In this episode, Glynis Tao discusses the reasons behind declining website traffic for fashion e-commerce sites in 2025. She explores the impact of AI on search behavior, the importance of understanding traffic quality versus volume, and how to diagnose traffic issues using Google Search Console. Glynis also explains the need for a solid technical SEO strategy and the role of high-quality content in maintaining visibility and conversions.
Top rankings don’t guarantee clicks if AI answers show up first.
Lower traffic is not always bad as it could mean better-qualified visitors.
Use Google Search Console to identify what’s causing the drop.
Replatforming without redirects can negatively affect SEO.
Technical issues like slow speed and duplicates hurt rankings.
Find out if the drop is seasonal, sudden, or gradual to fix it right.
Blogs still build authority and feed AI content.
Helpful, specific content keeps you visible in search.
SEO audits catch hidden issues that impact website traffic.
Prioritize conversions over traffic volume.
Themes
Why don’t top positions guarantee higher traffic anymore?
You can still hold top positions in Google and see traffic decline. That’s because the search landscape has changed. AI-powered tools like Google’s AI Overviews now answer user questions directly on the results page, leaving fewer reasons for people to click through to your site. It’s not about dropping off page one—it’s about how people find and consume information. If you’re seeing fewer visits but stable rankings, AI could be the reason.
What do fashion brands need to know about traffic quality vs. traffic volume?
It’s easy to fixate on shrinking traffic numbers, but volume alone doesn’t tell the full story. The real question is: who’s visiting your site and are they ready to buy? A drop in overall sessions could be filtering out low-intent visitors, leaving behind more qualified shoppers. Brands that create content addressing specific pain points often attract fewer—but more targeted—visitors who are closer to making a purchase. Understanding this shift helps you focus on conversions, not just clicks.
How can you diagnose website traffic drops using Google Search Console?
One of the most valuable (and underused) tools for troubleshooting traffic loss is Google Search Console. Start by comparing clicks, impressions, and average position over different time ranges. Then dive into specific pages and search queries that are losing visibility. Look for patterns: is traffic down across the board, or isolated to a few key URLs? Is it linked to mobile usability issues, indexing errors, or slower site speed? These clues can point to whether the issue is content-related, technical, or algorithmic.
Why could replatforming or redesigning your site lower your visibility?
Switching platforms, especially moving from Shopify to a headless build can trigger unexpected traffic losses if not managed carefully. Changes to your URL structure, page hierarchy, or internal links can confuse search engines and wipe out your historical rankings. Without proper redirect mapping and pre-launch planning, even a beautiful new site can lose months (or years) of SEO value. Before migrating, brands need a clear redirect strategy and a site audit checklist to avoid preventable setbacks.
What are common technical SEO issues that hurt fashion e-commerce sites?
Slow load times, missing canonical tags, duplicate content, and crawlability problems are some of the most common issues holding back performance. Left unchecked, these problems quietly chip away at your search visibility and user experience. A technical SEO audit—run through tools like Semrush or Search Console—can help you catch and prioritize fixes based on severity and impact. Even a few improvements can make a measurable difference in how your site performs in both human and AI-driven search.
Why aren’t all traffic drops created equal?
Understanding the type of traffic drop you’re seeing is the first step toward fixing it. A sudden, sharp drop may signal a Google algorithm update. A gradual decline might point to technical issues or a recent redesign. If traffic fluctuates seasonally, it could just be tied to buyer behavior. And sometimes, it’s simply a reporting glitch. Distinguishing the cause helps you respond with the right solution, instead of making blind guesses or panicking unnecessarily.
Why does a blog strategy still matter in the age of AI search?
AI-generated answers are pulling information from the best content available—and your blog could be one of those sources. High-quality blog posts still play a strong role in attracting traffic, building trust, and training AI tools to recognize your site as authoritative. To stay visible, your content needs to be helpful, specific, and written with both humans and search engines in mind. Blog posts that solve real problems, showcase your expertise, and reflect your brand voice can still drive meaningful results in an AI-first world.
Chapters
00:00 Understanding Traffic Declines in E-commerce
06:31 The Impact of AI on Search and Traffic
11:27 Diagnosing Traffic Issues with Google Search Console
16:30 Technical SEO and Content Strategy for Recovery
Transcript
Glynis Tao
Why your website traffic is dropping and what to do about it. Here's a candid breakdown of the most common reasons fashion e-commerce websites are losing traffic in 2025 and how to fix them. In this episode, we are going to cover the impact of AI overviews on organic search, technical SEO red flags to watch out for, how to spot issues using Google Search Console, when to run a full technical SEO audit, and quick wins and long-term strategies for recovery. So let's get started.
Welcome to Chase Your Dreams, a podcast for fashion entrepreneurs who want to build a purposeful and profitable clothing business so they can make a living doing what they love. I'm your host, Glynis Tao, an apparel business consultant and SEO specialist with 20 years apparel industry experience. I'm also a mom to a wonderfully energetic little boy named Chase.
Your organic and direct traffic is down, but your site looks fine. Your rankings seem stable and your team is out of ideas. Sound familiar? In this episode, I will break down the real reasons your traffic might be dropping in 2025 and what you can do to fix it. From the growing impact of AI power search to overlooked technical SEO issues, I will share a practical action-oriented guide to help you recover visibility and conversions.
Whether you're a DTC brand or shifting into wholesale, this episode will give you the tools to diagnose the problem and move forward with clarity.
Hi, I'm Glynis. I'm the founder and CEO of Chase Your Dreams Consulting, which is an apparel business consulting and online marketing agency that specializes in SEO and AI search optimization for e-commerce companies. I help fashion, beauty, and lifestyle e-commerce brands create optimized content and attract potential customers through organic search results.
In this episode, you will learn why website traffic can drop even when your site looks healthy, the hidden impact of Google's AI overviews and declining click-through rates, what to look for in Google Search Console, the five most important technical SEO issues on Shopify and headless builds, why blog content still matters and how to make it work for AI SEO.
So let's just talk about the difference between traffic volume and traffic quality. I recently had a conversation with a potential client that runs an e-commerce website saying that they had seen a consistent decline in the website organic and direct traffic over the course of six to seven months and they weren't sure what was going on with it and came to me for help and try and hoping to find a solution to solve the problem to understand what is causing this decline in their organic and direct traffic to their website.
And so to be able to understand what the difference is between your traffic volume and traffic quality, the difference is that you know, traffic volume could be, you may be getting a lot of volume to your website, but perhaps they're not necessarily all converting or turning into sales, right? Because the quality of the traffic. So in the case where today we are seeing a lot more searches happening on other platforms, CI search platforms such as AI overviews or chat GPT, Claude or Perplexity. People are asking questions, looking for answers and typing in questions into their searches. So it's not just the way that search is changing, the way that people are asking questions on search engines.
So in the past where people were using more keywords, they're typing into search engines and then they would get a result on search engine results pages. And then that will require the user to go and click on the blue link that takes them to the website page to find their answer. And they may be looking, but if they don't find their answer, then they would have to go down the list and maybe go to the next website and go read through that. And they keep doing that until they find their answer.
But now with AI overviews and AI search engines, they are providing the answers directly right in the search area so that the people don't need to click to go to the website anymore. They are getting their answers directly in Google. So in the case of AI Overviews, they're typing in the questions and AI Overviews is giving them the answers and doesn't even require them to click on the link to go to the website anymore to get their answers. So Google and other search engines are now focusing on specific keywords, but it's generating answers where the users can get the answers to the questions directly right there.
This could be one of the reasons for the drop in organic traffic because there's less clicks happening across the board. And so you may be seeing perhaps lower volume of traffic, but perhaps maybe your sales have remained the same or perhaps even increased because it's probably due to the quality of the traffic that is going to your website through these searches. Because now the type of questions that people are asking and looking for a solution to, they happen to know your website is creating this quality content that directly addresses your customers' pain points and challenges, then that's a way for them to discover you. And it could be coming through any of these search platforms. And the better you're able to address your customers' problems, pain points and challenges, the better you're able to help them solve this problem. Then you have a better likelihood of converting this client or customer with your product or service.
So, think about it just in terms of, perhaps, you know, volume of traffic has gone down, but has your quality of traffic, you know, remained or have improved or increased over time, right? This is now a different way of looking at things. In the past, we were looking at traffic volume and how much volume we're getting. Think about how much you think of it now in terms of the quality of traffic that you're getting. If somebody is typing in a question and looking for an answer to a particular problem, they're probably, you know, really further along in their purchasing journey. And if your website, your product or service is able to solve this person's problem, then you have a better likelihood of converting them. Nowadays, it's not just the amount of traffic that you're getting, but also the quality of traffic that you're getting because of the way that search landscape is changing.
And so let's talk about how AI search is causing fewer clicks, even when rankings are stable. So this goes back to what I'm saying previously about, you know, increasing the quality of your content. So I have a previous episode that I talk about blogging and how blogging builds brand trust and boost sales. And you can listen to that episode.
AI search is causing fewer clicks. In some instances, some websites have seen up to 25% drop in clicks and traffic and overall traffic. So you got to be able to measure this and see like how much of your, how much is your search traffic being impacted and think about, you know, what is the content that you are creating on your website now, because now it's really more important than ever, but this could also be a reason why you are seeing a decrease or decline in your organic traffic, okay? Because AI search itself, AI search engines are providing you with the answer without having the user to click on a website directly, okay? So that could be explaining the reason for you're seeing a drop.
But in the case of this potential client who came to me who experienced a decline in their direct and organic traffic, they couldn't figure out why and what was going on. And one of the questions I asked them was, have you re-platformed or redesigned your website? And they had to mention that, yes, they changed from Shopify to a headless website. So in this instance, the decline could be explained by change in website structure and URLs. And I actually have another episode where I talk about how to prepare and plan for website redesign. And so there are steps that you need to do in order to prevent potential loss in organic traffic prior to migrating your site, okay, over to a new platform. And so you want to make sure that you have several things in place beforehand. You want to be able to map out your website. You want to identify which pages have the most organic traffic and you want to be able to preserve that traffic.
Map out your website pages, URLs before you move over to the new website. And once you have the new website and you launch, you want to make sure that you have proper redirects in place as well so that you don't lose traffic over time. That's very important. And so in this case, this had to do with a change in website structure.
So there are ways to check for traffic declines using Google Search Console. And I will walk you through that. So what you can do is you can use the performance report and compare current data with past periods. So you want to look for significant drops in clicks, impressions, and average position. Then investigate specific pages and queries to identify the source of the decline.
So I'm going to give you a more detailed breakdown step by step on how to do this. First, you want to access your performance report in Google Search Console. You select your property and then click on performance in the left-hand menu. By default, the report will show you data for the last three months. So you want to set your date range and compare previous periods. So you can click on a date range filter and select a custom range. For example, you can compare the last three months with the three months before that. So you can compare, you know, the last three months to the previous three months. And just by selecting your date range. Next, you can, you want to analyze the data. So you want to focus on clicks, impressions, and average click through rate and average position.
So look for significant drops in these metrics. Then you want to click on pages to see which pages have experienced decline in traffic. And then you're going to click on queries to see which search queries have seen a drop in clicks.
Then you want to investigate this further. To investigate this further, if you see a drop in clicks for a specific page, then investigate that page's content structure and SEO. If you see a drop in clicks for a specific query, you search why that query might be performing worse. Check the Google Search Console coverage report to see if any pages have indexing issues. And you can review the Google Search Console mobile usability report for any mobile related issues.
Lastly, we'll go through the debugging stage, okay? And so if you're unsure why the traffic dropped, you want to try to narrow down the affected pages or queries. Compare the drop period with a similar period to identify the source. See if the drop affects one page, a few pages, or it's site-wide. Look for direct errors in the coverage report and check for Core Web Vitals issues in the Core Web Vitals report. By following these steps, you can effectively use Google Search Console to identify and diagnose traffic declines on your website. And also, Google has a very helpful debugging Google traffic search traffic drops page on their site. This talks about, you know, a drop in organic search traffic can happen for several reasons. And it may not be straightforward to understand what exactly happened to your site. So you want to just go through the steps and be able to identify, investigate the reasons for the drop in search traffic. And then you can come up with a plan on how to address it. But there are four main causes for drops in organic traffic. And I'm just going to explain and walk you through what these are right now.
Okay. So if you see a sudden drop in website traffic, that could be due, that's a sudden large drop that's site-wide, that could be from an algorithm update. So that's usually if you see a sudden drop in your traffic, because Google is always improving and how it's assessing content and updating its search ranking and serving algorithms accordingly. And so they are making so many updates nowadays, you know, like they've made thousands of updates, algorithm updates over the past year. And so that's why you want to take a look and see how drastic is the drop. Another thing that could be causing a drop would be say seasonality. And so if you're seeing kind of more, you know, up and down, activity that could just be due to seasonality. If your products are seasonal, you're selling seasonal products, then you kind of see a lot more of that up and down kind of activity.
And another issue that you could be seeing is the, in the case of this potential client who I was talking to, saying that they were seeing a gradual decline. This to me, would be more of an indication of technical issue, which in my case, I was saying probably due to site structure change in which they, know, previous pages that were ranking had changed in the URLs and they may not have done the proper redirects. So they're sort of starting to see that gradual decline in traffic. Okay, so then you want to take a look at and do a technical SEO audit in this case.
And the last issue could be due to a glitch or recording glitch and that could just be something like your traffic could take a dip, but then it returns back to normal levels. So you have your website traffic and then you sort of see this slight dip, but it eventually returns back to normal. So hopefully it stays that way. And so in that case, you know, maybe you had some broken links in your site. So these are some technical things that you really want to take a look at and assess the situation.
Okay. And just to talk a little bit about technical SEO, I'm going to actually create another episode that talks about the five most common technical SEO issues that I've seen in Shopify and what they are, what the issue is, why it is important, and how to fix it. Technical issues can take form in, page speed, load times in canonical tags, duplication errors, and that sort of thing. And so in the case of this potential client person who I was talking about, I really recommended that they do a technical SEO audit and you can do that in Semrush. And what that does is it checks your site and makes sure that there aren't any crawlability issues that may affect your site's ability to be indexed, probability and indexing issues.
And also if there's any duplicate content or duplicate title tags, meta description, it'll tell you, you know, what are the major issues and errors that will need to be addressed immediately, what priorities, what things would need to be fixed first in order to get your site health in a way that it performs properly. And so that's what I think an SEO audit is important to do so that you're able to diagnose the problem, right? And know exactly what needs to be done to start fixing that and start to regain and repair and, you know, restore that website traffic that they were previously getting. So that was pretty much my recommendation to them.
The last thing I want to talk about, and this was another recommendation that I had mentioned, was how I always encourage all my clients to have a blog strategy. And why this is important is because in today's world of AI search engines, the search landscape is changing, right? So, I mean, traditional SEO still works and is still around and still important, but it's building on that layer that's for AI search. So AI search engines like AI Overviews, ChatGPT, Perplexity, all those, which I had mentioned earlier, could be causing clicks to go down and overall traffic to decline. I actually recorded a previous episode that talks about how blogging builds brand trust and boosts sales, which I encourage you to have a listen to because I think it's important.
And I still encourage all my clients to use the strategy of blog creation, but you're not just creating content for the sake of content. You’ve got to make sure that you're creating content that, you know, it's high quality, that's written by people, for people, that also helps address the common problems and pain points. But not only does the blog do that, but it also helps you establish your expertise, experience, authoritativeness, and trustworthiness as well, which is a huge factor for search engines and AI search in deciding whether or not they will rank your content or not. And so these are the things that you need to start thinking about in terms of how you're going to adapt and the type of content that you are going to be creating.
