish, chic maternity wear: Vanessa Knox-Brien, previously head designer at Victoria’s Secrets in New York and Baukjen de Swaan Arons, a marketeer in the FMCG sector.
“We’re thrilled at the progress over the past eighteen months,” said Baukjen de Swaan Arons. “From personal experience we know what women want during pregnancy and there was a frightening shortage of stylish, well-designed, figure-hugging maternity clothing. We are pleased that our trading performance endorses this vision.”
The company has now launched three maternity collections (Essentials, Sleepwear and Loungewear) and has received significant endorsements from the fashion and business community. Customers are able to purchase on-line, phone or by mail order. With strong customer service values, all purchases are luxuriously and individually hand wrapped.
To cope with increased levels of business (now comfortably exceeding six figures per month), Isabella Oliver has recently overhauled its website (www.isabellaoliver.com), designed and built by Screen Pages, an online retail specialist. Sales conversions (visitors to orders) currently run at 6%, well above industry norms. In addition, it the company has taken new loft conversion offices in London’s Kentish Town to provide space for additional personnel and warehousing.
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