Building an engaging brand is one of the most challenging parts of starting a company. This is especially true in competitive sectors where you need to cut through the noise to create connections with your target customers. So I wanted to hear from experts on how to build a brand from scratch.
Lucinda Chambers and Serena Hood are co-founders of Collagerie: a leading fashion, interiors, beauty and lifestyle marketplace. The former British Vogue editors founded Collagerie in 2019 and quickly built their brand through interesting and dynamic ways.
Lucinda and Serena share their advice on what to do first when building a digital brand and how to ensure your brand story and visual identity work well together.
Lucinda and Serena’s advice:
FF&M enables you to own your own PR. Recorded, edited & published by Juliet Fallowfield, 2023 MD & Founder of PR & Communications consultancy for startups Fallow, Field & Mason. Email us at hello@fallowfieldmason.com or DM us on instagram @fallowfieldmason.
Let us know how your start up journey is going or if you have any questions you would like us to discuss in future episodes.
FF&M recommends:
MUSIC CREDIT Funk Game Loop by Kevin MacLeod. Link & Licence
Building an engaging brand is one of the most challenging parts of starting a company. This is especially true in competitive sectors where you need to cut through the noise to create connections with your target customers. So I wanted to hear from experts on how to build a brand from scratch.
Lucinda Chambers and Serena Hood are co-founders of Collagerie: a leading fashion, interiors, beauty and lifestyle marketplace. The former British Vogue editors founded Collagerie in 2019 and quickly built their brand through interesting and dynamic ways.
Lucinda and Serena share their advice on what to do first when building a digital brand and how to ensure your brand story and visual identity work well together.
Lucinda and Serena’s advice:
FF&M enables you to own your own PR. Recorded, edited & published by Juliet Fallowfield, 2023 MD & Founder of PR & Communications consultancy for startups Fallow, Field & Mason. Email us at hello@fallowfieldmason.com or DM us on instagram @fallowfieldmason.
Let us know how your start up journey is going or if you have any questions you would like us to discuss in future episodes.
FF&M recommends:
MUSIC CREDIT Funk Game Loop by Kevin MacLeod. Link & Licence
How to build a brand with Lucinda Chambers & Serena Hood, Co-Founders of Collagerie
[00:00:00] Welcome to season 10 of How To Start Up, the
podcast helping you start and scale your business with advice from entrepreneurs on what to do now, next, or never when scaling your company. This season, we're focusing on all things brand. So you'll hear from a series of amazing entrepreneurs on what they've learned in their own journeys.
hosted by me, Juliet Fallowfield, founder of the B Corp certified PR and communications consultancy, Fallow, Field and Mason. Our mission is to enable you to earn your communications in-House with a long-term view.
Juliet Fallowfield: Building an engaging brand is one of the most challenging parts of starting a company. This is especially true in competitive sectors where you need to cut through the noise to create connection with your target customers. It's this reason I wanted to hear from experts on how to build a brand from scratch.
Lucinda Chambers and Serena Hood are co founders of Collagerie, a leading fashion interiors, beauty and lifestyle marketplace. The former British Vogue editors founded Collagerie in 2019 and have quickly built their brand through interesting and dynamic ways. [00:01:00] Lucinda and Serena. Share their advice on what to do first when building a digital brand and how to ensure your brand story and visual identity work well together. I mean, huge congratulations, guys, on what you've done. It's incredible.
Serena Hood: Thank you.
Juliet Fallowfield: Do you, Have you taken a breath yet and gone, wow, we've done this. This
Lucinda Chambers: We do, We do sometimes take a moment actually. I think it's really important to do that, just to, especially when we're sort of doing an event or when we're about to launch a collaboration, I think Serena and I are quite good at going, wow. You know, a bit of a pinch me moment, especially with, you know, people who we have collaborated and, and who we're about to collaborate with.
You know, it, we do take, we do take a breath and say that, wow, you know, that's, that's,
Juliet Fallowfield: Good.
Lucinda Chambers: a really
Serena Hood: And then we're quickly on to the next. I
Juliet Fallowfield: because You're going at such a pace, it's very hard to, lots of people say celebrate the small wins if you fix your IT problem on your laptop, like pat yourself on the back, because there's so many things you're fixing the whole time that you forget to
Serena Hood: I definitely have a number of sort of software updates that just have, are literally [00:02:00] piling up. But um,
Yeah, you balance out the kind of small things and the bigger things that you need to fit in. And I,
I always say, you know, one of the big questions I'm always asked is sort of, you know, with sort of work and kids about, I say, as long as the plates
Just sort of, you know, nothing sort of drops to the ground.
You kind of just keep them from Yeah. Sort of smashing, but
it it is kind of just, yeah.
Juliet Fallowfield: It's a good old rollercoaster. Every single, So you guys, I think of the 105th episode
Serena Hood: Oh, wow.
Juliet Fallowfield: just hit a hundred on
Lucinda Chambers: That's
amazing.
Serena Hood: Congratulations.
Juliet Fallowfield: Thank you. It's, it's bonkers. Like, had you asked me when I was at Chanel and Graff and whatever, like, Oh, you're gonna start a business and then have a team and do a podcast.
I'm like,
Lucinda Chambers: It's great where life leads you, no?
Juliet Fallowfield: It's amazing.
Lucinda Chambers: As long as you're open, open, on receive mode.
Juliet Fallowfield: And I was made redundant and I thought I was so indignant and angry about it that I was like, right, well, I'm just going to make up a job and it was in lockdown and I thought, sod it, I'll give it a go. What's the worst that can happen? I had nothing to lose. But I think people who leave gainful employment and then leave a salary behind and start up, that's far braver.
I was like . It's lockdown. All fun is [00:03:00] cancelled. No money's being spent just start. And the podcast was born out of friends seeing on LinkedIn that I blindly put up that I'm starting a company and they called with advice, couldn't take notes quick enough.