And I will be talking more and creating more content in the future about AI search, generative AI, AI optimization, GEO, LLMO, all sorts of things like that because I've been having so many conversations lately and people reaching out to me asking me questions about how to optimize for AI search and is SEO still relevant?
So please stay tuned. I will be creating more content and more future podcast episodes around these topics. And I'd love it if you can let me know if there's anything you'd like to learn more about.
Please send me your questions or any ideas, topics that you would like to hear more about. And I'd love to create those for you. So thank you so much for tuning in today. And I hope you found this episode to be helpful. Thank you so much for listening and have a great day.
In this conversation, Christine Daal, CEO and founder of Fashion Angel Warrior, shares her journey from fashion designer to coach, emphasizing the importance of confidence, community, and a holistic approach in fashion entrepreneurship. She discusses her unique coaching methods, common mistakes made by fashion entrepreneurs, and the significance of adapting to industry changes. Christine highlights success stories from her clients, showcasing the impact of her coaching on their businesses. She also addresses the future of fashion, including the need to develop more workers for local apparel manufacturing and improving sustainability to keep up with global standards and consumer demands.
About Christine Daal
Christine Daal is the CEO and founder of the fashion consulting and marketing agency, Fashion Angel Warrior. Her experience spans over 20 years in the industry, reaching the position of VP of design and merchandising by the age of 30, and then starting her own successful fashion line. For the past 10 years, she has coached fashionpreneurs on how to leave their nine to five and have a profitable business. Through one-on-one coaching, group coaching masterminds, fractional CMO services, online courses, retreats, manufacturing tours, and digital marketing services, Fashion Angel Warrior has become a one-stop shop for e-commerce brands.
Confidence plays a direct role in building a successful brand.
A holistic approach blends mindset, lifestyle, and business strategy.
Build your audience and email list before launching any product.
Don’t invest in inventory without first validating demand.
Track key metrics like traffic, email list, and average order value.
Choose coaches and service providers based on results, not hype.
Know your budget and revisit it before making major decisions.
Successful founders outsource strategically and focus on what they do best.
Community support is essential for long-term growth and resilience.
Sustainability and adaptability are no longer optional, but are expected.
Moms can build legacy brands that create freedom, income, and impact.
Interview themes
What are common mistakes that fashion startups make, and how can they be avoided?
Christine Daal has seen too many early-stage brands go under—not for lack of passion, but because they spent their budgets in the wrong places or worked with the wrong people. Common mistakes include hiring the wrong agency, underestimating the power of community, and trying to do everything solo. Her biggest red flag? Founders investing tens of thousands in inventory before building demand. Christine’s first step with every client is to review their budget honestly and plan strategically. “Compliments don’t make you money,” she says. “Results do.”
How can you launch a fashion brand with no product?
Through her “no product fashion line method,” Christine teaches clients to flip the traditional launch model. Instead of designing and producing inventory first, brands build community—an audience and grow their email list before they release their first item. Some clients have ranked in the top 20% of Shopify stores for traffic the week they launched with no product on hand. The approach reduces financial risk and creates demand before production, setting up founders for stronger sales and sustainable growth.
What do successful founders have in common?
Christine’s most successful clients are committed, coachable, and clear on their strengths. Many are moms working late nights or early mornings, multitasking between life and business—but always willing to do what it takes. They don’t try to master every skill themselves. Instead, they focus on what they do best—like designing—and outsource the rest, whether it's accounting, analytics, or ads. They also tend to prioritize health, organization, and mindset—understanding that how you care for yourself affects how you lead.
How does confidence affect business outcomes?
Christine takes a holistic approach to coaching—blending business strategy with mental wellness and confidence-building. She’s helped clients unlock major growth just by helping them feel empowered to make decisions: hiring a seamstress, collaborating with a designer, or pitching to a store. When founders feel confident, they take bolder actions—and those decisions directly impact their bottom line. For Christine, mindset isn’t a side note. It’s a growth driver.
A client case study: from unprofitable to multi-7 figures
One of Christine’s long-time clients was generating $500K in sales—but spending $600K to get there. Together, they cut $100K in operating expenses and doubled the brand’s online revenue. The result? Profitability for the first time, and a six-figure month shortly after. Over the next few years, Christine helped him scale to 7 figures, overhaul his email strategy (growing email revenue from $2.5K to $10K per campaign), and increase site conversion rates to nearly 4%. He even let go of two other coaches and chose to keep Christine. “That was the ultimate compliment,” she says.
Where does Christine start when a founder says, “I need more sales”?
Christine starts by getting straight to the numbers: website traffic, email list size, social media following, and average order value. With just those four data points, she can calculate revenue potential and uncover what’s holding a brand back. She also helps founders shift from gut-based decisions to data-informed ones. Whether it’s pricing, product design, or inventory planning—every decision should be tied to a measurable stat. “Show me the numbers,” she says. “That’s how you grow.”
What should brands focus on as the industry changes?
Christine believes fashion entrepreneurs must evolve alongside the industry. That means shifting to community-first marketing, adapting manufacturing models (especially as tariffs and labor shortages rise), and taking sustainability seriously. Whether it’s building private feedback groups or learning to sew as a backup skill, Christine urges founders to stay flexible, use tech tools wisely, and listen to their customers early and often. The future belongs to brands that can pivot—and care.
Why does Christine love working with moms founders?
Christine lights up when working with women who are building something meaningful for themselves and their families. As a mom of two, she understands the juggle—and the deep motivation behind legacy-building. She sees business as more than income. It’s about empowerment, freedom, and impact. Helping a mom go from idea to income, or showing her child what’s possible through entrepreneurship, is what Christine finds most rewarding. “You’re not just growing a brand,” she says. “You’re changing your family’s future.”
Chapters
00:00 Building Confidence in Fashion Entrepreneurship
02:41 The Journey of Fashion Angel Warrior
05:51 Holistic Coaching Approach
08:43 Signature Coaching and Marketing Framework
11:38 Common Mistakes of Fashion Entrepreneurs
14:46 The Importance of Community
17:23 Full Spectrum Solutions for Fashion Brands
20:25 Client Success Stories
23:20 Growth Metrics and Revenue Increases
26:30 Mindset and Habits of Successful Clients
29:19 Navigating Online Sales Growth
32:12 Adapting to Industry Changes
35:16 The Future of Fashion: Trends and Sustainability
38:16 Empowering Female Founders
41:07 Advice for Fashion Entrepreneurs
44:06 Upcoming Programs and Promotions
47:02 Final Thoughts and Contact Information
Transcript
Christine Daal
We've had a lot of different success stories. Even just aside from e-commerce, going back to the confidence side, again, because I'm so holistic and I like to look at your mental health and your mindset and confidence and all this different stuff, even on the confidence side, we had a brand that she finally felt the confidence to start hiring more seamstresses and expanding her team. And then that allowed her to now take on more orders because she was turning away business because she wasn't able to fulfill orders, but she didn't have the confidence to think that she could actually hire a good seamstress. So even just having a confidence increase, right, can affect the remainder of your business.
We had another client who was literally part of our Soar Mastermind program, she connected with another designer. She didn't feel confident in her own design capabilities, believe it or not. So she wasn't really a designer by heart, but just wanted to start this business for other reasons. And so she connected with another designer, hired that designer to be her designer and now she felt like, now I have actually really good designs, which then gave her the confidence to start reaching out to stores, which then she got her first wholesale order. So even just having that boost in confidence can really help your bottom line, which people don't think about or want to talk about maybe, but it does affect the bottom line of your business. So that's also been amazing to see, just people's confidence go up.
Glynis Tao
Welcome to Chase Your Dreams, a podcast for fashion entrepreneurs who want to build a purposeful and profitable clothing business so they can make a living doing what they love. I'm your host, Glynis Tao, an apparel business consultant and SEO specialist with 20 years apparel industry experience. I'm also a mom to a wonderfully energetic little boy named Chase.
Christine Daal is the CEO and founder of the fashion consulting and marketing agency, Fashion Angel Warrior. Her experience spans over 20 years in the industry, reaching the position of VP of design and merchandising by the age of 30, and then starting her own successful fashion line. For the past 10 years, she has coached fashion printers on how to leave their nine to five and have a profitable business. Through one-on-one coaching, group coaching masterminds, fractional CMO services, online courses, retreats, manufacturing tours, and digital marketing services, Fashion Angel Warrior has become a one-stop shop for e-commerce brands.
Welcome, Christine. It's so nice to have you here today. Thanks for joining me on the podcast.
Christine Daal
Hi, Glynis, it's so nice to be here. Thank you so much for having me.
Glynis Tao
You've had an incredible journey from fashion designer to coach and agency founder. What inspired you to start Fashion Angel Warrior? Was there a gap you noticed in the market?
Yeah, so I think that first of all, I felt called to do this probably because of two main things. I've always loved fashion and I've always loved helping people. And so I kind of just put them together, right? And that's how I started the coaching side of the business. But at the same time, I really saw a need and a gap in the market and I saw a lot of injustice happening. So when I had my successful fashion line, I experienced with one of my manufacturers, they actually tried to take advantage of me.
And this was, you know, at the time I had already 12 years of experience in the fashion industry. I wasn't a newbie. I kind of knew what I was doing. And so it just became really apparent to me right out of the gate that if these newbie designers don't have someone in their corner kind of fighting for them and helping them, who's going to help them navigate this, right? And avoid having these manufacturers take advantage of them. So I had a personal experience, right? That kind of shaped my desire to start the business.
And then just the industry itself, for those who have been in it, kind of know it's very secretive, it's very competitive. There's a lot of this whole devil wears Prada nonsense going on where people are really just pushing each other down to get ahead, right, to make themselves feel better. And I just don't agree with any of that. And so I wanted to do the opposite. I was like, can I be the angel who wears Prada? Can I be the one lifting people up because there's way too many people, you know, pushing people down.
And so when I started my business almost 10 years ago now, I was like, okay, we need to have the vision that people are serving one another and helping each other and collaborating instead of competing. That's like one of our core visions and values, right? And so I always say for the fashion industry to survive, it can't be survival of the fittest, right? We all need to really work together. That's really what drove me to start Fashion Angel Warrior.
Glynis Tao
Okay, that sounds great. Okay, and like, I was also curious about the name and it sounds like now it makes sense. You are the angel versus the devil who wears Prada.
Christine Daal
Yes, yes, yes, that was part of it, yes.
Glynis Tao
I love it. Your mission is to help fashion printers turn their passion into profit. What does that transformation usually look like for your clients?
Christina Daal
So the transformation can look like a lot of different things. I always tell people my coaching approach is really always two things, holistic and customized. So I believe in looking at the whole person, not just your business model, right? So what are your values? What are your interests? What are your goals? What are your strengths, your weaknesses, your budget? That really takes a huge factor, right? If you come to me and say, have a $5,000 budget versus a $200,000 budget, my advice is gonna be very different, right?
Even your lifestyle, if you're a working mom, if you just got divorced, you know, all of these different things, I like to incorporate into my coaching approach and strategy. So I like to say I go beyond the typical business strategies and I really like to incorporate your soul, body and spirit into everything that we do. Right? So I always say mental health and confidence are just as important as having a marketing plan, for instance.
And so I also like to take a very long-term approach. So yes, I can teach you what's popular right now on Instagram, right? But let's look down the road. Do you want to be doing Instagram in two years, in three years? Is this really sustainable for what you're doing, where you're at with your life, your lifestyle, your preferences, right? Or do you need something else that's more evergreen? That's not going to be, I have to post every single day and show up and that sort of thing. So, that's kind of my approach to coaching and the transformation can be anything. I mean, I've seen people go from a confidence level of two to a confidence level of seven. I've seen people go from zero to a million dollars in sales in their very first year, which is crazy, crazy success. And then everything in between, right? So the transformation really spans the gamut.
Glynis Tao
Okay, so we're going to go deeper into your coaching approach and some client success stories, but just want to ask you, how has your background in both corporate fashion and entrepreneurship shaped your coaching approach and how do your services differ from traditional marketing firms or generic business coaches?
Christine Daal
Yeah. So I think having a background in both corporate and entrepreneurship has really helped to make me a well-rounded coach. I have a very broad understanding of different levels, of different avenues, and things that brands can explore. And so it helps me to understand, for instance, common mistakes that a brand might make. For instance, typically if you've worked in corporate fashion, you are going to start your fashion line thinking, well, I can just do what the company that I just worked for did, which maybe they sold, you know, 10,000 unit dress orders, right, on a daily basis and so their margins were maybe only 11% versus you, you're now a startup business, you can't have an 11% margin. You're not selling 10,000 unit orders. You're maybe selling two or three or five or 10, right? And so you really need to have that minimum, what I always say, 65 to 70% margin, which sounds really high if you're used to coming from a corporate background, right?
That's, I think, kind of what helps to make me a little bit more well-rounded and trying to be able to look out for those typical mistakes, common mistakes that people might make coming maybe from a corporate background or something like that. I also like to make sure that everything that I do is customized, right? I don't want to give you advice that's cookie-cutter. We have an amazing program. It's our Soar Mastermind group coaching program where we have eight different brands and I work with them for six months straight.
During that program, I create a marketing plan for each member. And so it's crazy to me because each marketing plan will look very, very different. One brand, I might tell them, hey, I think you should be doing PR. And the other one, I might tell them, I don't think you should waste any money. Please do not do any PR, right? So it just kind of depends on what the brand is, again, what their goals are, and what they really want to achieve.
Glynis Tao
And what types of fashion brands do you typically work with?
Christina Daal
I work with all different types of products, even non-fashion products. Everyone is like, well, I'm doing a medical product or I had a lady that was creating covers for dentist chairs, right? So things that are not even a typical fashion product, if you're making any kind of sewn product or even a non-sewn product, I mean, we've had people that were just starting like a stationary business or candle business, right? It's not anything to do with fashion or apparel, but it's a product that they're making, right? And now they want to sell it primarily online, but also wholesale.
So the majority of our customers would say 99% of them all want to sell e-commerce. And then I would say at least 50% of them want to do wholesale business as well. And so we work with both startups, meaning you have nothing, maybe just an idea, all the way to brands that are already doing six and seven figures and helping them scale from there.
Glynis Tao
So we're going to move into your coaching approach and services. Can you walk us through your signature coaching or marketing framework and what does that client journey look like?
Christine Daal
Yes. So let's talk about the signature coaching method first. We have a method that we've developed, what I like to call the no product fashion line method. And so basically we'll teach you how to start building your audience before you even have a product. Everyone seems to want to do it the reverse. They focus on building the product and building the website and then they launch and they hear crickets and they wonder why. And I'm like, that's because you didn't focus on the marketing.
And so we'll teach you how to drive traffic to your website, build your email list, grow your social media following all before you even have a product. And literally we have clients that are launching their Shopify stores in the top 17 to 23% of all Shopify stores ranked for traffic the same week that they launch because they're following our system and they literally have no product. So they're launching without any product and they're still beating out the other 90% of stores on Shopify. So it's really amazing to see that it does work and I can see that you're laughing Glynis because you know this is how all these brands are right?
