OK, it's 2011, you have been promising yourself that this will be the year you start your clothing line. You have a ton of ideas maybe even have a few sketches, but no cash to bring your vision to life. Now what do you do? Don't panic...your situation is not at all uncommon among new designers and start up clothing companies. I have a creative solution that just might solve your problem dear fashionista! There is a new trend going on right now; where designers are thinking outside the box to find creative ways to finance their collections. It's called CrowdFunding...DO READ ON...
According to; http://www.businessoffashion.com, "It’s traditionally been extremely challenging for emerging fashion brands to get the financial and marketing support they need. The crowdfunding approach — pooling together funds from fans via the Internet to finance young designer businesses and one-off collections — could very well help to address this market failure. There are a few choices oriented toward the fashion crowd."
Lucky for you, I have the names of a couple of websites that might be able to help you out of this tricky little jam and enable you to raise the much needed cash to finance your fashion dream.
One company,FashionStake — a new online start-up, will focus, as the name suggests, on the new trend of Crowdfunding your start up clothing line. In my opinion, this website is set to answer the cries of starving designers everywhere. You can even earn CASH...that's right, cash for recommending your favorite designers resulting in the sale of merchandise. Can you imagine? Fabulous!
Another one, StyleTrek.com is set to become THE launching platform of choice for talented, serious designers who need the cash and exposure to break into the scene. Finally, last but certainly not least, there is Kickstarter , one of the largest online crowdfunding websites where projects from every scale get funded; from raising funds to aid in disaster relief, financing that dream trip to see the pyramids or an alternative method to raising capital to finance your next business venture.
These are just a few websites I found when I googled; crowdfunding, so check it out and see what you can come up with. You can also read the full article on Fashion CrowdFunding websites on BOF here: An Introduction to Fashion Crowdfunding.
TIP: This concept also works for production. For more information on how to create your clothing line , get orders and use Crowdfunding to finance your production, visit my website- TheDesignPrinciples.com
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