They gave me all this really humble, like you're going to be stressed. You're going to feel like it's a rollercoaster, get a good accountant, get a mentor, like really practical.
And then moved in with my mom for a few months in Devon and lockdown. It's like, oh, I should do a podcast because all these other people are starting businesses.
And then she was the one to be like, wouldn't that also speak to your future audience? It's like, you're a retired English teacher, how have you made this work? And here we are, we're like top 25%. It's ridiculous, but I love it.
Lucinda Chambers: Well done. Congratulations. And you
enjoy it?
Juliet Fallowfield: You. I
love it.
Lucinda Chambers: Well, you must enjoy it if you're on if where you're 105th.
Juliet Fallowfield: It's, it's my work therapy and it's, I've, I think I didn't realise because at Chanel, you're very much behind the brand and you are not bigger than the brand and it's not about you.
And I was totally fine with that. I think having to put your hand up and ask for help can be very vulnerable when you're self employed, this has been an amazing experience to be like, [00:04:00] I have a legitimate platform where I can go to the head of neuroscience at Oxford University and be like, 'Hey, do you want to chat?'
And they'll go, yes and people want to help.
And that was my
Lucinda Chambers: yeah, they
do.
Juliet Fallowfield: biggest lesson.
Lucinda Chambers: I know. And Serena and I have really found that actually about starting our own business is that you ask advice and you ask advice from people who are that much further ahead of you or have, you know, done different things, but, and the advice that we have is, has just been phenomenal actually.
And you know, whether you take it or not.
You know, it's, it's great to, to have people, to have a sort of friendship group or to have your peers, you know, who are further along the line
and can tell you sort of pitfalls or, you know, what to look out for, you know, what's going to be great. It's just, and it's quite overwhelming actually, because. And I think maybe COVID did do this where everybody felt much more on a level playing field. You know, everybody was in their homes. Nobody was jetting off here, there to Ibiza or whatever, or on holiday. You know, we were all in the same situation [00:05:00] with the same set of problems. And I think it really, evened things out in a, in a wonderful way.
You know, it's a, it's a bit like Instagram in that sense that you can reach out to anybody and you know, either they'll answer or they won't but, but the fact that you can do it and ask, you know,
Juliet Fallowfield: Yeah, the
Lucinda Chambers: people that you admire, you know, what, what problems they had, or, you know, it's, it's, it's fantastic to, to, to be able to do that and then to have, to receive that sort of advice is invaluable.
Juliet Fallowfield: And it's interesting, I'd love to chat to you within this conversation about the fact that we've both come from very good training backgrounds of Vogue and Chanel which are two of the most prestigious brands in the world, to suddenly doing it all on your own, and then building a team and building this brand
brand brand is obviously what we're going to talk about today, but you started COLLAGERIE in 2019, so pre pandemic.
Lucinda Chambers: Just.
Just me. We
Juliet Fallowfield: I mean, the first thing I wanted to say, ask you rather, was where did you start? What was the first thing you did? In building the
Lucinda Chambers: started with the idea. We, well, We started with the idea, which was, well, Serena and I were having a coffee and a sort of catch up and, you know, a bit like you, Juliet, when you said that about [00:06:00] Chanel, you know, it's a big, you've got a big beast behind you you you know, and Serena and I were very privileged at Vogue that there was an incredible
sort of infrastructure and you know, network of you know, you, if you on receive mode, you know, brands, photographers, creatives, they all came to you, you know, you just had to sort of sit there and go, yeah, yeah, bring it in, bring it in, I want to hear about everything. And we were meeting for a cup of coffee and a catch up. And we were, We were saying , where would we get all that information from now?
You know, where would we. Where would we get all that information in one place? And you know, Serena and I have been equally obsessed by fashion and interiors and indeed travel and beauty. So we were going, I wonder where we get that all from? And we realized, you know, Serena and I have very different tastes, very different sort of passions, in a sense, and We both looked at each other and it was literally, as they say, a light bulb moment where we thought there isn't any one place that has all that information, but also, You know, we love luxury, we love discovering brands, we love affordable product, you know, and we thought, well, if there isn't one place that we can think of, we're not so peculiar and weird and wonderful that we need to start this, we need to start this, we need to solve our own problem, we need to start this in order to create that space. You know, and I think we also thought in a sort of [00:07:00] general way that people are very overwhelmed by the amount of choice, but also underwhelmed with how that choice is made. laid bare, you know, so we thought,, let's, you know, there is this gap, so it really made sense for us to sort of solve this, this problem, create it for ourselves, really.
Juliet Fallowfield: And was it always, Did you always have in mind it was going to be a platform? an online platform?
Serena Hood: Yes, actually. It was always an online platform. I mean, from the very beginning. Not
to say that we don't definitely have, you know, the idea of bricks and mortar on our roadmap because we do. And actually we've done a number of pop ups and it's something that we want to continue doing. But from the beginning, it was always sort of dreaming up this. You know, platform that not only I think, I think one key thing too, it wasn't all, it it wasn't just solving the problem in terms of, you know, being the customer ourselves and wanting to create something that felt very aspirational, but also very inclusive. We also felt there was a, a sort of a moment to create a magic to [00:08:00] shopping online. And I think that, you know, with the, we'll go into it further, but the branding and the design and the look and feel of the website, you know, was always going to be rooted in storytelling and how we can drive commerce through storytelling.
So, you know, one of the big challenges you know, from the start was how do we extract this vision of this site in our minds to actually what you see.
I
Lucinda Chambers: I mean,
it probably was the biggest challenge. I mean, I think we always, yeah, like Serena said, thought of a platform that really felt un-anxiety inducing, as Serena said, storytelling to create a really, really beautiful platform where, you know, an archette pair of trousers could sit side by side with a Chanel handbag and look equally at home in place. So that was very, that was really from the start that, that the look and the feel of it, and that people would be taken on this fabulous journey and be really involved in it was absolutely key and central right from the beginning. So probably that was our biggest challenge actually to make [00:09:00] it as beautiful as what was in our heads.