Glynis Tao
I know that's way most typically how most brands do it right? Yeah, and I just yeah, that's what I love about you and how you know you have no product launch process, right? Yeah, I've seen brands make that mistake all the time. They like invest in so much inventory before they've even validated their business idea
Christine Daal
Yeah. I cringe every time I see it happen. So I always tell people like, do it, give yourself at least six to nine months, if not a year, to really build up that traffic before you launch. And trust me, once you have customers dying to get what it is that you want, you're going to be in such a better position than if you didn't do it that way and you did it the reverse. And so if you want to learn more about our no product fashion line method, at the end, I'll tell everyone how to get a free video training that explains it in detail. So that's kind of our signature coaching method.
On the marketing agency side, again, our signature framework, I would say, is just being holistic, right? When it comes to digital marketing, I like to say that it all works together, right? Kind of like trying to lose weight. If you went to the gym, but then you ate pizza and chicken wings and hot dogs and all this horrible junk food all the time, right? You're probably not gonna lose as much weight just by going to the gym. But if you ate right, if you got good sleep, if you weren't so stressed out, right? All these other things, they all kind of work together for the whole, right?
So my approach to digital marketing is that same thing. I want to see everyone, if possible, do as many things as they can. Social media, email, SMS, blog writing, SEO, live shopping, paid ads, PR celebs, influencers, UGC. Let's do it all if we can, if we have the time and budget resources. If not, then we can at least pare down and see what's going to be the best strategies for your brand, at least in the beginning, until we can see what works. Because again, what works for one brand may not work for another brand for various different reasons. And so that's kind of my marketing approach when it comes on the marketing agency side.
Glynis Tao
That really makes sense to take that tailored approach because not all businesses are the same. What are some common mistakes that you see fashion entrepreneurs making when they first come to you?
Christine Daal
Yes. I have seen so many mistakes. I've seen people waste so much money, like tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of dollars. And unfortunately, sometimes they come to me and it's too late because now they're out of money, right? So hopefully you haven't made a lot of those monetary mistakes and we can really help you. But I would say if I had to narrow down maybe the top three mistakes, I would say the first one is they waste a lot of time and money on the wrong coach or the wrong agency, right?
So I always say try to work with a coach who actually gets you results. Compliments are nice. We get compliments all the time. Christine, your webinar was so informative, or I really liked how you strategically laid it all out. Those are really nice things, but compliments don't make you money. Results make you money right at the end of the day. So make sure you're working with a coach that actually gets results. Make sure you're also working with a coach who has the experience of where you want to go. So did they have their own line?
Did they work in the industry? Different things like that, right? And then just watch out who you're taking advice from to make sure that they're not biased, right? There's a lot of people who maybe they started out as a manufacturer and now they offer coaching on the side. Well, their main business is manufacturing, right? So when you come to them and you say, have $50,000 to start a fashion line, they're going to easily tell you, well, great, spend $40,000 on manufacturing, right?
They know they can suck you into that versus spend $40,000 on coaching or something like that. So because we're a one-stop shop, I think it's really easy for me to not be biased. And that's one of the reasons primarily that we offer so many services because I want to make sure I can give you that unbiased opinion. I can tell people, hey, I don't think you really need one-on-one coaching. Maybe you need to put your money into influencer marketing, or maybe you need to put your money into social media, or whatever it is because we now offer all of these services. So that's, think, the first number one mistake.
Second one is, I think, undervaluing community. So yes, having a coach is great, but a coach is one person. If I have a community of other fashion brands that are all on the same level or even a greater level than I am, right, I now have multiple people's advice that I can now take in versus just one person's advice, right? Because I'm only one person. I only have one experience, one background, one set of perspectives, right? But now I have 10 people's perspectives. So it's so great to be in a community. Can bounce ideas off each other. You can get feedback on designs. You can see what marketing methods are working for one versus the other. You can do co-branded giveaways and shoutouts. It's literally a game changer. So see any way you can be part of a community. Everything that we do, all of our programs all have a community aspect and that's why.
And then the third mistake I would say is trying to do everything yourself. I think people in the beginning, they want to save money, maybe they don't have a huge budget and they're like, I'll just do everything myself. And I found after working with probably close to over a thousand brands at this point that sometimes it's better if we just handle some of the things for you, right? And so that's why we wanted to become a full service marketing agency because sure, I can teach you what to do on Instagram, but if you don't have the mindset for it, if you don't have the time for it, it's sometimes easier and faster for me to just do it for you, right? I have a team, they have our system in place, they know what to do. It's just 10 times easier for us to kind of handle some of that stuff and for you to focus on what you do best, which nine out 10 times is usually the creative side, right?
Definitely try not to do everything yourself.
Glynis Tao
I think that's really great advice. Just to recap the three things that you said, the three comments that you see are like, first one is they're spending way too much money, maybe on the wrong thing. Secondly, not having a community of supporters behind them. And then thirdly is that they're trying to do everything themselves.
Christine Daal
Yeah, definitely.
Glynis Tao
And so you also offer production and design services and marketing. Like, why do you choose to provide such a full spectrum solution? And you sort of had already talked about this, but just maybe if you want to elaborate.
Christina Daal
So again, we like to say that we're a one-stop shop, and it's so that we can remain unbiased. I want to make sure that when you come to me, you are spending your money in the right places, because as we just discussed, not having enough money, or I should say running out of money, is the number one thing that I see all the time that prevents brands from succeeding.
So I want to make sure, and that's why every client I work with, whether you're a one-on-one client or you take one of our online programs, the very first step is budget. Like we need to talk about what is a realistic budget for you. Look at your bank account, right? If you have someone helping you, your parents, your husband, this, that, whatever, right? How much are they really realistically looking to put in, right? You're taking money from your job. What on a monthly basis can you contribute, right? And where do you need to be to walk away from your job? Because nine out 10 times, most of the people do have a full-time job and their goal is to eventually walk away. And so people think, oh, well, you know, I make $100,000 in my job, so I just need to make $100,000 in my business. Well, that's actually not true because you need to make yourself a salary of $100,000. If your business made $100,000, you're not taking a salary of all that money, right? That's the gross, not the net. So we really need to see how much does the business really need to produce, right, in order to pay yourself that salary.
And so, yeah, it's just the number one reason is so that we can remain unbiased. And I've just found so many other marketing agencies and companies that just all they care about is their own bottom line. They don't really care about helping other people. And so they'll steer you in the wrong direction. They'll, you know, show stats that are a little bit tweaked, you know, to make it look like everything's going really great. Meanwhile, that's not really what's happening in the back end.
And I'll be clear that we don't do everything in-house. So we do partner with some other marketing agencies or service providers like yourself, Glynis, right? We partner with you for SEO because I know if I have a resource that's the best in the business, I'm just going to go to that person. Why would I start my own SEO service when I already know Glynis is the person for SEO? I'm going to send everybody to her.
Right? So we don't do everything in house. I would say probably 70% we do in house and then the other 30% we outsource to other agencies and other providers like yourself. But a lot of it we do in house because it's the control factor too. I like to make sure that my clients are well taken care of and they're treated well and everything is going to go smoothly.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, because at the end of the day, it's all your reputation that's on the line. Right? That comes back to your name, your brand, your business, and even it matters to which referral partners that you work with as well. Cause you want to make sure that they will deliver and stand behind, you know, your brand's name and quality. So that's what I really love about you. then
Christine Daal
Exactly.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, the fact that you have an unbiased view and you're really looking out for the best interests of the client and what's best for them.
Christina Daal
Yes, because at the end of the day, if they succeed, I succeed, right? If you do good, you only make me look better. If you don't do good, I'm not going to look so good, right? So it's kind of I'm shooting myself in the foot, if you don't succeed. So it is in my best interest to help you succeed as much as possible.
Glynis Tao
So let's talk about some of these clients' success stories. Let's dive into one of your client case studies. Can you share a case study that you're especially proud of? And can you tell us about a brand you helped, where they were before and what changed after working with you?
Christina Daal
Yes, absolutely. So one of my favorite case studies is a long-time client of mine. I started working with him back in 2019 and at the time he was making $500,000 in sales, so pretty good. But the problem was he had $600,000 in expenses. So he was in the red, right? He was not profitable. And so the first thing I wanted to do was we got to make you profitable like before we even tried to increase your sales. So we reduced a lot of his operating expenses literally by $100,000 working together. And then at the same time, we actually were able to double his online sales. So he was doing wholesale and online at the time. So we doubled his online sales. And then that essentially put him in the black, which was amazing. And he was profitable for the first time he ever was in his business.
Even better was one month after finishing working together, he had a six figure month, which was his highest earning month that he ever had, you know, after implementing all the strategies that we taught him. And so we've been working together off and on over the years back in like 2020, 2022, we did a lot of digital marketing services for him. We helped him really grow his IG. I think his IG is up to like 14,000 now.
And then in 2023, he hit seven figures, excuse me, and we started working together again because he had hired an outside marketing agency and he wasn't happy with them. So he came back to us. We started doing more digital marketing for him and literally his site conversion rate was at a 1.3. It went to 3.96, so almost four, which is incredible because average site conversions are really only one to 3%. His abandoned cart rate dropped. He was at 65%. It went to 47%.
His AOV increased, his repeat customer rate increased, and his sales were up by 127%. So again, more than double. And that literally was all within four months of just doing a little bit of coaching and some of our digital marketing services. So that was really, really amazing to see that transformation, right? Here was a customer, had a horrible experience with another marketing agency. We came in, we took over, right? And the numbers just drastically changed.
But I think the best part, the cherry on top, was that in the beginning of 2024, he had hired three coaches, so myself included plus two other coaches. And we were all kind of a little bit overlapped but a little bit different backgrounds and experiences, right? Don't ask me why he hired all three of us, but that's what he wanted to do. And by the end of 2024, I was the only coach left, meaning he had fired the other two. And I took that as a really big compliment.
Because for someone to say, you know, I had three and now Christine's the only one left, right? I was like, that has got to be the highest, you know, praise and testimony that I've ever received from anyone. So I was super, super proud of that and just awesome. I love working with him. I love seeing the transformation. We're still working together until this day, six years later, right? And it's just been amazing to see his business grow the way that it has.
Glynis Tao
Oh, that sounds amazing. I love that story. Do I know this client?
Christine Daal
Yes. You were part of that success.
Glynis Tao
I feel so good. Yeah, that client was great to work with.
Christine Daal
Yes, yes, he's amazing.
Glynis Tao
And he really takes the recommendations that you give seriously and you know, will do all the things.
Christine Daal
He's coachable. He's coachable and willing to learn.
Glynis Tao
He is coachable. And that's important, right? Yes. a coaching client as well, like they have to be coachable. Do you ever turn people down?
Christine Daal
Yes. If they just happen to be, if they're not the right thing. Absolutely. I will. I will tell people, you're not listening to what I'm telling you. I don't know why you're paying me. You should just let us do it, like either hire us to do the digital marketing stuff ourselves or, you know, we need to cut our ties and that's it because otherwise I'm just wasting your time. Like you're spending money but you're not even listening to what I'm telling you to do. So you're never going to succeed. And then again, you're going to make me look bad which defeats the whole purpose, right? Yeah, I have definitely turned clients down or stopped working with them because of that reason.
Glynis Tao
So you share a little bit of details in terms of growth metrics, sales, revenue, not exactly revenue numbers, but conversions and stuff. Can you, it's up to you if you want to share specific results such as sales growth, wholesale deals or e-commerce metrics that show the impact of your work.
Christine Daal
Yeah, definitely. I think the biggest one, obviously helping a brand go from zero to 1 million in one year was by far the biggest jump, right? That's obviously not normal. Everyone should not expect those types of results,
Glyinis Tao
Is that possible for everybody?
Christine Daal
No, it is not possible for everyone. She did have a huge budget to start out, right? I was also responsible for putting together the entire team of people, right, from the designer to the pattern maker to the sales rep, like everything I put together for her. And a large part of it was wholesale, so it wasn't just online sales. Now, I will say as far as online sales, we've definitely helped double people's revenue. We've helped triple people's revenue. In just like two months, I helped triple one customer's revenue.
We have brands that went from $100,000 to $300,000 in just a year. As far as other stats, I have a client that went from having a repeat customer rate of maybe 40%, which is already a really high repeat customer rate. Like I always tell people, if you can have a repeat customer rate around 20 to 25, you're doing pretty good. She already had 40, which was amazing. She ended up having 80,000 by the time we were done working together. I mean, 80%, excuse me.
So she doubled her repeat customer rate, which is the highest I've ever seen. I've never seen anyone get 80%. I think the highest conversion rate we helped a client get was 6%, which is also super high. What else can I share? We had one client that got a $30,000- $40,000 increase in revenue just from one pricing strategy that I gave her. Like one little tip, one little tip that I gave her and she was like, oh my gosh, we just increased our revenue in one month. $30,000 to $40,000. I was like, that's amazing.
Email sales. People don't talk a lot about email sales, but I always tell people, your email needs to be making you money. When you send an email out, an e-blast out to your list, it should bring in dollars, right? And so we had a brand that was averaging $2,500 per email that she would send out. She went from $2,500 to $10,000 per email. That was a huge, huge increase.
So yeah, we've seen a lot of different things. I talked about abandoned car rates dropping, site conversion rates going up. We've had a lot of different success stories. Even just aside from e-commerce, going back to the confidence side, again, because I'm so holistic and I like to look at your mental health and your mindset and confidence and all this different stuff, even on the confidence side, we had a brand that she finally felt the confidence to start hiring more seamstresses and expanding her team. And then that allowed her to now take on more orders because she was turning away business because she wasn't able to fulfill orders. But she didn't have the confidence to think that she could actually hire a good seamstress, right? So even just having a confidence increase, right, can affect the bottom line of your business.
We had another client who was literally part of our Soar Mastermind program, she connected with another designer. She didn't feel confident in her own design capabilities, believe it or not. So she wasn't really a designer by heart, but just wanted to start this business for other reasons. And so she connected with another designer, and hired that designer to be her designer. And now she felt like, now I have actually really good designs, which then gave her the confidence to start reaching out to stores, which then she got her first wholesale order, right? So even just having that boost in confidence can really help your bottom line, which people don't think about or want to talk about maybe, but it does affect the bottom line of your business. So that's also been amazing to see, just people's confidence go up.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, so besides just the numbers, sales, revenues, but also you get the benefit of, like you said, building the confidence as well, which really does affect your bottom line in terms of how much confidence you have with your business and brand.
I want to ask you, what do your most successful clients have in common in terms of mindset or business habits?
Christine Daal
That's a good one. So mindset wise, I always like to say my key phrase is do whatever it takes. And I would say my successful clients definitely have that attitude, right? They're willing to do whatever it takes. If they have a newborn baby, they're staying up till 3am, you know, after they put that baby down, right? And they're working on their business, right? Or they're breastfeeding while they're working on their laptop and watching a YouTube video or something, right? So they have that mindset that they're willing to do whatever it takes.
I think they also have the mindset that again, they know they can't do everything well, right? A good, successful business person knows their strengths and their weaknesses. And so if I know I'm really great at design but I'm not really good at numbers, well, then I better outsource all the number stuff, right? I better hire a bookkeeper and an accountant and somebody to look at my Google Analytics and all the nitty gritty back end of my ads and dashboards and all this stuff because that's not my strategy. That's not my strength, right? It's doing all of that kind of stuff. And so I think that they have the mindset that I do what I do well and the other things I outsource because yeah, sure, you can take the approach that you can strengthen your weaknesses, but the amount of time and effort it would take for you to get good at something that you're not good at, whereas you could just outsource it, you're gonna be far further ahead, right? So much faster if you just simply outsourced it. So I think they kind of have that kind of mindset for sure. And what was the second part of your question? What mindset and what?
