Wow....it's been one whole year since we relaunched our agency with a new website and name. I can't believe how quickly it has gone and how busy we have been....so busy that I started writing about our relaunch back in April 24 but never got chance to finish it!
So here we go....what happened at our relaunch and what we have been up to since!
As part of the evening I made a speech....so for those of you who didn't make it here is what I waffled on about.....
"For as long as I can remember having a fashion business was my dream….from making clothes for my barbies at age 4 out of old pillowcases to being here now at the relaunch of my business.
It’s been a long journey to say the least and in particular the last two years have been brutal.
I started my business in 2011 with my womenswear label Fazane Malik and went onto win Midlands Designer of the Year and also Runner UpEntrepreneur of the Year at the Nottingham Post Women in Business Awards, as well as a competition with ASOS Marketplace to get 6 month’s worth of free business mentoring.
Through this in 2013 I set-up The Production Lab in response to my absolute inability to market and sell my brand and bring some much needed cash into the business to have someone do that for me.
This side of the business progressed rapidly and in 2015 when my son Jonny was born I decided to quietly close down my brand and concentrate on The Production Lab. It’s not what I had envisioned but business is never smooth and I feel that to last you have to continuously keep adapting, changing and updating…something I feel we are still doing to this day.
Over the years we have expanded our offering…manufacturing in the UK, Portugal, China and Turkey and over the past 13 years have worked with over 80 different brands ranging from men’s, women’s, kids, lingerie, sportswear, socks, accessories and many, many more.
In 2020 when covid hit I thought we were a gonna but luckily given the fact the majority of our clients were online and online sales increased so much we tripled our turnover. I also used the downtime to work on the business, refresh the website and reposition ourselves in the market.
This brought in a lot of new clients and two finalist positions for Fashion & Beauty Entrepreneur of the Year at the Great British Entrepreneur Awards in 2020 and 2021.
By 2022 we were flying and on target to hit the 1m turnover mark but success isn’t always what you imagined and I was soon brought backdown to earth.
I had a lot going on in my personal life and one day I came into work and had a panic attack for the first time in my life. The pressure of a fast-growing business, a nightmare client and life had gotten to me.
I got progressively worse and would shake with anxiety from morning to night. I had to move home with my parents as I couldn’t look after myself.
It got to a point where I felt I couldn’t carry on anymore and after numerous calls to the paramedics to come and take me away I decided I had to fight it for the sake of my son.
I took myself off to Bali for a month to complete a retreat, relax and learn to cope with the anxiety. Being around people all day shaking like a leaf and in severe pain wasn’t easy but I continually pushed myself and after a few days had fleeting moments of calm. Unfortunately in my second week there I was hospitalised in severe pain and was diagnosed with a stomach ulcer and was very heavily medicated. I decided to fly home as I was no use at the retreat off my head on painkillers and felt it was better to continue my treatment back home.
I came home in early August 2022 and the long road to recovery began. Unfortunately due to my illness and not being able to get any new clients during that time, coupled with the effects of Brexit and the cost of living crisis we lost over ¾ million pounds in planned sales leaving us on the brink of collapse.
I was slowly getting better, the pain from my stomach ended up being psychosomatic but I was still very weak and quite honestly couldn’t see myself continuing with the business….plus how on earth was I going to pull us back after losing all that money?!
We had to make one of the girls redundant in late 2022 and I got to a point where I said to the girls….I literally cannot do this anymore. Thankfully they wouldn’t let me give up on my dream and we sat down to come up with a plan to keep going.
I still wasn’t 100% sure so in early 2023 I invited the wonderful Paul Goldman to try and help me work on an exit strategy. Despite my fragility he also saw hiding deep down that spark I once had for the business and offered to help me get back on track.
And that was the start of our rebrand….Paul brought on board the wonderful Danielle from The Gather Creative and Liselle from Tailored Marketing Solutions who together with Paul helped us to go back to our roots and rediscover exactly what we were all about. When I started The Production Lab Iwanted to do things differently hence our original motto “Not Your AverageManufacturer”.
Having previously worked for a huge supplier to the high street I had experienced first-hand how badly we were treated and even internally! I promised myself my business would never be like that. I wanted my staff to love coming to work, to feel supported and needed, for our suppliers to love working with us and get paid a fair price, and our clients to feel supported and cared for.
We had lost some of that ethos working with bigger clients who ended up treating us terribly so it became clear that going forward we would focus on passion projects, projects with meaning and a purpose where we can feel like we are making a difference.
I took my name off the business when I was ill, as I just didn’t want it to be about me anymore but after much discussion, we decided to put it back on. By now I was feeling much better and had found that old spark I once had. I even managed to get to be a finalist at the Great British Entrepreneur Awards for 2023 for the Creative Entrepreneur of the Year.
We also brought in an amazing all female team of accountants Troy Business Services who have alongside Paul worked wonders on the financial side of things. I’ve learnt so much over the past year….I just wish I had met them in the beginning as I would probably be retired by now living my best life on a beach somewhere!!