Juliet Fallowfield: This is so interesting because for me, I
built my website on Wix. My brother actually builds websites. He's like, just do it yourself because then you know how to brief a designer.
I still don't know how to brief a designer. I've tried so often to extract it out of my head and give them as good opportunity to
translate that out and please don't look at our website it's incredibly corporate and dry and I know that but it's it's I look at COLLAGERIE and it it makes perfect sense you look at it, it's beautiful, the user experience is wonderful you see this incredible curation. You kind of made it look easy but i know it's not how did you do it how did you how did you even start getting it out on paper
Serena Hood: It's It's, It's interesting you say that because you know when we, when we sort of,
when we
when we go back to the beginning, actually, you know, we, we had actually sort of been taken on by quite a big agency who we were quite, we were flattered. You know, we said we have X amount of budget, you know, would you be able to help us build this vision in our minds?
And, and, you know, we, we got six months along, you know, put, put quite a bit [00:10:00] of you know, money into
it it And and time, a lot of time. And we got, yeah, we got six months along and we were no further than where we were from the start. I mean, what was interesting is they just could not
extract what, what, what what our vision was.
Juliet Fallowfield: so
Serena Hood: We made, you know, We made sort of the decision just to sort of rip it up and start again. We walked away from it, which actually was, quite a big risk. And that we didn't know what the next step was after that, but we knew this wasn't right. And and actually, you know, from there actually found sort of a smaller designer who, you know, there was, there was just the synergy was there from the start. It went along much smoother and much quicker. And then we had a separate team who built it.
And so, you know, I guess what we're saying is that, everything did fall into place, but it didn't fall into place easily. It didn't fall into place in the timeline usage, and it didn't
fall into place with the kind of budget we had to begin with. So, you know, but, But the kind of takeaway was that I'd say, don't kind of stop until you get exactly what you want, because I think you, you, you definitely,
Lucinda Chambers: We knew in our gut that it was, and our instinct told us, it's not going in the right direction. And as Serena would say, you know, you have to rip the band aid off,[00:11:00]
and walk away from something where we were flattered by, but we knew it wasn't working. And I
think, you know, it's better to just nip it in the bud, start again, you know, and, and, and go for gold, hold out for something you really, are blown away by, you know, which we did.
Juliet Fallowfield: Your gut feeling is so important on so many areas of business, but that translation of your visual identity or creating your visual identity for COLLAGERIE, would, do you have any advice for people sort of where to start? Mood boards? How would you brief a designer? How would you interview a designer?
Yeah. Who would you go to first? Visual identity over brand tone, if you could look back and do it again, what would be your first thing you would do?
Lucinda Chambers: well, I, there was a lot of sitting at the dining room table here with a lot of, of mood boards. And one thing we started with actually was something which we And we still have because we absolutely love it. And it was a bit of a starting point of COLLAGERIE, which is something called in the mood. And, you know, what we felt very [00:12:00] strongly from the beginning was that often people don't know what they want to buy. I mean, that, you know, there's somebody who thinks, I want I want to buy a pair of black sandals because that's what I actually need and want and it's, I've got an outfit and I've got to complete it. So we do that. That's absolutely fine. But there's also something called in the mood where, you just want to have a lovely journey. You want to have a beautiful journey that inspires and delights that, you know, you might think you're wanting a pair of black sandals, but actually in the end, you've been captivated by a lampshade and that's fantastic. in the mood. Yeah, yeah, oftentimes. So in the mood we still have, which is just a piece of storytelling and a piece of content that, that really is holding you by the hand. And it can be anything from clouds or green stripes and the green stripe could be in a shirt, it could be in a cushion, it could be in a lampshade, it could be in anything, but it's a mood, And that we still have and probably will always have. And it's just one of the things that we started with. And it was a sort of starting point of this is what we want the website to be. It's a kind of real,
Juliet Fallowfield: A [00:13:00] feeling.
Lucinda Chambers: It's a feeling.
And It's not purely transactional, you know, it's not just boom, bish, bash, bosh. We've got that as well, but we've also got something that's as close to a magazine that you flick through and you return to and that you save and you put on your wishlist and we inspire and delight, you know, and I think that's a really important part of building something that feels very different and feels very aspirational and inspirational.
Juliet Fallowfield: And becomes very much part of your brand's DNA because your,
your website is such a beautiful discovery. You could just browse it. It's sort of delicious in that sense that you might not even go to it to buy anything, but you can just learn more, discover more in a very comfortable, it's the wrong word, but.
enjoyable environment. You're not being, it's not sell, sell, sell. I don't feel like I'm being marketed to, but the aesthetic, the tone. But was that something, given there's two of you, you bashed heads on, did you disagree on, did you always have the same [00:14:00] sort of aesthetic idea around your brand that you were building?
Serena Hood: It's funny. I think, you know, Lucinda, I remember at the beginning, we, we, we sort of the first thing we need to have a Pantone book and we, Lucinda used to cut all these little colours out of this book and put them together and say, you know, colours talk to each other and see these do and these don't, and actually I learned a huge amount, I've always been in love with colour.
I mean, you know, and that actually, you know, it goes back to sort of A level and my, you know, sort of whole project being on the colour blue, but I've always loved colour. And obviously, you know, with Lucinda's background and experience, she's been, you know, editor, stylist, designer, her whole career. And I have to say, I really learned so much on the journey about colour and why colours work, why some don't, you know, how to piece them together. And I think, you know, I think it's interesting. I think that when you do go to COLLAGERIE, it does feel like a brand in itself. And I think that was always really important too, is how we could create something bigger than just ourselves. And it feels like it is that brand. It's not necessarily Lucinda's taste is not necessary.