Glynis Tao
Habits.
Christine Daal
Habits, yeah, kind of the same thing. Guess habits would be willing to wake up early, willing to go to bed late, taking care of yourself. I think again, having that holistic approach, most of them work out or do some type of exercise because they understand when you're getting the blood flowing, your brain's gonna work better and you're gonna be more effective at your job or your work, right? So I think they have a very holistic approach to how they take care of themselves and they prioritize self-care. right, knowing that, this is going to affect my business, right? They maybe, you know, have a very organized workspace or, you know, a home that's not super cluttered, right, because they understand that that clutter is not going to affect their mind, which now affects their work, etc., etc. So I would say, yeah, those are probably the things that a lot of my successful clients have in common.
Glynis Tao
And when a client says, I have no idea how to grow my online sales, where do you usually start?
Christine Daal
That's a good question. I would say I usually start by telling them and explaining to them that it's a numbers game, right? So everyone's seen the movie, you know, Jerry Maguire where he's like, show me the money, right? I feel like I'm Jerry Maguire, but I'm like, show me the numbers. And so I tell people like how much website traffic, how many people are visiting your website every day, how many people are on your email list, how many people on your social media following, right?
I just need those three stats, basic, right, to then be able to tell you how much revenue you're making. And of course, your average order value, four stats, right, is all I really need. And I can tell you how much revenue you're going to make, right? So it is a numbers game. And I think when people start to understand the more left side brain, analytical side of things, number side of things, versus being so right brain and criteria, then they really start to see like, this is actually kind of like a game.
Like we can have fun with this, right? Like let's see how high we can get our website traffic. Let's see how high we can get our social media. Let's see how high we can get our email, right? Can we increase our average order value? And all you have to do is just play around with the numbers a little bit, right? And you can see how drastic your revenue will change.
We've created this amazing spreadsheet. It's literally called the How to Leave Your 9 to 5 Spreadsheet. That's literally what I call it. All you have to do is plug in those three numbers. It's got all the stats and everything else, those four numbers with your AOV and it will tell you how much you need to make in order to leave your 9 to 5 job. And it's not 100% foolproof, of course, but it's interesting to just play around with it and see, you don't really want to be on social media? Great. Well, then let's focus on email and website rather than social media, right? And just tweaking a couple of things here and there can drastically increase your revenue at the end of the day.
Glynis Tao
It's really unique, I think, with what we do in terms of working with mostly creatives, designers, who I find a lot of them are scared of the numbers. Yeah. Don't really want to look at the numbers. Yes. A lot of the time I find they just go by gut feeling, which is not good, right? Like, how do you feel about that? So I think you and I are similar in that way in terms of what I call it.
I call myself a logical creative in which I have this balance of left brain or right brain. And that's how I'm able to do SEO because I can, you know, still have the creativity. Yeah, technical, but also requires some creativity at the same time. And this is the stuff that I love to do. And so you seem to be very numbers oriented as well, but you're also a designer. So do you find that to be challenging?
Christine Daal
Yes, yeah, it's simply challenging with clients because they are typically designers by heart, right? That's what motivated them to start their line. Yes, they probably want to make money too at the end of the day, right? But you can make money with anything. You could go make money with real estate. You could go invest in the stock market. You could do Bitcoin. You could do it, right? They chose this industry because it's their passion. It's what they love to do because they are creative people. But numbers can be creative. I agree with you on that side of it.
Glynis Tao
So yeah, we were just talking about balancing left brain, right brain, technical, with the creative side of things. Because I know with like my work, SEO, and a lot of times like when I talk to brand owners and designers, they know it's important, but they're afraid. And they're like, when I talk about the technical stuff, they kind of just freeze up and they don't know what to do about it. And they're kind of like, yeah, well, I'll just think about that later, which is necessarily a good idea for them. I'm like, yeah, you know, as a business owner, if you want to just strictly design and create products, you can go work for somebody else. That would be your sole job. But as a business owner, you do need to know both. Yeah, you have to be creative, but you also need to know the numbers.
Christine Daal
Exactly. And the business owners or most successful business owners, I will say, make decisions based on numbers, right? Not based on, I just have a gut feeling that everyone's going to want this bright pink fuchsia dress of mine. It's like, no, did they buy anything else from you in the past that looked like that? Did they buy anything bright pink before? Did they buy any bright colors before? we all, every decision that you make as a business owner should be based on some kind of stat or data. Otherwise, you're just throwing spaghetti at the wall hoping something sticks. I mean, how is that going to help you achieve your success, right?
Glynis Tao
Exactly. Yes, I agree with you. So the fashion industry is changing fast with AI, sustainability, DTC shifts. What do you think fashion founders should focus on right now to stay competitive?
Christine Daal
Yes, so there is a lot going on. We have a lot of disruption with the rising tariffs, labor shortage shortages, the sustainability, environmental pressures. And really, we also have a very, for people that aren't familiar with the fashion industry, we have an antiquated manufacturing model that literally hasn't changed in over 80 years. So there's a lot of disruption going on, but I always say disruption equals opportunity, right? If you're willing to adapt and pivot, you can take advantage of so many things during the disruption.
So I would say there's three things to focus on. The first thing a brand should focus on is personalization and not the kind of personalization that you're probably thinking of, but personalization through a community first type marketing. So rather than focusing on, just need to acquire customers, as many customers, keep them coming, more, more, more, more, more, right? Focus on building that community within your customer relationships, right? Focus on keeping that customer as a long-term customer and raising your lifetime value versus just getting a one-time transaction, right?
So I want ongoing relationships, not just that one-off transaction. And so helping them feel, you know, emotionally invested in your brand, whether that's through your identity, your story, your successes, turning those customers into co-creators, right? Can they help you create and design the next line? Of course, they're going to be fully invested. If they feel like, my gosh, I helped design their next t-shirt. I picked that color or I picked that print or I did this or whatever it is.
And so really helping them be part of the process and then using real-time feedback loops, right? So how can I get my customers telling me what they want, what they like, what they don't like before I have to go and invest in all this inventory and all this production and all this stuff, right? So almost having a live focus group, 20. And that can just be through like a private Facebook group. It can be through your SMS. It can be on IG. Like, you can do this very easily. It doesn't take a lot of, you know, time and effort. But it always stood out to me because we've done a lot of case studies. They're all on our YouTube channel where I've studied brands and what made them successful. And a lot of the times, 9 out of 10 times, I would say a lot of them listened to what their customers wanted and then they just gave it to them. So if your customers want blue, just give them blue. I don't care if your favorite color is pink. Your customers want blue. You better give them blue, right?
So that's gonna be your way to success. And I think that personalization, community first type marketing is only gonna increase, right? We've seen like live stream shopping and all this stuff take over in China. It's only a matter of time before it really, really becomes mainstream over here. And even utilizing AI and 3D design and CAD tools and all these different things, right? There's so many tools out there. You can predict trends. You can predict your customer shopping behavior. There's so many new AI things out there. We even have a whole online course on how to use AI. can tell everyone about how to get it at the end. But I think that connection with your customers is gonna be super, super important. So that's number one.
The second thing I would say is changing the way you manufacture. I think the number one thing everyone's coming to me right now, my gosh, is my manufacturer in China or my manufacturer's in this country and the tariffs are going up and I need to move, right? And so even with this whole manufacturing model that we have, it's just very antiquated. Like I said, it's been 80 years, we still do it the same way. Think about how fast your phone changes. And we still make, the way we make clothing hasn't really changed in 80 years, right? It's been a long time.
And so I think there's going to be a rise in new ways of manufacturing, whether that's on-demand manufacturing or some other type of new way. I don't necessarily think it's going to be robots, even though there are some snowbots out there already trying to do some stuff. Pre-orders are still going to continue, of course, but I also think it wouldn't be a bad idea if people started to learn how to sew because there's a shortage of laborers, especially sample makers.
No one right now is teaching their daughter. I'm not going to teach my four-year-old daughter. You know, you need to learn how to sew so you can grow up to be a seamstress, right? That's not like an aspiring job that anybody really wants. And unfortunately, because American manufacturers are not paying their people, you know, high wages, they're paying the minimum wage or slightly above, they're finding that they can go to other industries like the weed industry, right? They can pick weed on a weed farm for $30 an hour versus getting paid $20 an hour to sew. So we're losing all of our laborers.
And so great that you want to bring American manufacturing back to America, so do I. But if we don't have people to sow the stuff, how is it happening, right? So it's a problem. I used to tell people, you know, 10 years ago when I first started my business, you don't need to learn how to sew. You can just hire a sample maker, hire a manufacturer. But now, in 2025, I think it is going to be important that people learn how to sew. And I think it's going to be a much more valuable skill as a business owner in case anything happens with your factory. So I would say that number two is changing the way you manufacture.
And then the third thing I would say is really getting serious about sustainability. I think that it's going to start to move away from a trend. Now, sustainability has been very trendy. Oh, I'm a sustainable brand and who knows what sustainability even means. There's like a gazillion different, you know, ways to look at your brand being sustainable or not. But I think it's going to start to move away from a trendy thing to literally a mandate, especially when it comes to Europe. Europe has already been ahead of us as far as food regulations and things like that. And I think they're going to be ahead of us as far as the sustainability regulations.
And because we're so far behind on reaching all of our goals, the sustainable goals that were set for, I think, 2030 was the year they wanted to hit all these, you know, sustainable goals. We're so far behind reaching all those goals that I think at some point it's going to become like a mandate. Just like you can't I mean, I live in the New York City, you know, New Jersey area and I can't go to the grocery store and get a plastic bag anymore. You have to use a reusable bag. It is now forced. You are being forced to use reusable bags because they've realized plastic is bad for the environment, so on and so forth, right? So it's now become a mandate. And so I think that for fashion, it's going to eventually become a mandate.
So I think US brands, even though you're US-based and not Europe-based, need to start adopting this a little bit early on because then they're going to have an advantage and they're going to have an advantage globally. So I would say those are the three things that brands should really focus on right now.
Glynis Tao
That sounds great. So you've built a business that empowers so many female founders. What's been the most rewarding part of that journey?
Christine Daal
There's so many rewarding things. I always tell people I love what I do and I have to pinch myself sometimes that I get to do what I do because I really do truly love what I do and not many people can say that about what they do for a living. But I would say definitely helping brands feel confident and whether that's through helping them achieve success, helping them make money, helping them overcome negative mindsets, right? Seeing someone's confidence level go up is really, really rewarding because again, it's about their soul, right? It's about like, what really makes them who they are
I also really love working with moms. I think one, because I am a mom, but also two, because it's great to be able to show your children, hey, you can do something that you love too. You can start a business from scratch. You can take a risk. You can do something that's not ordinary, right, and achieve something great. And now, not only are you doing it for yourself, but you're leaving a legacy for your kids, for your grandkids, like if your business takes off, they can now take over eventually when you pass on, right, and continue your legacy for you. And so you're changing your family generation to come. Like, you're literally leaving a legacy, which is, I think, one of the most amazing things.
And then I would say it's also really rewarding just, I think, as a Christian to be able to weave my own faith into my business and to be able to share about Jesus and just what he's been able to do in my life and different things. It's been amazing to be able to work with other Christians. I think a lot of people are drawn to me who are Christian. They want to work with a Christian coach. So I do get a lot of Christians working with me. And so that's kind of a blessing as well, to be able to just weave my faith into what it is that I do.
Glynis Tao
What's next for Fashion Angel Warrior? Do any upcoming programs, events, or new service launches?
Christine Daal
So we have, I don't know, we always have a lot of stuff going on. I feel like I can barely keep track. But we definitely have some amazing promotions that I wanna share. I don't know if you want me to share them now or I can share them at the end. So that's up to you, Glynis.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, you can share them at the end because I know you had mentioned a few different things and maybe some offers, but I guess maybe sort of what if you want to just kind of tell us about what's coming up for you, anything exciting on the horizon.
Christine Daal
So I think our business, Fashion Angel Warrior, has also gone through its own transition and pivot over the last couple of years. I'm now a mom of two small children, which is a lot to juggle. And they're ages four and six, although my son will be seven soon. And it's a really great time period in their life that I don't want to miss. And so I didn't really fully enjoy the baby years. It was a little difficult and challenging for me. And so now that they're not really babies and toddlers anymore, they're actually a lot of fun to hang out with. And so I've kind of been taking a lot of time off, honestly, from Fashion Angel Warrior because I do want to spend it with my family. I do want to really focus on them.
And so the great thing is I do have a small team in place that can handle a lot of stuff. It's not like if you email us, you won't get a response or something, right? We're still here. We're still active. We're still going. But if you've noticed on our Instagram, we are not posting on Instagram anymore these days. I have taken a very slow media approach and I really, I think value the information and just we've had so much client successes that I feel like I've kind of reached the status that I don't need to give away free information.
There's over 150 blogs on our website. There's over 100 different YouTube videos. We've done over 100 Facebook lives that are all recorded and available for people to watch. We have free webinars. We have free cheat sheets. We have so many free things out in the interwebs that I've kind of reached the point that I don't really care about producing more free stuff. I know that that's what content creators are telling you you have to do. And to be a thought leader, you know, you have to constantly pump out more information.
To be honest, it doesn't fit my lifestyle anymore. And so we've kind of taken the approach that what we have to offer is really valuable. If you see the value, you'll see the results, you'll see the value, and you'll want to hire us and pay us. And that's kind of been our approach. And so we've kind of scaled back on a lot of our digital marketing. We've scaled back a ton on social media. I'm not even traveling as much to do trade shows or really that much anymore.
And thankfully, you know, we have a steady stream of clients and income coming in that I don't really need to do all that stuff anymore. So I'm kind of, you know, I'm kind of enjoying my kids and kind of taking a little bit of a break and, you know, just focusing on myself and my family and that sort of thing.
Glynis Tao
And you be. You did a lot of work in those early years building up your business and now it's time to reap those rewards. You deserve it. Yeah. Finally, what's one powerful piece of advice you'd leave with our audience of fashion entrepreneurs today?
Christine Daal
Yes, one piece of advice, this is always tricky, right? Because there's so many areas I would love to tell you about. But I think for right now with everything going on and just the fact that the future of fashion is changing, I would say you've got to change, otherwise you're going to be left behind. The best brands, the most successful brands, always learn how to pivot or adapt or change when there's any kind of disruption, recession, right? Whatever is going on, the pandemic. And so just keep growing, keep changing, and never stop learning.
Learning is so, so important. I am a lover of all things learning. I loved school. I love taking online courses. I love learning from other people. Even you, Glynis, I watch your videos and your podcasts, right? There's so much to learn out there. Never think that you know it all and you're done learning because there is just so much to learn out there and it's exciting. So yeah, that would be.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, never stop learning. I'm a lifelong learner myself. And I learned so much from you today, Christine. I mean, we've known each other for years now. I can't even remember.
Christine Daal
Been a while, yes.
Glynis Tao
It's been a while. And I just feel like I've learned so much about you today by talking to you. Yeah. Yeah, this is. Yeah, it really is. It's just nice to connect with another business owner and fashion professional. So where can people find you if they want to get in touch with you?
Christine Daal
Yes, so the best thing, you can always email us. That's the best method. I don't check DMs very much.
Just for all of you podcast listeners, we have a bunch of different things. I mentioned some of them briefly. You can grab our free six-part video training series that explains in detail our no-product fashion line method.
