Entrepreneur Alice Hall has announced ambitious growth plans after taking back ownership of popular fashion business Pink Boutique.
Ms Hall was 23 when she launched Pink Boutique alongside her mother Julie Blackie, investing £90 between them on a handful of dresses and then juggling the fledgling firm with other jobs to help pay her mortgage and other bills. The company was soon recruiting staff to help sell hundreds of dresses a day – peaking at 4,000 dress sales a day – aiding gross sales of £15m while also earning Ms Hall a place on the Forbes 30 Under 30 Europe list, amongst other award wins.
Three years ago she left Pink Boutique to launch luxury furniture and homeware venture Rowen Homes with her husband Andrew, starting as a purely online venture. It has since built up a large social media presence with more than 1.3million followers, leading to the opening of its first physical store at the Metrocentre, while also working with celebrities including TV presenter Rylan Clark.
Read more: The Handbag Clinic launches in Selfridges' luxury London department store
Now Ms Hall has unveiled grand plans for the future of the company that propelled her into the North East business community, after her mother decided to retire. She and her husband announced their future strategy today to the teams at Rowen Homes and Pink Boutique.
She said: “My mum decided to retire, so either the business was going to be sold or I took it back on - and I’m really delighted to come back in. I’ve learned a lot in the last three years in terms of applying things to this business so it’s all good fun. Andrew is assuming the role of MD and I’m creative director, and we’re now splitting our time in half across the two businesses to start with, and we’ll see how it goes.
“The premises are in Newburn for Pink Boutique and Blaydon for Rowen Homes so just over the river and really close, and a quick win for us is that we can split some overheads in staffing. I’m bringing some of the qualified people in Rowen to Pink Boutique, as part of knowledge sharing, which will help us scale. And running two e-commerce businesses side by side is going to be really great because you can apply your learnings across both sides.”
“The business has had good recovery from the pandemic, however we’d like to increase it. It hasn’t fully recovered to pre-pandemic trading so our focus is around growth and getting the revenue back up, to compete with the bigger brands. Dresses are trading really well and we’ve still got that customer for whom christenings, weddings are really important.”
As Rowen Homes has made a successful move to the high street with its bricks-and-mortar base, Ms Hall says she would consider a physical presence for Pink Boutique.
“I’m not ruling it out, it’s a harder business model to make work but I do feel that the customer has so little choice on the high street now, so I’m not definitely ruling that out whether that’s a concession approach first. There’s definitely a place for in-person retail but to start with we’re really going to optimise online and grow it, and maybe in the future that will enable us to do some experiential stuff - there’s loads of cool stuff we could do in terms of collaborations, and all sorts of fun stuff, but we’ll see where it takes us.
“It’s really important for us to keep things quite stable and get to know the team. There are some people I’ve worked with before and some that are newer, and we just want to make sure that everyone is really enjoying themselves before we scale.
“I think everyone is really excited. We presented a bit of a strategy and then Andrew and I will be going to meet suppliers. The team has been super receptive and I think we’re very fortunate because we are very focused on culture at Rowen and that’s very important in this business as well. It’s just really nice to have smiling faces and we’ve excited for the next phase.”
Julie Blackie – who has also been a successful TV screenwriter for the likes of Casualty and Hollyoaks – had been working within property development when her daughter decided to explore interior design, and she sold up renovation project – the Grade II listed Otterburn Coach House Hotel – to pave the way for taking over sole ownership of Pink Boutique.
Ms Hall says the deal to take back Pink Boutique will allow her mother to focus more on her passion for property. She added: “Ultimately she was ready to take a step back. Fashion is a very fast industry and it’s all consuming and you have to be really into it, and she was ready to have someone run the brand who was more engaged in fashion, so it was a lovely opportunity for me to get back in. I think she will do more property development, the kind of things she loves doing – restoring period homes back to their former glory.”
Sign up to receive regular North East business news emails HERE
READ NEXT
- Billionaire Elon Musk would 'strongly consider' North East for next Tesla gigafactory
- Read more North East business news here
- People on the move: key North East appointments and promotions
- North East deals of the week: key contracts, acquisitions and investments
Gateshead creative agency Blue Kangaroo opens Bristol office