It's just, it's, it's everything [00:15:00] combined into one brand that we feel speaks to millions and millions out there. sort of in the same
Lucinda Chambers: I always do think colours talk to each other and, and, they can be really noisy conversations, you know, or they could be like a quiet whisper murmur
conversation You know, they don't have to be loud and shouty all the time. They can be soft and gentle.
But they do have to, say hello to each other on some level.
think that, that Colour was always really, really important to both of us and, and I think the colour palette, we worked hard on it to get it right. And you know, so that there are different colours that match different edits and, but, but as Serena says it, it feels all of a piece and that's really, that's very key to design, and it's key to everything that we, we do really.
Serena Hood: I think what's, I think what also it you know, The The whole point about COLLAGERIE, you know, in a sense is actually the context, and how we contextualise product, different categories at different price points from different designers. But interestingly, you can take two moods that are so completely different.
You know, you can take something like Lucinda said, you know, that very [00:16:00] maximalist story with lots of colour or a theme that is very minimalist, you know, even sort of like a, you know, a thin line and it all works within the brand within the kind of template we have. And so, you know, how we navigated designing almost that framework of where anything could, could, could sit there was part of actually the fun and the joy, but also the challenge.
And that's why, you know, colours that talk was, was so key. And we, you know, we feel we found them. that's what you see today.
Juliet Fallowfield: Because obviously continuing to have new content, new pages, it's not a static website. That's always going to grow. And that's another challenge that that template, it needs to be iterated in many different ways. For someone starting out, because I've sort of come into my business with a comms background, and I've learned payroll, and recruiting someone, and firing someone, and all of the hats you have to learn.
I also know that I need to learn more about visual identity, visual design, brand architecture. What talent [00:17:00] would you say a new founder absolutely has to have to create their brand?
Lucinda Chambers: I think if you don't have it yourself and you
know that, I
think it's really important if you know where your skills lie and you know what you're short on, is finding then the people who can translate that. You know, And listen, not everybody's going to be good at everything. For me, just saying this on a personal level, you know, Serena says she's learned from me about colour, but I've learned about business, you know, from Serena, I think what I found fascinating is that business is it's creative. You know, I always thought business, not at all a dirty word, but it was something that I never was really involved. I always loved commerciality within a business. I loved building brands and seeing what sold and what didn't sell and why it didn't sell and I've always been really interested in that but business wise, no, I mean Serena's so business smarts and
Juliet Fallowfield: It's good you've got different
Lucinda Chambers: got very different skill [00:18:00] sets and I mean
Serena Hood: Still
Still learning on the job,
but yeah.
Lucinda Chambers: mean, and I think
that's really unbelievably fortunate and lucky. I feel that every day that I have a partner who, you know, gets on with what she's brilliant at, and I get on with what I'm good at, and that
we always meet and talk about everything.
But I think if you're alone, that's a very different
place, you know, because it can be lonely. But I think if you, if you, acknowledge what your, you know, your strengths aren't, and then find the people who can, you know, do that. I think we can't, we can't all of us be good at everything.
Juliet Fallowfield: No.
Lucinda Chambers: That's just impossible. And you set, you know, you set yourself up for failure. So it's about finding, it's always about finding the people. It's always about finding your community who have a skillset set that's different from yours.
Serena Hood: and
I think That's where a network, I think that's where a network comes into, you know, being able to reach out and not being shy to do so to those who, you know, have done it or you admire, you know, oftentimes there's been, you know, kind of brands we don't know or people we don't know, but, you know, we want to meet them.
So it's just a cold call sort of on DM or LinkedIn. And I think having, You know, [00:19:00] I think when you have that drive to start a business, you are so motivated to drive it forward that actually, you know,
it's
normalized. No, it's normalizing actually asking
for outta the picture. Yeah.
Yeah.
Juliet Fallowfield: it overcomes your fear, your imposter syndrome, your doubt. You're like, I want that ending of there. If I, If going through this difficult, uncomfortable, ask, hand up for help, it gets you there.
Serena Hood: think, I think also one thing too, is just not thinking of everything you need to do at the
same time and getting overwhelmed by that. It's
actually thinking, okay,
You know, it's the next step
Yeah.
Juliet Fallowfield: Bringing it back to brand, that practical, I need a graphic designer, I need someone to help me with my tone of voice, like, what order of things would you tackle it in? Establishing your brand's identity.
Lucinda Chambers: I think we started with the visual and then we got the tone of voice.
Juliet Fallowfield: And was that through a graphic designer or a branding expert, because there's so many people with so many different sort of titles out there, it's really hard to know who to go to for this help.
Lucinda Chambers: Well, we looked at a lot of things that we admired and, but we wanted to make it very much our own and have our [00:20:00] own voice. So, you know, as we said, we did find a really great agency in the end who could absolutely deliver
what,
Juliet Fallowfield: a branding agency? Was
Lucinda Chambers: we had in our heads. Yeah. And
Serena Hood: Yeah.
I, I think I think what was interesting, actually, at the beginning, we tried to go for someone who could do everything
Who could do branding and build, and actually what we realized is that, you know, maybe, maybe you can't put all your eggs in one pack and we separated them
out, but I think the starting point would be to actually go and look at you know, who is on your inspiration board? You know, If you're building a brand, like who's who, what company out there do you think has a great tone of tone of voice, who's built a gorgeous sort of website or where does it look and feel? And then ask them, you know, just, just reach out to them or kind of, it's not, you know, the internet is filled with information and a lot of the times you can actually figure it out yourself.
So I
think it's just, you know, research.
Juliet Fallowfield: backwards.
Serena Hood: Yeah.
Juliet Fallowfield: I'm obsessed. Now, anytime I come across a beautiful user experience on a website, I email them to be like, who helped you build this?