You can grab our online course, How to Use AI for Fashion Ecom Brands. Literally, it's going to save you like 10 to 20 hours per week learning all of these different AI tricks. It's normally $129, but just for the listeners, I'm going to give you $50 off, so you pay only $79. And then if you are a startup, meaning you have not yet reached $100,000 in sales in your very first year, we have our all course bundle, which you can learn more about. That's an amazing hybrid group coaching program.
Normally $2,495, but I'm giving everyone $1,000 off. And I'm going to throw in four bonuses, including two private one-on-one sessions with me valued at $1,000. So I typically charge $500 an hour for coaching, as you can see, based on the results. So that's why I charge that much. And I'm going to give two private one-on-one sessions included with that and $1,000 off. So you're basically getting $2,000 for free by signing up for the all-course bundle.
And then if you're an established business, you can always sign up for our group coaching program. The Soar Mastermind, it's literally the only intimate group coaching program specific to fashion brands that exists. And so all that information is right there, fashionangelwarrior.com/glynis
Glynis Tao
Okay, awesome. And we'll put that link in the show notes as well as your contact information on your website and email address. So thank you, Christine, for sharing your knowledge, wisdom, and behind the scenes of what it really takes to grow a successful fashion brand with us today.
Christine Daal
Thank you, Glynis, so much for having you. It was so fun chatting.
In this episode, Glynis Tao discusses the importance of blogging for fashion e-commerce brands, emphasizing how high-quality content can enhance brand visibility and customer engagement. She outlines the key elements of effective blogging, including the need for SEO optimization and the creation of valuable, engaging content that resonates with the target audience. Glynis also shares real-life examples of successful blogging strategies and encourages brands to invest in a solid blogging approach to drive traffic and conversions.
Today we’re covering why blogging matters, what makes a good blog, and how you can use SEO to increase your visibility and boost conversions
Takeaways
Blogging is marketing—it’s not just about writing.
High-quality blogs can enhance brand visibility.
Every blog post should address a customer problem or question.
Start with your ideal customer’s pain points, then create content from there.
Most blogs fail to provide valuable content.
A good blog should educate, entertain or both.
High-quality blogs can rank in AI Overviews and traditional Google results.
Themes
What’s wrong with most fashion brand blogs today?
Many fashion e-commerce blogs are missing the mark—they’re bland, unhelpful, and offer little value to readers. This not only wastes time, but can actively erode trust in your brand. Instead of writing generic, keyword-stuffed posts, fashion brands need to create blogs that educate, entertain, and reflect their brand voice—just like a great product, your blog should feel satisfying and on-brand.
Why is blogging still one of the best marketing tools?
Blogging isn’t just content—it’s connection. Every blog post is a touchpoint that can build trust, drive traffic, and convert visitors into customers. With 56% of consumers making a purchase after reading a blog (according to Hubspot), fashion brands that skip this strategy are leaving money on the table.
How to brainstorm blog content that builds trust
Start with your customer’s pain points. What do they want to know? What problems can you help them solve? Use those answers to create content ideas that feel personal and useful. Think behind-the-scenes posts, styling tips, FAQs, and expert how-tos that align with your audience’s needs.
What makes a blog “AI-ready” and SEO optimized?
Good written content needs to be structured for search. For SEO success, focus on: one main keyword, 3–5 related keywords, strong title tags and meta descriptions, optimized images, internal links, and clean formatting. With tools like Google’s AI Overviews now surfacing top blog content, high-quality, search engine optimized posts have more visibility than ever.
A real-life example of a high-performing blog
In a real-life example, Nomi Designs’ blog post “Can You Wear Linen in Winter?” now ranks for 700+ keywords and appears in Google’s AI Overview. In just three months, it brought over 22,000 impressions and 500 clicks—all from one well-optimized, helpful post.
What should fashion brands do before publishing?
Don’t just write—strategize. Check that your blog content is helpful, original, and aligned with your brand. Ask: Is this solving a real problem for my customer? Does it reflect my voice and values? Does it help Google understand what my brand stands for?
Chapters
00:00 The Power of Blogging in E-commerce
00:48 Creating High-Quality Blog Content
05:38 Blogging as a Connection Tool
Transcript
Glynis Tao
Today we're diving into a powerful tool that many fashion ecommerce brands are underutilizing, that's blogging. If you've ever wondered whether blogging is really worth your time or how to make your blog posts work harder for your brand, then you want to stick around for this.
Welcome to Chase Your Dreams, a podcast for fashion entrepreneurs who want to build a purposeful and profitable clothing business so they can make a living doing what they love. I'm your host, Glynis Tao, an apparel business consultant and SEO specialist with 20 years apparel industry experience. I'm also a mom to a wonderfully energetic little boy named Chase.
Hi, I'm Glynis. I'm the founder and CEO of Chase Your Dreams Consulting, which is an apparel business consulting and online marketing agency that specializes in SEO and AI search optimization for e-commerce companies. I help fashion, beauty, and lifestyle e-commerce brands create optimized content and attract potential customers through organic search results.
Today, we're covering why blogging matters, what makes a good blog, and how you can use SEO to increase your visibility and boost conversions. So let's get into it.
Why are so many blogs missing the mark? Let's be real here. Most blogs out there are bland, forgettable, and do little to support the business behind them. They may have catchy titles, but once you click through, there's nothing valuable on the page. That's not just a wasted opportunity. It's damaging. Poor quality blogs can erode trust in your brand and waste your readers time. And in a space as competitive as fashion e-commerce, your blog can't afford to be stale.
Now imagine a blog that feels like a delicious meal, satisfying, informative, and totally on brand. That's what we're aiming for. A good blog should educate or entertain your audience, offer clear, actionable insights, reflect your brand voice, and leave the reader wanting more. These high-quality blogs become long-term assets in your sales funnel. They nurture your existing customers and attract new ones, all without being overtly salesy.
So how do you use blogging as a tool for business? Well, blogging isn't just about writing, it's marketing. Every post is a touch point. According to HubSpot, 56% of consumers have made a purchase after reading a blog post. That's real revenue potential. Your blog should address your customer's needs, offer genuine value, and reflect your expertise.
So start with your customer persona and dig deeper. What are their pain points? What do they care about? What solutions can you offer? Then use those answers to brainstorm content that builds trust and engagement.
To stand out, your blogs need flavor. And that means creative formats like interviews, behind the scenes features, and how-tos. Use engaging hooks such as stats, humor, or imagery. Also, thoughtful insights that add depth to your message. Blogging is more than just a writing task. It's storytelling, strategy, and relationship building rolled into one.
So how do you use SEO to track the right traffic? Once your content is optimized for people first, then it's time to optimize for search engines. So remember, always focus on your target audience, your ideal customer, and because you want to write high quality content that establishes your expertise, experience, and trustworthiness. So then you want to optimize for search engines.
You want to focus on one main keyword and five related ones. Have a strong keyword rich title tag and meta description. Include clear structures with headings, H1, H2 tags, bullet points, readable formatting. Make sure your images are optimized, and have some internal linking. Internal link your pages within each other, because search engines like Google reward high quality, helpful content. And with AI tools like Google's AI Overviews now pulling top blog content into search summaries, visibility potential is huge.
So just think about it, right? With AI Overviews, and AI mode, you have the opportunity to have your blog show up in those areas in AI overviews, as well as in the search engine results pages as well. There's multiple opportunities for your page, your blog, and your content to show up in all these areas within search, both in AI search and traditional search engines.
To give you a real life example, one of my clients, Nomi Design, had written a blog post titled, Can You Wear Linen in Winter? This blog ranks for over 700 keywords and appears in Google's AI overview. In just three months, it brought over 22,000 impressions and 500 clicks. That's the power of helpful, optimized content.
When you create helpful content that is written by people, for people, establishes your expertise, experience, authoritativeness and trust, then you have the ability to appeal to both AI search and traditional search engines. So think about, you know, the type of content that you produce. Is it helpful content? Is it original? Is it good quality? Does it solve a problem for your ideal customer? So in this example of Nomi Designs, they had written this blog article and seen an increase in the traffic to their website with the blog showing up both in AI overviews and in search engines and Google search.
So let's just wrap this up. Blogging isn't just about content, it's about connection. And if you want to increase traffic, build trust, drive more conversion, then it's time to invest in a solid blog strategy.
If you're ready to start creating content that actually brings traffic and converts, I invite you to visit the blog section of my website and you can read the full blog article on the benefits of blogging for business, which I will put the link to in the description.
As well, you can also sign up for my newsletter to get fresh tips, resources, and real world examples delivered straight to your inbox. And the link is also provided in the description. So I really hope that you found this information helpful. If you need help with putting together a content strategy, content creation, or a professional copywriter to help with producing high quality, high converting blogs, then I encourage you to book a call with me to get started on creating consistent website content today.
That's it for today's episode and thank you for tuning in to Chase Your Dreams. Keep creating, keep growing, and keep showing up for your business. Until next time.
In this episode, we chat with Nikki Dindo, founder of Spring Media Co., a boutique agency specializing in social media management, influencer marketing, and media relations. Nikki shares her journey through the fashion and PR industry, emphasizing the importance of authenticity, storytelling, and strategic branding. She discusses her experiences working with notable figures in PR and her approach to launching Spring Media Co. The conversation covers common mistakes in social media and PR, the process of developing a social media strategy, and actionable advice for fashion entrepreneurs.
About Nikki Dindo
With over a decade of experience leading digital strategy in both Vancouver and New York City, Nikki Dindo is a powerhouse in the world of PR, social media, influencer marketing, and event production. As the founder of Spring Media Co., she and her team helps brands show up with confidence, clarity, and creative impact online and off. From managing influencer campaigns for global brands to producing shows at New York Fashion Week, Nikki brings big picture thinking and hands-on experience to everything she does. She's also worked with luxury clients like Park Hyatt and built authentic connections that go far beyond algorithms. When she's not supporting founders and creators through her agency work, Nikki shares her expertise as a social media instructor at Blanche MacDonald, mentoring the next generation of digital talent.
Whether she's consulting from her hometown in Vancouver or creating content from a coffee shop in New York City, Nikki's all about empowering people to tell their stories well and build a brand that actually feels like them.
Don’t chase trends that don’t align with your brand values.
Select influencers based on audience alignment, not just reach.
Long-term partnerships perform better than one-off posts.
Track engagement that signals real connection—not just likes.
Short-form video is a powerful, low-cost way to grow.
Showing your face and sharing your story creates a deeper impact.
Interview themes
What are the biggest mistakes fashion brands make with social media?
Fashion brands often fall into the trap of doing more instead of doing better. Nikki Dindo highlights that many are spreading themselves too thin—trying to be on every platform, chasing trends that don’t fit, and outsourcing content before they've clarified their brand voice.
One of the most common mistakes is posting without a clear plan or strategy, which leads to inconsistent messaging and off-brand visuals. Others focus too much on vanity metrics like likes and follower counts, rather than measuring deeper engagement like shares, saves, DMs, and click-throughs. Influencer marketing is also often mishandled—brands choose influencers based on follower count instead of audience alignment or values fit, and rely on one-off posts instead of building meaningful, long-term partnerships. Most critically, many brands are afraid to show their human side. In a space where authenticity matters, hiding behind curated grids and avoiding founder-led storytelling makes it harder to build connection and trust.
What first steps should fashion brands take before posting to multiple platforms?
Many founders think they need to post more or be on every platform to succeed—but Nikki says that’s backwards. Before you start creating content or hiring help, you need to get clear on your brand’s voice, values, and audience. Without that foundation, nothing you post will stick. She advises fashion entrepreneurs to define their core messaging and brand visuals first, then build a system around it that allows for consistency without burnout.
How can agencies work with brands to create sustainable social strategies that actually work?
Nikki’s approach to social media strategy starts with listening—not posting. She begins every client relationship by doing a deep dive into the brand’s goals, challenges, and audience, followed by a full audit of current performance. From there, she builds a plan around strategic content pillars, brand voice alignment, and a calendar system the founder can actually keep up with. It’s not about posting more—it’s about posting with intention.
What are fashion entrepreneurs getting wrong about influencer marketing?
Too many brands chase vanity metrics or send out products without a clear plan. Nikki emphasizes the importance of selecting influencers whose audience actually matches your target market—and creating partnerships that feel long-term and values-aligned. She stresses the need for clear contracts, expectations, and approval processes so both the brand and the creator are set up for success. One post won’t cut it. Connection and consistency matter more.
How can a brand measure campaign success beyond likes and reach?
In 2025, Nikki encourages brands to track “resonance metrics” like saves, shares, DMs, and time on site. These indicators show that your content is making people pause, reflect, and act—not just scroll. She also looks for qualitative wins: customer feedback, press mentions, and partnership inquiries sparked by visibility. For Nikki, the best outcome is when a founder says: “I finally feel proud of how we’re showing up online.”
Where should fashion brands focus on when they have small marketing budgets?
If you’re in the early stages and resources are tight, Nikki’s advice is clear: invest in brand story and visuals first. Once you have that solid foundation, prioritize organic content—especially short-form video like reels or stories. It’s still one of the most effective free ways to build trust and get discovered. Then, consider partnerships with micro-influencers, like-minded brands, or a freelance strategist to help you stay consistent.
Why is showing your face oftentimes more powerful than paid ads?
Nikki sees it time and time again: one authentic, founder-led video outperforms a dozen polished posts. Her biggest advice? Stop hiding behind your grid. Fashion is personal—and people want to know why you started, how you design, and what you believe. When brands lead with heart and personality, they create emotional connections that build loyal communities—not just one-time customers.
Chapters
00:00 The Heart of Branding and Creativity
01:47 Nikki Dindo: A Journey Through Fashion and PR
05:56 Launching Spring Media Co.: A New Approach to PR
09:36 Lessons from Kelly Cutrone: Intensity and Clarity
13:36 Common Mistakes in Social Media and PR
17:30 Developing a Social Media Strategy: The Process
21:27 The Importance of Authenticity in Influencer Marketing
25:27 Case Study: Skip Hop Campaign Success
29:15 Finding the Right Influencers for Your Brand
33:03 Actionable Advice for Fashion Entrepreneurs
37:10 The Creative Influence of New York and Broadway
Transcript
Nikki Dindo
I get really lit up by brands and creatives with a strong point of view. Even if it's still messy or evolving, I just love it when there's heart and intention behind what someone is building and they just need a little bit of help bringing it to life in like a more refined and strategic way. So whether that's like fashion founders creating pieces with real meaning or a wellness brand that's actually grounded in science and care or a travel company that's telling stories that most people overlook or, you know, sharing destinations that are off the grid and more people need to know about.
But I'm especially drawn to people who have just really cared deeply about what they do, but maybe they just don't always know how to communicate that in a way that resonates online. And at the end of the day, I love working with good people, you know, cool people who's mission and values I stand behind and I just want to kind of help amplify that. And I also love working with founders and creatives who are just willing to be a little bit brave.
Glynis Tao
Welcome to Chase Your Dreams, a podcast for fashion entrepreneurs who want to build a purposeful and profitable clothing business so they can make a living doing what they love. I'm your host, Glynnis Tao, an apparel business consultant and SEO specialist with 20 years apparel industry experience. I'm also a mom to a wonderfully energetic little boy named Chase.