So here we are in 2024 at the relaunch of the Fazane Fox Production Agency. Things are still tough but we are fighters and won’t give up. So many exciting plans for the future which we will be revealing over the next few months and we hope huge growth. I hope all of you here today will help support us in that dream.
To end I just wanted to say a few thankyou to the key people that have helped me on my journey. It may appear to always be “always about me” but quite frankly I wouldn’t be here now without these people and they have helped shaped me and the business to where it is today.
Firstly I would like to thank my family and in particular my Dad and brother Joseph who are here tonight. Joseph and my Dad helped me set up the business initially, invested in me and have helped me out massively over the years. I would love to be able to present you both with a cheque tonight for all the money I owe you but unfortunately I am not quite there yet….so if anyone wants to help me out I’ll leave a donation bucket by the door.
Seriously though both of you inspire me and I watch in amazement at your own business successes. I know I do things differently to you both and that it’s taken me a lot longer to get where I am now but I hope that you are both proud of me.
My mum isn’t here tonight but I would just like to publicly t hank her for looking after me always, and especially during my illness, and for picking me up off the floor when I felt I couldn’t go on any longer. Thankyou for helping me look after my house and my son, and for bringing me food parcels when I am broke and hungry. I hope that I am able to be as good a mum to my son as you are to me.
Secondly to my long-suffering girls Cathryn and Chloe.The support you have given me particularly over the past couple of years has been mind blowing. From not letting me give up when I was seriously ill, to helping me come up with additional ways of bringing money in and even taking a voluntary pay cut when things got really bad. Both of you massively inspire me and have taught me so much and I am so lucky to have you.
Nothing I can do can thank you enough for everything….I know you both need a massive pay rise and that’s coming but for today I would just like to give you both these flowers as a little thankyou and also let you know that given the level of commitment you have shown to me and the business I am currently working on giving you both shares in the company in the near future as you aren’t just employees but part of the company.
Thirdly I would like to thank Paul Goldman. Nothing I could say or give you would be enough to thank you for your constant help and support. Always at the end of the phone when I need help, always guiding me and ringing me with your latest ideas to help the business. I think the only way I can thank you is to keep working hard and make a success of this and make you proud too.
Final few thankyou’s before I finish. Thank you to Karl, Emma and Molly for the use of this wonderful space tonight (Mr Shaw's House) and for supporting me over the years with my business and for also giving me the chance to fulfil my dream of DJing over the past few years.
Thankyou to Alex (Line and Dot Creative) and Erica (CAD for Fashion) my Fashion Business Besties who are always there for advice or general silliness and have kept me going through my darkest hours.
Thank you to Danielle of The Gather Creative for our fabulous new website and to Liselle of Tailored Marketing Solutions for the marketing campaign alongside it.
Thankyou to Lindsey of Passion marketing for your support over the past few years…. especially for bringing together the peer-to-peer network I was part of in lock down which helped me no end.
Thank you to the gang at MRZV Manufacturing who we are now partnering with to bring a complete end to end service for our clients. We work so well together and I just love the late night drunk texts telling me how wonderful I am.
Thank you to my Junior School teacher Charlotte Holwell who fuelled my desire to work in fashion with her crazy patterned tights and wonderfuloutfits. I remember sitting in class utterly fascinated by her clothes….she probably won’t remember this but she got a hole in her PE leggings and patched them up with balloon patches which I just thought at the time was incredible.
Thankyou to a few of my besties who are here tonight….Jamie,Elena and Deb who have always been there for me no matter what and kept me sane. I LOVE you all.
And finally Thank you to James Jackson and Adi Pickering for the tunes tonight and of course thankyou to all my clients, suppliers and business friends who are here tonight supporting me as they always do.
......so what have we been up to since last year?
We have ended year one with (some) money in the bank...but not rich yet unfortunately!
Started working with a number of amazing new brands and clients.....a high profile luxury childrenswear brand (we hand made dresses for them in the UK with the final product retailing for over £400!), our second international client based in Switzerland, an equestrian brand, a running brand, a number of unique womenswear brands, produced a collection of amazing bespoke jackets for The Distractions Band and started work on a second collection of sequin jackets for them! We of course continued working with exisiting clients on repeats and new products, a new menswear brand and many more!
We are working on a new workwear concept internally that aims to revolutuionise the workwear market and promote staff well-being whilst being kind to the planet,
Got ourselves a new product developer and designer Abigail May-Neve.....yes the lovely Chloe sadly left to pursue her own dream and now has her own successful content creation business!! Check her out HERE....
Had a terrible time with a rogue off-shore supplier.....
Sent 10,000 emails (probably)
Forgot to update the blog.....
Did a couple of public speaking engagements at local colleges and schools and are now inundated with work experience requests...
Lost all our marbles collectively on more than one occasion (that's production for you!) but we wouldnt have it any other way!
Here's to year two of the Fazane Fox Production Agency......I am excited to see what this year brings and am looking forward to meeting new clients and seeing some amzing new products and concepts come to life!
Much Love
Fazane xxx
Shelley / Childrenswear Brand
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