Lucinda Chambers: Yes,
Juliet Fallowfield: And it's the same thing. They could have had an in house graphic designer and then help someone with a technical build, or they've externalised the [00:21:00] visual side, but they did their own copywriting.
And I think it can be overwhelming because a lot of founders that we work with, so in my day job, where we teach people how to do their own PR, they're so caught up in their visual identity and their brand, it's like, that's great and it needs to be considered, but no one's going to be looking unless you tell people what you're going to be doing with the business.
So you need to kind of do both. But for me, my challenge is that visual part, because I'm a wordy person. I'm not an image person. And I can see something at the end and go, yes, that's gorgeous. Like I look at your website and think, Oh my God, it's delicious. But I have no idea how many iterations you'd have had to go through to get to that end
point.
Serena Hood: It was a lot.
Juliet Fallowfield: I'm sure.
Lucinda Chambers: But I
I also think it was a lot, although weirdly it didn't deviate massively from our initial thoughts at all.
Juliet Fallowfield: And it's amazing you were aligned on it because two heads are brilliant and supportive but sometimes you can disagree and that
Lucinda Chambers: I think if you come from a visual background, you know, you're always doing mood boards, you know, for everybody really, and so that's a bit of a second nature, I have to say.
Juliet Fallowfield: Yeah. [00:22:00] And so if someone's not got that background, you'd recommend just start practicing pulling, so we
Serena Hood: I think it's meeting lots of people. Honestly, I think a lot of
it, when you talk about gut, so much of it is the chemistry too. So I would say like, you know, with everything from the dots to LinkedIn to Instagram. There's so many choices. And also there's no formula.
There's no sort of like, this is exactly how to start it. You just got to start putting yourself
out there. And I think, it's almost like dating. You sort of
Lucinda Chambers: You find the person to execute it. Yeah, you do.
Serena Hood: Um,
Juliet Fallowfield: It's funny what you say, there's so many, podcast interviews we've had that have referred back to it's like hinge or it's like dating. It's like the gut feeling, you know, in the first three seconds, it's not going to work and recruiting people too. They can have an amazing CV, an incredible cover letter.
It's only until they start. And I think a lot of people are shy of starting because they need to have everything perfectly done and it's not going to work. There's nothing like putting something out into the public to be like, Oh my God, I've got to get on with this now. For me, that was the day after redundancy putting on LinkedIn, I'm doing this.
I have. Absolutely no idea what I was going to do. It [00:23:00] took 12 minutes on company's house and suddenly there's a
business you've got to follow through. And that, that kind of, okay, rabbit in the headlights. And then you get really snappy about who to ask for advice and who to ask for help.
With your brands, sorry,
Serena Hood: say One more piece of advice is, you know, what I've really learned in the beginning, really sort of, you know, do your diligence and put in writing deliverables and timelines and sort of, you know, clauses because you almost sometimes learn too late. And you think, gosh, I wish I had sort of checked the fine print.
So I think, you know, one thing I would do from the beginning is just always have a paper trail. That would, that would, be a,
know,
Juliet Fallowfield: Oh, I love a
process And documenting as well. It's always like a diary entry of we achieved this this week and our team calls every Monday, we say success and failure from the week before what capacity are we angry, amber, green and red, and just to share, cause we're remote first, share that.
Oh yeah, that didn't go well, but we've learned this from it and
Serena Hood: I
like that.
Lucinda Chambers: Yeah. And actually we always used to write, we still do when we, when we thought of the name, we were actually just about to go into a meeting and we hadn't got the name quite [00:24:00] right
Juliet Fallowfield: Can you
share
Lucinda Chambers: quite, far in and we would, we always knew that it had to be a word that, well, actually Serena said, wouldn't it be great to have a French word.
I'm not sure why, but something French. And actually, and I had a huge lovely Smythson's book and, and we wrote, you know, we, we explored so many of I think we had C curated.
Serena Hood: Yeah.
Lucinda Chambers: We got stuck on, hung up on that quite a bit. It's also about letting go of things as well. Like, you know, you get hung up about something because you think, yeah, that's right.
And then you sit with it and you play around with it and maybe it's been taken or it's not quite encapsulating everything that's in your head. And then we were thinking about, you know, collages and découpage and. All those things. and we, it actually, it kind of went découpage, collage, COLLAGERIE. It actually was a sort of like a
and then boom.
Juliet Fallowfield: block.
Serena Hood: yeah,
and It is sort of bringing things together.
Lucinda Chambers: yeah,
yeah.
Who, what we are.
Serena Hood: The French twist.
Juliet Fallowfield: Yeah. I love that.
Lucinda Chambers: With Swedish French twist. Exactly.
Juliet Fallowfield: I interviewed the founder of Necessaire and she's like, we wanted to create body products that were necessary,
but we wanted a bit of flair. So
we called it Necessaire and I was like, it works and [00:25:00] it's fantastic. And once you've built this brand and obviously the name is probably, choosing the name is probably like.
Buying a house, you have to fall in love with it and then let it go. Fall in love with it again. Oh no, that's not going to be it. And then you stick with it and it's there for life. Are there any other tips you'd offer founders of sort of how to iterate that naming process? Is it writing it down? Is it brainstorming?
Is it telling other people?
Lucinda Chambers: not to be hung up on your, I think it is a bit, it is a bit like Juliet you're right buying a house. It's when to let go. And when to, because I think it's so definitive finding a name that you really almost want to get that in the bag.
And actually it doesn't have to come like a lightning.
It can be a process, you
know, so don't be afraid of A: letting it go, trying things out, not to be in a rush. So just to sit with it, cause it's important. It's really important. That you're
happy with the name.
Yeah. And not to be afraid of really sucking it and seeing it, you
Juliet Fallowfield: Yeah. Yeah. And live with it. I think there's so many things you can do to get the company going
Lucinda Chambers: Yeah.