With over a decade of experience leading digital strategy in both Vancouver and New York City, Nikki Dindo is a powerhouse in the world of PR, social media, influencer marketing, and event production. She's the founder of Spring Media Co., a boutique agency that helps brands show up with confidence, clarity, and creative impact online and off. From managing influencer campaigns for global brands to producing shows at New York Fashion Week, Nikki brings big picture thinking and hands-on experience to everything she does. She's also worked with luxury clients like Park Hyatt and built authentic connections that go far beyond algorithms. When she's not supporting founders and creators through her agency work, Nikki shares her expertise as a social media instructor at Blanche McDonald, mentoring the next generation of digital talent.
Whether she's consulting from her hometown in Vancouver or creating content from a coffee shop in New York City, Nikki's all about empowering people to tell their stories well and build a brand that actually feels like them.
Welcome, Nikki. It's so nice to have you here today. Thanks for joining me on the podcast.
Nikki Dindo
Thank so much. So good to be here.
Glynis Tao
So you've built an amazing career in both Vancouver and New York City, leading digital strategy for brands across various industries. Can you take us back to the moment when you realized this was the path you wanted to pursue?
Nikki Dindo
My goodness, it was actually a complete accident. I worked in marketing. I went to university for marketing and I was a business major and thought I was going to go to law school though. And instead of doing that, went and worked on board a cruise ship for five years and came back and was a little bit lost and not entirely sure of where I wanted to go and what I want to do next.
And after kind of experimenting with a few different career options, I wound up going back to school for fashion marketing. And I actually intended to be a buyer. I thought maybe I wanted to have my own store. At the time I was seeing a lot of gaps in the retail strategy and the retail market in Vancouver and thought that that's what I wanted to do. But within my first month of being back in school, I got coached by our career counselor and executive team there. And they said, hey, we think you'd be a really good fit in the PR industry and they kind of placed me in a few different work opportunities and got my feet wet and I realized very quickly that they were right. And so I started my career in fashion PR and then very quickly pivoted over to social media marketing.
Glynis Tao
Do you specialize in any particular industry or niche? What drew you to fashion and lifestyle brands specifically?
Nikki Dindo
Yeah, so I specialize in consumer facing brands in the lifestyle space. So everything from fashion and beauty to baby and kids, travel and tourism, kind of anything that fits within that lifestyle space. I've also done lots of celeb brands, film and TV. So all over the map, but I did get my career start in fashion.
Glynis Tao
Okay, because you said you went to school for fashion marketing. Is that sort of the reason why you decided to also stay with fashion and working with fashion brands?
Nikki Dindo
And so immediately after I finished school, I moved to New York City and got an internship working for Kelly Cutrone. And I was producing runway shows for New York Fashion Week, which like as a girl who grew up on magazine culture, like my goodness, I think I have had been subscribed to InStyle magazine since I was 10 or 11 and was constantly saving all my fashion magazines and making cutouts and collages. It was an absolute dream come true to have gone from seeing runway shows in my magazines and then being behind the scenes and producing them all those years later.
Glynis Tao
Okay, so I know you mentioned that you had worked with the legendary Kelly Cutrone and I really want to get the meat behind that. Like what really happened? What was it like?
But before we get to that, sort of like what inspired you to launch Spring Media Co. and how does your agency's approach differ from traditional PR or digital firms?
Nikki Dindo
Yeah, honestly, spring was kind of born out of a mix of instinct and necessity. I'd been doing social media and brand work for others long before I officially launched anything. I had close to a decade of agency experience. I'd help friends with their businesses, jump in on passion projects, and I found myself kind of constantly drawn to that intersection of storytelling strategy and design.
And the actual spark came while I was on vacation in Bali and was talking to all these amazing women around me. I just realized how many brilliant founders and creatives and brands had so much heart behind what they were doing, but their online presence just didn't really reflect that. And, you know, I just kind of kept thinking that there's a real opportunity here to help be able to work with female founders and amplify their voices. And, you know, I saw how much more impactful their stories could be if their online presence kind of matched the soul of their business.
So it was a little bit of a slow build after I kind of had that first aha moment. But then I reached a point where, you know, I just wanted to stop treating something that I did on the side and start treating it like the creative business it deserved to be. So eventually I took that leap and that's how Spring Media Co came to life.
Yeah. And then how is my approach different? I think that was the second part of that. One of the biggest things that as a company that we prioritize, especially when working with fashion founders, is clarity, sustainability, and support. So we know that founders and brands and startups are juggling absolutely everything. And our goal isn't to add more to anyone's plate. We want to take things off of it. So we truly pride ourselves on being an extension of your team. I always tell people when I first meet them that I want them to think of us as being one of them.
Nikki Dindo
You know, I want to be on their weekly calls. I want to know what is happening and feel like I am one of them rather than an external agency partner that they send things to. I want to preemptively know what they're working on so that instead of me going to them to ask for more details, I already know what they need and I've already given them ideas and brought them options for how to execute it. So, you know, we're not really here to just help you post and land a few press hits. We're really here to help you think bigger, show up more consistently and feel like your brand is telling the story that you actually want to tell.
Glynis Tao
Amazing. So I'm going to go more into your process a little bit later, but let's just go back to the topic of working with Kelly Cutrone. So she's legendary and definitely a name that needs no introduction in the PR and fashion world. What was your experience like and what did you learn from her that still guides your work today?
Nikki Dindo
Man, working for Kelly was one of those wild, formative experiences that will probably stick with me forever. As you can guess, she is extremely intense, but I would say that her intensity is in the kind of way that really pushes you to rise to the occasion. It was very much a sink or swim work environment, but if you swam you were given so much responsibility and such an incredible opportunity to learn. I was pretty young when I started working with her and it was truly like being thrown into the deep end, but that's where I learned the most. You know, she's a force and being in her orbit, especially during fashion week was like bootcamp for the fashion and PR world. While I was there, she was also creating a brand and filming two television shows. So I also got to see the back end of so much of the industry with her.
In my responsibilities, I was largely in charge of coordinating backstage access for the runway shows at Fashion Week. So that meant working with press, talent, stylists, makeup artists, and all internal and external teams to make sure that everything ran smoothly behind the scenes. It was very fast paced. It was high pressure and full of last minute changes, but I absolutely loved it. That experience really taught me how to stay calm under pressure. It taught me how to be a problem solver and how to trust my instincts and communicate very clearly even when everything was moving a mile a minute and falling apart around me.
Another thing I learned while I was working with Kelly is I mean something that she's absolutely brilliant at is cutting through the noise. She knows exactly what a brand stands for and never tries to be everything to everyone. And that's something that really helped me shape how I think about storytelling today especially in a world where people are constantly scrolling. It's more so that I've learned the importance of having to be clear, bold, and unapologetic about your message because she was not, she was sometimes controversial, but she made news and she knew how to get a message out there.
Glynis Tao
Wow, that sounds like a really amazing experience. How long were you with her?
Nikki Dindo
Yeah, just about a year and I ran two seasons of runway shows for her.
Glynis Tao
And so how long were you in New York for?
Nikki Dindo
I stayed in New York after working with Kelly and I was there for just under five years, then came back to Vancouver and spent another kind of five years in Vancouver and then had an opportunity to go back to New York again and was working as head of digital for a PR agency in New York right up until the pandemic actually.
Glynis Tao
Okay, so that's really recent.
Nikki Dindo
Quite recent. And then, you know, as kind of pandemic things happen. And I loved, loved, loved going back there. I loved the team I was working with, the brands we were working with, but I kind of started freelancing just a tiny bit before and knew that that's kind of where my calling was. And then as the pandemic happened, it almost forced my hand a little bit. You know, we had so much indecision and didn't really know what was going to happen in the industry. And I was back in Vancouver, just kind of waiting it out. And, you know, all of a sudden a lot of brands needed to be online and amplify their online presence very quickly. And so I just kind of kept taking on more work and then needing to bring people onto the team. That's how Spring Media kind of really came to be. It was ultimately a pandemic baby that had been in my head for quite some time, but that really brought it to life in a new way that surpassed even what I had been expecting to do.
Glynis Tao
Wow, that's a great story.
Nikki Dindo
I love New York. It still feels like home and I'm always happy to hop on a plane for a quick work trip or even a photo shoot.
Glynis Tao
Yeah I lived there briefly, not as long as you did, but it's definitely very different, I guess, the pace there compared to Vancouver.
Many founders are overwhelmed with doing all the things and struggle with getting media attention. What's one mistake you often see fashion entrepreneurs make when it comes to social media or PR and how can they fix it?
Nikki Dindo
Yes. One of the kinds of mistakes that I see the most is that people are trying to do everything and be everywhere all at once. And I get it. There are so many platforms and we're constantly being told that we need to be posting five times a day on this platform, but also be on this platform. And don't forget this new emerging one. You want to be, you know, at the start of it. And I don't think that's necessary. I think what is most important is to really listen to your audience, know who they are, know where they are, and just really focus on a couple of platforms. Otherwise, you're going to spread yourself too thin.
Even if you have a team, trying to be successful and keep up with every single platform is going to be exhausting. You're going to get burnt out. Other parts of your business will suffer if you are spending your entire day, especially as a fledgling brand, you're just starting out. You don't have time to be filming TikToks all day long. Is it fun? Sometimes for some people. So I think it's better to kind of really understand where your audience is and focus on strategically growing a couple of platforms, meet your audience where they are and go from there.
Glynis Tao
For early stage clothing brands, what are the must-haves before they're PR ready?
Nikki Dindo
I would say that you need to have a very solid understanding of your audience. So make sure that you've kind of gone through and done the research. I think you need strong branding. You need to know your messaging. You need to know what it's going to look like to show up as a successful brand online. So I think strong messaging and branding is super important.
Having a website, definitely you need to have that up and running so that you have somewhere to guide all that amazing traffic that's going to go flooding there. But I think that kind of having that beginning point of making sure that you have strong branding and a strong direction of where you want to go and who you want to reach is the most important. From there, you know, we can work on shaping out what that looks like, what the core pillars are going to be.
But you want to know what your foundation is and how your current visuals and messaging stack up against the competitors, because that's information that we'll use to help you stand out. Those will become our anchor points and we'll build the actual strategy around those pillars, really kind of balancing storytelling with conversation.
Glynis Tao
Can you share your process when you're developing a social media strategy for a new fashion client? And what do you look for in terms of the branding or visuals or storytelling? What is it that you look for?
Nikki Dindo
For sure. So whenever I start working with any new client, the first thing that we do is listen. We want to understand their vision, their values, what makes them different, where they want to go, not just what they sell. So we'll sit back and listen first and just learn as much as we possibly can about the brand. Social media isn't just about posting outfits. It's also about telling the deeper story behind the brand in a way that really resonates and builds trust over time. Now more so than ever.
So once we've kind of gotten that foundation, we'll dive in and do a full audit. We'll look at what's working, what's not, what's engaging. You know, as I mentioned before, kind of how we're stacking up against your competitors and really use that data to kind of help build out a full strategy. So once we have done the audit, we'll build out the strategy, look at core messaging and content pillars and really kind of use that as our North Star when it comes to developing content.
So we'll go through creating that strategic guide, make sure that everyone is aligned on it. We'll take our ideas, we'll do mocks, we'll put together sample posts, sample feeds, some kind of trial reels just so they can get an idea of our vision. We'll bring it to them. Then they'll also go through and it's a conversation. They'll tell us what they like, what they don't like, what doesn't feel aligned. And from there, we'll kind of get to work on creating the actual content.
So whether that is doing creative direction for shoots, whether that's leading with our own brand photography and videography, turning all of that into engaging content. We'll also kind of make sure that all of our ideas are doable for the team behind the scenes. We understand that not everyone can do everything. So we want to make sure that our plan is balanced and doable.
And so to help with things like that will also often create systems, templates, content calendars, approval workflows, just to kind of help make everything feel seamless. And again, make sure that we're really taking as much off of their plate as possible. As I kind of said, the biggest piece is like we approach everything like we're part of their team. We don't, you know, just deliver a strategy and disappear. We're there in the day to day helping refine, adapt as the brand grows or shifts. Also, you know, if there's an option, an opportunity to jump on a trend, but maybe we need to lean on someone. I'll kind of put together an email and say, hey, I think this would be such a good fit to tap into this. Can you spend 10 minutes? Do you know, film me like this, like that, like that. And just want to make sure that we always accommodate for anything, any opportunity to help their brand be part of that larger conversation. You know, especially in fashion where things are moving fast, that kind of flexibility and partnership truly makes all the difference.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, it sounds very collaborative too, the way that you work with your clients. Yeah, I guess taking that time upfront, to do the audit, to really understand their business and coming up with the strategy before you even do any posting and stuff like that. Cause I find a lot of times they just go and start posting. I don't know. I find it very frustrating because what they post doesn't necessarily really align with who I am as a business and my brand. I don't think they really understand it yet. So I think that's really important and it's great that you do that.
Nikki Dindo
I think it's so important to have those conversations upfront. That way it's just kind of crystal clear and also just constantly checking in on that because things change, focuses change. And I would rather always kind of have that conversation and that open communication as we go along just to make sure that we're always aligned.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, and also, guess doing those check-ins and having checkpoints in place with your clients and making sure that you are aligned in what you're doing so that there are no surprises and someone going, this is not really like they're not happy with it in the end and just like what, you know, like, but it was never really communicated.
Nikki Dindo
So many times. And so I'm all for monthly check-ins, even weekly check-ins and like cross department. That way there's just full visibility, open communication and no surprises because I think everyone has kind of been in that situation where one person maybe said yes or you got used to saying yes and then you just throw something up on social and then you get an email, you know, I didn't authorize this or like this is an old product. How did this go up there?
So it can sometimes feel tedious, especially in the beginning to kind of go through that approval process. But it's so important down the line, especially when it comes to messaging and just making sure that brand voice sounds like them. Because there's nothing more jarring than coming across a post that just feels off brand as a consumer.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, and it's hard to find an agency or somebody who actually gets it and this is kind of the thing that I hear often a lot from my clients is that they have to end up doing the social media themselves because they're just kind of like, no one's able to do it as well. I'm kind of feeling like, yeah, that's maybe a challenge for you to kind of be able to find that in between, I guess, between you and them, but really to be able to make it sound like, what you're saying is really sounding like them coming as if it's from them.
Nikki Dindo
Yeah, that's a big one. And it's I, and I get it. And especially if it comes to like a personal brand or a founder or something, because that's you, that's your voice. And sometimes people have a hard time articulating it too. You know, this doesn't sound like me, but I don't know how to say why. I think I like to pride our team on being able to capture brand and also personal brand voices very well and I tell them from the beginning I said please please please give me as much feedback give me as many notes edit this you're not going to hurt my feelings I would wrap the more information you give me the quicker I'll be able to learn and adapt and truly it usually just takes one max two rounds of feedback and edits and then we're pretty easy to nail it down and be able to just kind of absorb that voice and switch into it moving forward which, it seems odd. I think it's because I was a double major between English and business. I was always a huge reader, a huge writer. So I think it might have been that from before that it never felt too difficult for me to switch into voices and copywriting was actually always my favorite aspect of social. But thankfully being able to kind of translate that and help teach my team and share that skillset with them has been I think very valuable for everyone on the team that we've been able to kind of learn and adapt to different brand voices relatively with ease.
Glynis Tao
Brands or creatives light you up the most to work with.
Nikki Dindo
I get really lit up by brands and creatives with a strong point of view. Even if it's still messy or evolving, I just love it when there's heart and intention behind what someone is building and they just need a little bit of help bringing it to life in a more refined and strategic way. So whether that's fashion founders creating pieces with real meaning, or a wellness brand that's actually grounded in science and care, or a travel company that's telling stories that most people overlook or, you know, sharing destinations that are off the grid and more people need to know about. But I'm especially drawn to people who have just really cared deeply about what they do, but maybe they just don't always know how to communicate that in a way that resonates online. And at the end of the day, I love working with good people, you know, cool people who's mission and values I stand behind and I just want to kind of help amplify that. And I also love working with founders and creatives who are just willing to be a little bit brave. You know, the internet moves fast, but the brands that stick are the ones that know who they are and are willing to show up with honesty and creativity. And that kind of energy is just magnetic. And I gravitate towards those kinds of people. And I think that that's where as an agency, we do our best work as well.
Glynis Tao
Let's talk a little bit about influencer marketing. Influencer marketing changes fast. What makes a campaign successful in 2025 and how do you measure success beyond likes and reach?
Nikki Dindo
For sure, okay, so I think at the end of the day for influencer marketing or for campaigns in general, but especially for influencer marketing, it's really about authenticity. And I know that we hear that all the time, but it's true. Consumers now, especially with influencers, know and understand that influencers are getting paid for a lot of their partnerships. People know that, but I think that the most authentic influencers are still only going to take those partnerships that is from a brand that they would already buy from or a company that they would already use. And therefore it doesn't feel salesy. It feels authentic and it should kind of meld seamlessly into any non-sponsored content as well. And people will kind of still know that it's an affiliate link and they'll make some money off of it. But as long as it still feels true to the brand and that the influencers are still providing value, then I think that they know and are willing to help support them with something like that. So I think authenticity is extremely important, especially in the influencer space.
And then kind of social media in general in 2025, a successful campaign, I think goes way beyond likes and reach. Now those kind of used to be the prime metrics before. Nowadays, we kind of look at measuring things that are indicators of resonance and relationship. So the question that I'm kind of always asking is like, did this campaign actually move the needle? Did it create a moment? Did it have a deeper connection with the audience? So this could mean stronger brand loyalty, an increase in DMs, more website traffic, or even just people spending more time engaging with your content in more meaningful ways. So metrics that we look at now, and also the algorithm looks at, are kind of more in line with shares and saves because
Anybody can like something without putting much thought into it, but a share and a save is a better indicator that this is meaningful content that somebody wants to send to somebody else or wants to save to come back to for themselves. So, you know, it's a better indicator of like a cute comment or emojis, but knowing how many people saved your content really kind of is an indicator of whether a piece of content has any stickiness or whether something hit.
We also look at the backend data. So click through rates, email signups, time on site. And we take that to the clients. Sometimes too success looks like a product selling out and knowing that it came from social first push. Sometimes it's a new partnership or a press opportunity that came out of visibility. I'm working with a personality right now, let's say, and amplifying their personal brand online. And we are getting podcast requests and press requests all the time sent to us via DMs as a request of somebody seeing their content on Instagram first. So that's also kind of an indicator of success in a campaign that their visibility is kind of moving outside of Instagram and into the real world in other ways.
So other times it's opportunities coming out of visibility. And sometimes it's just, you know, a founder saying, we finally feel proud of how we're showing up online. So I think at the end of the day, looking at success for campaigns these days is a blend of data and instinct. If something feels sticky and it's getting shared, sparking conversations, that's a win.
Glynis Tao
Certainly is. Love it. You've worked on social campaigns with brands like Skip Hop. Could you share what went into building that campaign and the kind of results it delivered?
Nikki Dindo
Yes, absolutely. My gosh, working with Skip Hop was such a fun and rewarding project. I did this on the social side in conjunction with a PR agency that I was working with and was brought on as their social partner. So at the time, Skip Hop, when we first started Skip Hop was toying with the idea of an acquisition and they are wanting to improve their brand online kind of in advance of that. And in addition, they also wanted to reach modern parents in a way that felt both relatable and stylish because that was kind of new within the parenting space at the time. They didn't really want to be overly salesy or traditional. So we started by getting super, super clear on their audience, millennial parents, mainly millennial women who value design functionality and a bit of humor and amongst the chaos of parenting. So from there, we built a content strategy that leaned into an aspirational but attainable lifestyle. So think really elevated visuals, quick tips and like real parent moments that felt authentic.
In addition to this, we had a very, very, very strong influencer seeding program. And we are partnering with some of the combination of top parenting influencers, but also micro influencers before that became a huge thing who had an awesome aesthetic and were able to kind of provide on-brand content. And so kind of having this multi-pronged approach, we were able to have really, really, really strong results, engagement rates practically triple during our first campaign window. saw a notable lift in website traffic directly from social and we started to see if we were launching a new product and we would lead with social posts two days before any other advertising. We are starting to see almost sellouts from social first. And even better, the brand got great feedback from customers who said the content made them actually want to interact with the brand, which is what we were going for. And as this kind of continued through specific campaigns and through an acquisition, we wound up staying with the brand for about three years until it ultimately got brought in-house by the parent company. But it was such a joy to work with them and one of the most fun projects I've ever been a part of.
Glynis Tao
I can imagine as a parent myself, I use the products. I almost had everything from their diaper bags, change pads, play mats.
Nikki Dindo
Those diaper bags are the best and they were so cheap. I was using those to travel with.
Glynis Tao
I know, it can be used beyond just a diaper bag. It's got all the great compartments and pockets and zip and everything. It's a great design.
Nikki Dindo
They're so smart. They're the greatest products and the best, best people to work with. I truly loved working with them and they gave us so much creative flexibility and freedom and they trusted our instinct and the copy was so much fun to work on. It was just a joy.
Glynis Tao
Sounds wonderful. Let's see, what advice would you give fashion founders trying to find the right influences to represent the brand?
Nikki Dindo
I would say it's really hard. You're going to get approached as a fashion brand by so many influencers. I think the most important thing is to do your research and be selective with who you choose to partner with. Make sure that you're aligned with that there's audience alignment, of course, first and foremost, because while an influencer may have a ton of followers, if they're not aligned with who your audience is, it's going to make no difference what's up if you don't share that same audience.
So check for alignment. Make sure that their target demographic is aligned with yours because you want it to feel like a partnership. So I'd say to do your research and also make sure that you're doing something that feels comfy for you. There are so many different ways of working with influencers now, whether it's a paid partnership, whether it's an affiliate partnership, whether it's just an in-kind donation.
Find something that works for you and be clear about what that looks like. Make sure that you get everything in writing. Make sure that you get timelines in writing. Make sure that if you have any guidelines for how you want your influencer partner to shoot or any messaging, that that's provided to them in advance. If you want to see the content before it goes live, make sure that you have approval windows in there and that that process is laid out just to get crystal clear on what you're looking for. That will help make sure that you have the most successful partnership with an influencer.
Just because there's so many different ways it can go and so many different, you know, if someone says one post, it's like, okay, is that a reel? Is that a story set? Am I going to have access to the photos? There's just so much to think about. So make sure that you know exactly what it is that you're looking for and that you give them as much information as possible to help make sure it will be successful at the end of the day for you.
Glynis Tao
And is one post even enough for an influencer to...
Nikki Dindo
I’d say no and I think that also kind of goes back to that authenticity of people seeing more than one post if they see kind of a longer term partnership over you know like maybe four posts over six months or something like that. It will also kind of help build the trust in the consumer from the influencer side that hey this is a brand that they truly love that they truly do like working with and that repetition helps build brand trust. So you know to expect content from them you'll truly trust their opinion on it. So I would say to focus more on a longer term partnership rather than here's a thousand bucks. I just want one post and three story sets with one link. At the end of the day, you're going to see a better ROI from a longer term partnership with people who truly also care about your brand and want to continue that partnership as well.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, amazing. That's great advice. For fashion entrepreneurs listening today, what's one thing they could stop doing on social or PR and one thing they could start doing right now?
Nikki Dindo
Okay, so one thing to stop doing, I think I already touched on like stop trying to be everywhere all at once. But I think that the other thing to stop doing is stop trying to mimic what everyone else is doing. You don't need to follow every trend, you know, just because something is popping off. If it doesn't make sense for you, don't do it. Create your own trend. Especially if it's going to pull away from your core story or if feeling like keeping up with every trend is going to make you burn out. You don't want to do that.
So showing up consistently in one or two places with clarity will always be being scattered and stretched thin. So stop trying to be able to all at once and stop trying to do what everyone else is doing.
One thing to start doing is get comfy showing your face and telling your story behind the brand. At the end of the day, people connect with people, people buy from people, and especially in fashion where there are so many options, your unique perspective, why you started, how you design, what you believe. That's what's going to turn a follower into a fan and a fan into a customer. So even one good piece of founder led content can do more than, you know, have more impact than a dozen polished posts. So I know it feels scary sometimes to put your face out there and tell your story, but at the end of the day, your messaging will stick with people too. So stop hiding behind the grid and start trying to lead with your voice a little bit.
Glynis Tao
I love it. If a brand only has a small marketing budget, where should they focus their time and money first?
Nikki Dindo
Mm hmm. Yeah. If your budget is tight, which is totally normal, especially in those early stages, focus first on nailing your brand story and your visuals. So investing in clear messaging, a strong visual identity. And if you have really solid pieces of content that you can repurpose across platforms, as we talked about before, like if your foundation isn't clear, no amount of paid ads or PR will really help you show up or like will really land the way you want it to.
And then from there, I'd focus on prioritizing organic content. So ideally short form videos. So whether that's reels, TikTok or stories, it's still the most powerful and free way to connect, build trust and get discovered. So you don't need a huge team, just a phone, a solid plan and like a willingness to show up. And then if you do have a little bit of budget to play with once you've kind of gone through and nailed the basics, I would consider putting it towards community building. Whether that's partnering with a micro influencer and leaning into that space, doing a small giveaway, doing a partnership with like minded brands, or even hiring somebody to help you stay consistent. The goal is connection over perfection. So a few small things that can help take that off your plate and just help you stand out.
Glynis Tao
Hmm, that's amazing. So I'm hearing some of this, uh, the themes that have been repeated throughout the conversation of what you, from what you've been saying about like making sure that you have a plan, right? Be consistent. And then just kind of taking those steps, you know, little small steps will add up.
Nikki Dindo
Little small steps add up and I promise that once you have a plan and it takes the guesswork out of what you're doing, it makes it feel so much more attainable because just kind of sitting there scrolling being like, okay, I guess I should post something today that I don't know where to start makes it feel insurmountable. And that's what's going to hold you back. That's what's going to suck your time and suck your energy and then leave you feeling frustrated and overwhelmed. But if you have a solid plan, if you have six or seven kind of
core content pillars that you know you can fall back on. Or if you even just have a content calendar with ideas laid out and say, ok, I know that today I should be posting my European summer outfit suggestions. There you go. If you already have the idea. You already have content ready to go for it. And it's a matter of sitting there putting the copy together and getting a couple of images together for it. So taking that time to put together a plan will really, really help save time and help you lead with direction and clarity down the line.
Glynis Tao
Thank you. I think I could even use that advice for myself because I just find the whole task of managing social media is so overwhelming and I never know what to post.
Nikki Dindo
Even sometimes just sitting down and spending an hour or two and looking at, you know, your upcoming quarter and being like, and just testing against what you have coming up, you know, and just kind of jotting down on this day, I want to do this on that day, I want to do that and slot what launches you have against your content pillars. It'll take the guesswork out of it and make it so easy.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, cause I often second guess myself as to if I'm posting the right thing, then I don't end up posting yet.
Nikki Dindo
Yep, I actually relate to that on a deep personal level because I can do this for brands and clients non-stop. Personally, I sit there and I'm like about five years behind on posting something from my last trip, but it's because I don't have a plan and I don't have it laid out. I sit down and I get stressed. Like, I don't want to do this.
Glynis Tao
See people as even professionals struggle with this.
Nikki Dindo
Yeah, I usually sit down and kind of look at all my folders, then map out a little grid and an app and then I'm like, okay, perfect. I go into posting overdrive and we'll start doing three a day.
Glynis Tao
Let's talk about you personally because you split your time between Vancouver and New York. So how do those cities influence your creative perspective?
Nikki Dindo
Well, it's impossible to not kind of tie in the energy of New York City into anything creative. Like that city is just so vibrant and filled with so much life and so much culture, so much music. whether it's, you know, I feel like I'm always drawn to things in the arts when I'm there. So whether it's going to a jazz bar or a concert in the park, there is just so much life in that city so much movement, it creates for a dynamic environment. And so I always leave there feeling so energized and invigorated and refreshed. I also grew up in the arts. I was a singer and a dancer and pursued that for a little bit when I was on cruise ships specifically.
And so a huge thing, and when I lived in New York, or when I lived in New York, my apartment was in Hell's Kitchen, right smack in the heart of the theater district. And it's where I tend to always kind of go back to, but it was so cool to, now, wake up on a Sunday and be like, I don't have any plans today. Let me just go for a wander and see if I can rush a show and get tickets. And being able to kind of be surrounded by that creativity and that artistry. I love going and seeing all the new shows every season and am just so inspired by the artists and the artistry and the movement and the creativity.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, I can feel your passion and I mean, okay, now we have to talk about this because I heard that you are a lifelong Broadway musical theater fan. How has that passion influenced the way you show up creatively in your work?
Nikki Dindo
I think that they had to kind of ask what they know of me as a person. They'd probably say she's a traveler and she's obsessed with Hamilton.
Glynis Tao
I was gonna ask you what’s your favorite Broadway musical?
Nikki Dindo
Yeah, Hamilton hands down and it's wild to me that they are hitting their 10 year anniversary and I watched their performance a couple weeks ago at the Tony's and I was like, how is this still so good? And leave it to me to find a way to weave Hamilton into just about any client call. I've put secret nods in content sometimes. It's just like a little giggle to me if it's something super innocuous and I'm just kind of a couple of just a series of words or something like that, but it shows up in their favorite Broadway show is Hamilton by far. Lin-Manuel Miranda is our generation's William Shakespeare. He is incredibly talented. And I followed his work for years and other things, but Hamilton is just such a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant piece of theater.
Glynis Tao
Where can people find you if they want to get in touch with you?
Nikki Dindo
The best way to reach me is send me a DM on my Instagram. I'm on Instagram. My handle is at @nikkidindo. You can shoot me an email. My contact info is on my website, www.springmediaco.com. And any questions you have, if you just want to say hi, shoot me a note. I'm around.
Glynis Tao
Thank you so much, Nikki, for sharing your journey, insights, and inspiration with us today.
Nikki Dindo
Thank you so much for having me. It's been a pleasure.
In this episode, Andréanne Mulaire, founder and designer of Anne Mulaire shares her journey of building a sustainable fashion brand rooted in her Métis heritage. She discusses the importance of authenticity and her commitment to ethical manufacturing and community support in the age of fast fashion. Anne emphasizes the significance of storytelling in fashion and how her cultural background influences her designs. She also highlights her initiatives to reduce waste and promote sustainability within the fashion industry, while offering valuable advice for aspiring entrepreneurs.
About Andréanne Mulaire
Anne Mulaire is an award-winning fashion brand founded by Red River Métis designer, Andréanne Mulaire Dandeneau. This woman-led brand blends ethical manufacturing, inclusivity and Indigenous teachings, setting new standards for sustainable fashion in Canada. Rooted in Winnipeg, Manitoba, the brand started 20 years ago in Andreane’s parents' basement. Her collections celebrate Métis heritage through vibrant designs, eco-friendly practices, and empowering Indigenous communities.