Juliet Fallowfield: into that [00:26:00] branding exercise, because
Lucinda Chambers: And ask friends if they like it, you know yes, sometimes it's, you have to spell it quite a lot, but now people it's in the lexicon, so it's
Juliet Fallowfield: yeah
Lucinda Chambers: It's really great,
you know,
Juliet Fallowfield: people know what COLLAGERIE is now and in a very quick time, considering you've built this new platform and once you've done all of that amazing legwork and you've got your visual identity and you've got the bare bones of your website and all that structure, what was your go to market plan of like delivering this brand out into the world. Did you kind of keep it all quite close until it was finished and wonderful and then go ta da?
Or how did you start letting the industry and your future clients know that it was a thing? Hmm.
Lucinda Chambers: Before we launched and we just had dinner here with, I think it was about 16, 17 women, all different ages, wasn't it, Serena, and people whose opinion would be really valuable to us, you know, people either we admired or knew or, you know, all had different experiences, but all, you know, shoppers, like, you know, who enjoy shopping, but whatever form that sort of took and we did have a focus group here and we had a whiteboard and we asked, we sent them a really in depth list of [00:27:00] questions before they came and they all got goodie bags and I think we had a chicken curry and that was really valuable actually just you know they all came out of goodwill and That was, that was our first kind of where we slightly
Serena Hood: Started. Yeah.
And I think, you know, from there, there was, I mean, you know, when we first launched, we, we did hire somebody to do some PR for us just at the beginning, you know, to get it in a few key titles, which we know we definitely saw impact from that and, you know, on day one, we saw, you know, people on the site transacting, which was fantastic.
and I think, you know, network effect, the power of word of mouth. I mean. You
Juliet Fallowfield: It's the best
Serena Hood: we live in, it is, it is, especially at the beginning. I think that, you know, what, what's been, you know, you know, I think what we've really done successfully is be able to grow the brand on the brand marketing rather than be a company based on performance marketing. You know, I think we do understand the privilege that we've had, you know, given our backgrounds is that we were placed, you know, well placed to do this. And I think that between, you know, our industry contacts, our press [00:28:00] contacts, you know, our relationships with the brands, it really helped us have that kind of advantage of getting COLLAGERIE out there into the world.
And still today, you know, we, we have, we're very limited in terms of how much paid performance we do. I mean, everything really is still rooted in you know, how we, how we grow COLLAGERIE by brand marketing.
Juliet Fallowfield: Could you go into a bit more detail about what you see as brand marketing? Because a lot of people, don't understand it. And I don't, There's so, There's PPC, there's paid, there's social, there's PR, there's CRM. And it could be totally overwhelming.
Could
Serena Hood: So. Interestingly, you know, when it comes to the brand marketing side of things, that's where we see, you know, press, influencer, you know, working with sort of tastemakers that we admire, and they, you know, talk, talk about COLLAGERIE on their social. Email has been a huge, huge driver for us from the very beginning, actually. Not something we anticipated right, Lucinda? I mean, I think I mean, I think just naturally,
Lucinda Chambers: maybe that's why, you know, we did, We wanted to do a beautiful email, but, but, you know, that you wouldn't just, you know, delete, delete. and we work very hard on them, but it has been incredible, our email. Yeah. It's
Serena Hood: And I think we've become quite synonymous with it too. You know, I think What's interesting is that when you know, we, we meet people and they talk about [00:29:00] COLLAGERIE, they say, Oh my God, I love your emails, you know, and which is, you know, reflected in our engagement stats on it. But you know, the, the kind of, in the world we live in today, you know, and like you said, you can do so much yourself on, on a shoestring. You know, it's, it's, you know, you can, You can launch a website on Squarespace or Wix. You can create a, an email and send, start it with your network. You can talk about it on Instagram. So there's so many ways you can get going. And I think that, you know, the passion and the idea sort of, and this, how you drive it forward. You
Juliet Fallowfield: So it's more, So brand marketing's more owned and earned, not paid. So you're looking at the POE where paid advertising earned is PR, typically you're earning media on other platforms and owns your own platforms that you can control. It sounds like you were really using your own platforms and leveraging those with those brand partners.
And presumably you had a very good curation of product on the site and they were singing your praises as well. So, that augmentation grew, but it makes it much more authentic. And obviously we all know that if an editor is talking about your brand rather than [00:30:00] you, it has more value than if you paid someone to talk about your brand, about saying how amazing you are.
So that's really interesting that it's grown organically, authentically. I I should say.
Serena Hood: yeah, I mean it, But it also lends itself to the type of business we are in that, you know, we don't have a product we are selling on a shelf or in a store. So, you know, we had to really think about how we get, you know, new and returning customers to our website.
Juliet Fallowfield: Would you say that that builds more loyalty with customers than doing more of a paid campaign?
Lucinda Chambers: think
it depends. Depends what it is, I think, but I think certainly as Serena said about the email, you know, people say, you know, I keep them. I save them. I love them. And I think that was, I think everything we do is built around a sort of passion for the product. You know, The words are really important to us.
So we have an amazing, you know, writer. that That Everything comes from a very, I mean, it's a very overused word and, you know, authentic, but it's,
it, it is from that. It is,
you know,
We'll put products up that we really believe in and that we really, whatever their price point is, [00:31:00] we love them.
So I think the taste and the trust is absolutely vital.
And is that, is the heartbeat of COLLAGERIE that, you know, what we're doing for people is, you know, cutting out out all the hard work. Cutting out the anxiety, you know, that everything we push up, we love and we believe in whatever the price point is. And if everything feeds into that, everything, our product collaborations, you know, we don't design a shoelace without loving it and believing in it and wanting to buy it ourselves.
So if it, if it all comes from that place, that place of authenticity and passion, then I think that,
that,
Juliet Fallowfield: works.
Lucinda Chambers: that, works. Yeah. I think it
Juliet Fallowfield: It's interesting you say that because I've interviewed somebody who has a company that trains people to create work cultures that are remote. Like there's a whole variety of people I've chatted to and every single person is be okay with a rollercoaster, get a good accountant and really believe in what you're doing to the point if someone puts a gun to your head, you still believe in it.
It is [00:32:00] so key because when you're exhausted or had a bad day or, you questioning what you're doing, you come back to that. I know I have to, it's not a choice. I have to do it. And that resolution in that I think is really powerful, but it keeps you really focused as well. And that's what comes across with COLLAGERIE.
Every touch point of your brand is consistent. And that the builds trust in it, that it's, it's tied up. It's not confused. I can rely on it.
Lucinda Chambers: That's a lovely thing to hear. Oh, Juliet, that's
Juliet Fallowfield: Well, you've worked so hard on it. It's paying off, hopefully. Is there a golden piece of advice that you give to founders when they're starting to develop their brand?
I think what you said earlier was really interesting about trusting your gut feeling of if you are outsourcing, like knowing that chemistry check, but is there anything else? That you
Lucinda Chambers: Yeah. So learning to walk away and I think always to be on receive mode, you know, that, and I think what Serena and I both said is ask advice. I think that it's free and it's available and, and don't be afraid of, you know, being vulnerable about what you don't know.[00:33:00]
Juliet Fallowfield: Yeah.
Lucinda Chambers: You know, you can't know everything.
Serena Hood: think, I think also, you know, What's been interesting on the journey, especially from a kind of fundraising standpoint is you'll get lots of people thinking, well, and telling you, you know, giving you advice, but also thinking that they've got the answers.
And, You know, you have to be, and It's like you said, you know, being so focused on what you're doing, you cannot be all things to all people.
Juliet Fallowfield: Yes.
Serena Hood: But I think you also can be creative in how you diversify the business and how you grow it. Because you know, what you see today with COLLAGERIE is not exactly the same, as where we there's new products, there's new revenue streams. So I would say it's a balance and everything has to feed in to exactly why, you know, what is your value proposition?
Why did you start this? What do you offer? And is this something that speaks to the customer. And I think that if, if everything feeds into that, you'll be on the right trajectory,
Juliet Fallowfield: I love that.
Serena Hood: But I think you need to be very resilient
and I think that's where, you know, having a business partner has been just invaluable in so many ways, but particularly, you know, you'll have those days [00:34:00] where, you know, somebody who might be, you know, sort of decades in the business or, you know, thinks, okay, well this will be a great idea, but it's just not right for the brand. And you can really question yourself. And think, well, should I be, should I be, you know, pivoting this way or should I be doing that, but actually, you know, you know, your company best, you know, you are, you know, you eat, live and breathe it. And I think that everything has got to feed into that gut feeling of what works.
Juliet Fallowfield: That's another dating analogy. Someone said, if you have to ask the question, it's a no. It's like, should I text him? Does he like me? Like, if you have to ask, it's a no. And it's the same with business. If you're doubting something, there's, listen to that gut feeling, because it's, it's protecting you. It's, it's, from imposter syndrome, which is also meant to be protecting you, but can be really bad.
Not helpful,
but that
nagging feeling I find actually just going for a really long walk. So we travel our time in our team with Toggl and I've put in a walking Toggl and a podcasting Toggl and a reading Toggl so we should be reading the press the whole time and Francesca and the team came back and said I really stuck on this problem and I went for a three hour walk and I've got this answer and that answer and this is [00:35:00] solved.
I was like
great. Yeah,
but listening to that niggle of not just kind of trying to put a lid on it I think is so
important as
Lucinda Chambers: instinct as well. It's based on, you know, When you talk about instinct and gut, it's often based on your experience and your knowledge, but you just think it's gut, but actually it's not.
Already know,
but you've
Juliet Fallowfield: Something that we do is the previous guest has a question for our next guest and our previous guest was Titi from Ori Lifestyle. So she's created a hair care brand because she had her own hair loss journey and worked out through hair education she can fix this problem.
So. Titi. She's absolutely killing it.
Her question for you was what was the thing, the one thing that you did that completely transformed your business for her, she redesigned her packaging in year one, and it was a huge investment and a massive risk, but it.
it got her all of the recognition in retail that she
needed. Yeah. Is there one thing that you did that was just game changing?
Lucinda Chambers: Have the idea.
Yeah. I think having
the idea question. have to say, I do think, I think something that came quite organically, but actually kind of like was not in our [00:36:00] plan, like at our business plan was collaborations, you know, product collaborations have been, I mean, one, just so exciting. I mean, I'm wearing my shirt today.
Serena Hood: We did With nothing, Nothing Underneath. And when we talk about the brand marketing, that has been an amazing way
that we have have grown. You know, at different phases, but the different launches that we've done. And I think
It's actually really set us apart in the landscape.
We're in, you know, Somebody said to me the other day, you know, there's nothing quite like COLLAGERIE out there. You know, nobody collaborates in this sort of space with brands the way you do. And I thought, you know, you're right, actually. I think that the kind of
Lucinda Chambers: That's pretty unique.
Serena Hood: the
Juliet Fallowfield: But it takes you out of being a marketplace and it gives
you both a voice and recognizes your experience before COLLAGERIE. And that shouldn't be underestimated. And it's nice that that is a very subtle way of saying. Guys, we back this, like we know what we're doing because of these beautiful, like the With Nothing Underneath shirt that you're wearing today.
We see that on their social, on Pip's social, on your social, you, you,
from a consumer that the cross pollination of audience or that lovely ripple effect from a business perspective is [00:37:00] wonderful, but the integrity behind the actual product and the design is there as well. So we've, I've been watching what you've been up to since 2019, but it's so smart, but it's also really fun. I think. Yeah.
Lucinda Chambers: it's really fun.
Serena Hood: no. And I mean, Lucinda, you know, the sort of Lucinda, you know, will go to the brand and work with them so closely on the design and the creative. And I'm always just, you know, chomping at the bit to see kind of what she comes back
with. I think what's been so sort of special is the way that, you know, You know, they're so reflective of the brand itself, but then COLLAGERIE is interwoven, and it feels like, you know, we say it's a collaboration, but it really is, you
know?
Lucinda Chambers: Yeah, it's super important when, you know, brands approach us. And, you know, I think the first one we did was actually on our dream, on our, you know, on our dream. And Serena always goes, manifest it, manifest it. And it was The Conran Shop, you know, and we did our first,
you know, you know, product collaboration with The Conran Shop.
I know we, it's wonderful. It was a great, great start to what has just, as Serena said, you know, gone on to be really successful. And I think. I think the way we work with brands [00:38:00] is, is very COLLAGERIE in the sense that,, we never throw the baby out with the bathwater. We absolutely respect that brand.
We see maybe what they're missing or what they could do with, or what they haven't got and what they could do and the potential and the possibilities of really of the meeting of the minds of COLLAGERIE's experience and talent with that brand's experience and talent. And so it's a fabulous, you know, truly collaborative experience to bring all of us around the table and to do something that feels very, very bespoke to that brand, you know, and yet they've got something that maybe they wouldn't have done or they haven't thought of, but
it's very true to them. And I think that's the real, it's a real joy to do that.
And, you know, always keeping that brand in the top of your mind to reflect what they're doing, but to amplify what they're doing
and to make it all just that bit more shiny [00:39:00] and a
Juliet Fallowfield: But also your
COLLAGERIE client that's deeply loyal, we like when's the next on Wednesday, on Wednesday, the anticipation piece is golden for any brand to have that like waitlist effect. So huge congratulations. And what would be your question for our next guest? And it could be anything about starting a business, how to scale, what not to do.
Lucinda Chambers: Hmm.
Juliet Fallowfield: It's always interesting to ask this question because people like, well, today, my question is, Estée Lalonde actually from Mirror Water, she's, she's like, when was the moment you thought you were going to give up and what pulled you back from that moment? Because she'd had a really tough day the day before.
And it was, she's like, it's fine. I'm good now. But yesterday, and it was bless her for being so heartfelt. But in the trials and tribulations of running a business when you're just like, really? Is there something you'd want to ask in terms of challenge or joy? I love the fact that you're both deep in thought.
Lucinda Chambers: I know, because, because it's a really good question, but it's also where people are on that journey, you know, and trying to think of somebody [00:40:00] who's ahead of us, you know, who we'd love to ask some proper advice.
Hmm.
Serena Hood: can we email it to you?
Juliet Fallowfield: Yeah, of course.
Well, WhatsApp me a voice note and I'll layer it in.
Lucinda Chambers: Yeah. We've only got one shot of this
Serena Hood: I know,
I know.
Juliet Fallowfield: I
love the fact that you're taking it so seriously. This is great.
Lucinda Chambers: of course, because advice is precious, you know, and and we need to make it measure.
Juliet Fallowfield: I never normally share who the next guest is, but let me see ah, interesting. It's Atisha from By Rotation.
Lucinda Chambers: oh
Serena Hood: okay.
Aw.
Lucinda Chambers: Oh, well, that would be a good, that's, thank you for
Serena Hood: I want to know from Ashita how she finds the time to seemingly do it all.
Juliet Fallowfield: Yes.
Serena Hood: I mean, I have to
say, I mean, she always looks, you know, she always looks fabulous. She's at the gym. She, I mean, she seems to have such a great balance of everything while running a very successful business. And yeah, she must wake up very early.
I think she must wake, she must be one of those
Lucinda Chambers: Well, that could be the question Serena. How,
Serena Hood: Sorry, I'm already
Lucinda Chambers: How do you fit it.
all
Juliet Fallowfield: that's, that's
Serena Hood: How do you fit it all in?
Juliet Fallowfield: Done. I'll put that in. No, I'm also curious [00:41:00] because sleep is the only thing, like time and sleep are finite. Money comes and goes. People come and go. Everything, the, I interviewed the head of neuroscience at Oxford University about sleep and he said, if you do not protect your sleep, you're running the red light on your business on a daily basis.
I was like, blah.
Serena Hood: So interesting you say that actually, because I'm, I'm a big sleeper, like, I'm usually in bed by 10 o'clock. And I was at dinner last night with a friend, she goes, we've got to go, because you've got to be in bed by 10. I said, yes, you know,
Serena Hood: but I agree.
Juliet Fallowfield: Well, it's very healthy because from what I learned from Russell, the more hours you get ahead of midnight are worth double what you get after.
Lucinda Chambers: fascinating.
Juliet Fallowfield: I was
Serena Hood: yeah. I think, I think being in bed by 10, if late is 1030,
Lucinda Chambers: Yes.
Serena Hood: way to keep yourself.
Lucinda Chambers: also, Serena, I think really clever that everybody knows.
Serena Hood: Yeah,
Lucinda Chambers: they've got the they've got the sleep memo.
Yeah. And
Juliet Fallowfield: that.
Lucinda Chambers: forward, like start at seven.
Serena Hood: I'm just gonna start getting up and leaving. I'm not even gonna, I'm not even gonna say goodbye. They're just gonna know.
Juliet Fallowfield: love this. Thank you so much for your
time
Serena Hood: Juliet, thank you. So
lovely to see you. [00:42:00]
Lucinda Chambers: Lovely to see
you.
Juliet Fallowfield: and . I'll send the edit through, I'm going to click stop so it'll bounce up to the cloud. If you'd like to contact Lucinda or Serena, you can find all of their details in the show notes, along with a recap of the advice they have so kindly shared.