Innovative practices have cut the brand's carbon footprint by 30%, reduced 15,000 pounds of textile waste, and lowered emissions equal to 143,200 kilometers of driving. In 2024, Anne Mulaire received the Sustainable Business Award from the Red River Métis Excellence Awards, nomination from the Canadian Arts and Fashion Awards, and Clean 50 Award in 2025. As Canada's first Indigenous-owned B Corp certified apparel manufacturer Anne Mulaire champions integrity, transparency, and sustainability.
Stay rooted in your beliefs to maintain authenticity.
Customers are drawn to brands with compelling stories.
Fashion should reflect personal and cultural identity.
Sustainability is about relationships and responsibility.
Education plays a key role in promoting sustainability.
Design with the end of life in mind for products.
Navigating challenges requires resilience and creativity.
Local community support can contribute greatly to brand success.
Surround yourself with like-minded individuals for guidance.
Interview themes
What does it mean to build a brand rooted in cultural identity and values?
Andréanne Mulaire built her brand with a strong sense of purpose tied to her Métis heritage, a connection that informs everything from her design process to company values. Rather than following mainstream trends, she chose to tell a story through her clothing—one of resilience, craftsmanship, and community. Her parents encouraged her to define what kind of designer and entrepreneur she wanted to be from the start, prompting her to center her business around authenticity, Indigenous teachings, and environmental stewardship.
How does storytelling create emotional connection and customer loyalty?
For Andréanne, storytelling isn’t just part of her marketing—it’s embedded in the product itself. Each collection reflects family history, cultural knowledge, and artistic collaboration, especially with her father, a retired art teacher and painter. His artwork adorns many of the brand’s garments, turning them into pieces of wearable heritage. This intergenerational partnership brings meaning to the clothes and connects with customers on a deeper level. As she says, people aren’t just buying clothing—they’re investing in values, legacy, and identity.
What role does community support play in sustainable fashion entrepreneurship?
Anne Mulaire’s success is inseparable from the support of her Winnipeg community. A pivotal moment early in her journey was being encouraged to return home to launch her business, rather than chase opportunity elsewhere. That local backing—from Métis and Francophone communities to word-of-mouth support—has helped her thrive for two decades. She credits long-time customers and regional connections for helping her grow while staying true to her mission.
How does a brand stay sustainable through both design and operations?
Sustainability for Andréanne goes far beyond choosing eco-friendly fabrics. From the start, she considered the full life cycle of each product—designing garments that could be easily repaired, upcycled, or returned. Her Return to Nature program includes six streams: repair, resale, zero-waste collections, donation partnerships, fiber recycling, and research through a dedicated Fiber Lab team. She even selects construction methods that make future repairs easier, prioritizing longevity over trendiness.
What are the challenges of choosing purpose over profit?
Building a Canadian-made, Métis-owned, and sustainability-driven brand meant turning down cheaper production options and resisting industry pressure to compromise. Early advice to move offshore or “pick just one value” was difficult to hear—but Andréanne stayed rooted in her purpose. This clarity helped her withstand challenges and remain authentic, even when Indigenous storytelling was not widely celebrated. Her experience illustrates that resilience and long-term thinking are essential for founders who want to stay aligned with their values.
How do you scale a mission-driven brand without losing authenticity?
Andréanne recognizes the tension between growth and integrity. Her solution is to selectively scale only certain pieces of the business while maintaining exclusivity and cultural respect in others, such as her Heritage Collection. She believes not everything should be mass produced—and that the handmade, small-batch approach keeps the soul of the brand intact. Even as she plans new ventures like a Banff boutique, she stays grounded in the company’s origins and mission.
How can design decisions support circularity from the start?
Every design decision at Anne Mulaire is made with circularity in mind—from fiber selection to stitch type. For example, she deliberately avoids certain seam finishes because they’re harder to repair. These behind-the-scenes considerations, like making leggings easier to mend, have kept hundreds of garments in circulation. To date, the company has repaired over 800 pairs of leggings that would have otherwise ended up in landfills. Andréanne’s team even quantifies product-level impact by displaying water, energy, and carbon savings on the website—offering full transparency into their sustainability efforts.
What advice does Andréanne have for aspiring fashion entrepreneurs?
Start with your “why” and let it guide every decision, Andréanne says. Don’t wait for perfection—launch small, stay curious, and keep learning. Surround yourself with people who share your values, and don’t be afraid to pivot when needed. Hire slowly and intentionally, and prioritize your own well-being. Andréanne emphasizes that success isn’t about fast growth or big profits—it’s about building a business that creates positive impact and stays true to its purpose over time.
Chapters
00:00 Staying Rooted in Authenticity
02:06 The Birth of a Brand: Inspiration and Heritage
09:54 Filling the Gap: Ethical Fashion in a Fast Fashion World
11:48 Defining Sustainability: Values and Relationships
17:57 Navigating Challenges: Staying True to Values
20:32 Community Support: The Backbone of Success
23:50 Creating Impact: Education and Sustainability Initiatives
30:06 Designing for the Future: End-of-Life Considerations
34:07 Looking Ahead: Future Projects and Growth
35:30 Advice for Aspiring Entrepreneurs: Starting with Your Why
Transcript
Andréanne Mulaire
What's really important is to stay rooted because the reason I'm still in business today is because I stayed rooted in what I really believed and nobody can take that away. It is my story and it makes me who I am and it makes me also different than other companies. So I think that's very important because even today it's about, well, why are you special? Like how can you make yourself special? Because customers want, they don't want the same thing. They want authenticity, they want the, you know, the real of a company and their story. They're attracted to storytelling to different companies and their different stories. Yeah, it made me who I am differently from other competitors and something that could not be replicated.
Glynis Tao
Welcome to Chase Your Dreams, a podcast for fashion entrepreneurs who want to build a purposeful and profitable clothing business so they can make a living doing what they love. I'm your host, Glynis Tao, an apparel business consultant and SEO specialist with 20 years apparel industry experience. I'm also a mom to a wonderfully energetic little boy named Chase.
Anne Mulaire is an award-winning fashion brand founded by Red River Métis designer, Andreane Mulaire Dandeneau. This woman-led brand blends ethical manufacturing, inclusivity and Indigenous teachings, setting new standards for sustainable fashion in Canada. Rooted in Winnipeg, Manitoba, the brand started 20 years ago in Andreane’s parents' basement. Her collections celebrate Métis heritage through vibrant designs, eco-friendly practices, and empowering Indigenous communities.
Innovative practices have cut the brand's carbon footprint by 30%, reduced 15,000 pounds of textile waste, and lowered emissions equal to 143,200 kilometers of driving. In 2024, Anne Mulaire received the Sustainable Business Award from the Red River Métis Excellence Awards, nomination from the Canadian Arts and Fashion Awards, and Clean 50 Award in 2025.
As Canada's first Indigenous-owned B Corp certified apparel manufacturer Anne Mulaire champions integrity, transparency, and sustainability.
Welcome Anne, it's so nice to have you here today. Thanks for joining me on the podcast.
Andréanne Mulaire
You're so welcome. Thank you for the invite.
Glynis Tao
My pleasure. You have such an incredible and inspiring story, having established a name in the Canadian fashion industry. I felt I needed to talk to you and have you share your story with our listeners.
Andréanne Mulaire
That's awesome. I love to share it. I don't always have the opportunity, so I really appreciate the time that you're taking aside for me.
Glynis Tao
Great. So let's start at the beginning. What inspired you to launch Angoulas? Was there a specific moment or experience that sparked the idea?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah, well, I always loved creating with my hands. So the real spark came from wanting to see fashion that reflected who I was, my Métis roots, my respect for the earth, my belief that clothes should be made with care and intention. From a long time ago, I was always very mindful about the planet. And that's how the values that my parents instilled in me.
So when I was in school in Montreal, when I was doing my fashion school, I was always using natural fibers. The moment that my aha moment, when we talk about those moments, it's when I was doing my last year exam and we had to create a couture dress. And I really wanted to do something in the natural fibers. So I decided to do a dress in hemp. And I was adamant to create a dress that was red carpet.
Because the feedback I had received from when I mentioned that to my teachers, they said, well, don't be surprised if it does not end up on the runway. And if you had your dress on the runway, you had extra points. So it's, it's almost like you, you had to have it on the runway. And so I thought, okay, I'm going to prove them wrong because obviously they don't know the capacity of what natural can look like. So I really worked hard on hemp silk, hemp jacquard, hemp lace.
I looked everywhere and I had sourced some fabric in the US and I had paid everything with my own cents and dollars and I made this beautiful dress all in hemp and they were so surprised and they could not believe that it was a natural fiber and I felt like, am I educating you about this today?
So that's where I really felt I had a space in the fashion industry. The fact that first of all, people didn't believe in me or in the fact that I could create something for the runway in eco fabrics and also the education about fashion, runway fashion shouldn't be disposable. It should be something that you're taking from the earth and you got to give it back to the earth somehow. So what's that cycle and that, you know, that mini education.
So all this to say that was the big spark, but also if I fast forward a little bit, so I started my company in my parents' basement and what I also noticed was, I remember a moment where my dad was, we were collaborating together and I had showed up in the morning and he was still in his house coat, no coffee in hand and painting on our dresses that we had collaborated. And I had really thought through at that moment, I'm like, you know what, we are creating something special. This is not just clothing we're doing, but we're really creating something meaningful together. And that was the path. That's like the big decisions on everything that I put behind the company and the mindfulness about that decisions that I put into the company comes from those moments.
Glynis Tao
Your Métis heritage and family history play such an important role in your brand's story. Can you tell us more about your cultural background and how it shaped the brand's identity?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah, so my Métis heritage, it's at the heart of everything we do. Growing up, I was surrounded with stories, beadwork, florals, traditions that holds really big history and resilience. And so I was really honored that I was able to create clothing that tells a story. That's huge for me.
The one question my parents asked me before starting my company, they said, what kind of designer do you want to be? What kind of business owner do you want to be? Because at that point, I thought I was just going to be an artist and create clothing. But they said, no, you're going to become an entrepreneur by doing what you love to do. So what kind of entrepreneur, what kind of designer, what story are you going to tell? That really made me think about who I am and where I came from, you know, the rest is. So I was very proud to use my story and to tell a story through craftsmanship and every way that I could through my clothing. And I find it, you can see, you look at the clothing and I personally, see roots, you see the rooted, you know, the value rooted in them. And I'm hoping to pass that down to generations with respect, sustainability and community.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, absolutely. I could really see that heritage woven into your designs. Just like such beautiful, you know, wearable art, I guess, if you could call it that. And where do you get the art, you know, the designs that you put on your clothing from?
Andréanne Mulaire
So that's with my dad. So this is where I think it's so special because we've been collaborating for 20 years. And I do find it's the one of the most special things. He was an art teacher before. So to see him going back to his first love of art, I remember when he was a kid, he would be, all his brothers, sisters would be on the farm, working on the farm. And his dad had asked, my grandpa had asked him to be in the kitchen and to paint the house, the homestead.
And so he was loving, know, he's like, I didn't have to be on the farm, but I was painting the homestead and his dad's like, you are an artist. And I could just feel him, you know, when he was a kid and just that feeling like that proudness.
And so when I started my company, he was also retiring. So we started just the fact that I said, I want to keep my story alive and just share the indigenous people history of Canada. Cause I find fashion and history go hand in hand. It's very important. So that's what he started doing paintings and we would say, on this dress, it would be amazing to have, what's a healing plant that we use and Northern Willow and let's tell the story of that, okay. And then for leggings, how about what can we draw? And we would do these beautiful collaborations. And to today, all the art is made by him. And sometimes we do other collaborations with other artists, which is really nice. That's super special too. So that's definitely a family affair.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, it definitely is. That's really nice.
Andréanne Mulaire
I was thinking about that today too because I do find it special also because it's his legacy continuing, his education, his storytelling, his stories. And I find every time we talk about something like a new launch or a new design, there's so much depth and wisdom that I gather from that. And that print, they never go away. They're so classic. They're so timeless that it gives so much hope and just also you know strength and just so much love to other people buying it. They feel it. I find that's it's so beautiful, that's authenticity of craftsmanship, but you know of good quality. Products, you know, you know something that has good values.
Glynis Tao
And so when you started the brand early days, what gap did you see in the fashion industry that you felt compelled to fill?
Andréanne Mulaire
Well, this is no surprise, but we know fast fashion is everywhere and it's disconnected from the land. Like we know that from the maker, from the story. So I wanted to, I wanted to slow it down. I knew it was going to be a huge undertaking because a small fish in the big pond, you think about that. But I saw we needed more ethical, inclusive and cultural-conscious fashion made clothing that's made here in Canada. That was the biggest thing. Not just clothing that looks good, but do good. And that customers, when you think about it, they invest a lot of their hard money. It's like everybody that makes money, they work hard for their money. And they invest, when they buy things, you invest in the companies. That's the way I think of purchasing, consummation. I think of that every time I put in my dollars in something, you know, do I support their value? I, my investment, where is that going to go?
So I want to bring that back and just to put, you know, make, make sure that there could be a company, fashion company that would respond to a lot of what the fast fashion can't and to show it's possible in Canada.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, and that's really what I love about you and your brand and having that longevity to be in business for as long as you have, showing that you can be sustainable and be purpose driven, lead with your values and not just, you know, that there's only fast fashion as the option out there, right?
Yeah. so sustainability is at the core of your brands. How did you define find what sustainability would look like for Anne Mulaire from the start.
Andréanne Mulaire
Okay, so it's not easy. It's not always easy. But for me, it came down to relationships and responsibility. So I stay grounded by listening to my community, that's number one, and collaborating with other Indigenous artists or elders and always checking in with myself. I think that's super important. What aligns, what doesn't align with my values, you know, making decisions. I've had to do a lot of tough decisions throughout my 20 years in business.
And it's not always like they say, it's not the easy decision is the right decision. And so that has always been very important for me to always make sure I do my due diligence. And at the end of the day, do I still want to wake up in the morning and face myself and say, I made the right decision because that's what I believe in. But yeah, it's always about, you know, growth is important, so we always have to do it, but integrity is non-negotiable for a lot of what I do.
Glynis Tao
I love that. And you say a lot of that on your website as well, that you list a lot of those values to your brand. So I guess just to take it one step further in terms of your designs are beautifully blend together, indigenous culture, equal consciousness and modern fashion.
How do you stay true to your values while ensuring cultural authenticity and respect as the business growth?
Andréanne Mulaire
Well, there's one thing that, so we have a really nice collection in our brand. It's called the Heritage Collection. And those are pieces that we make small amounts of because I believe that scaling, like something special can't be scaled. So when you think about scaling, see big, as soon as a company scales, they lose their authenticity. They lose their integrity. But for us, it's always been important that, you know, we need growth. We want to grow, but what pieces are growing and which pieces are staying authentic. And, you know, absolutely it's always, it's hard with the capital and things like that. But I think at the end, it's just, you know, working from my parents' basement and doing everything myself, I was able to really analyze and just understand every step of a company. And even today, you know, I learned, now I find I'm in the part where I learned a lot of the business side. And that's where you have to be careful because you will be told so many different directions to go. You know, but you have to be rooted so strong in the beginning where you, you know, where are proud to be for those decisions, not to weigh you on one side or the other kind of thing. I don't know if I'm making kind of sense.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, it does. Just to ask you another question, do you have any mentors or teachers that have helped you along this way, along your journey?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah, I think it's always important to try to surround yourself with the right people that carries the same values. So of course, I've had my family, I have an older brother that also is an entrepreneur, and he's been very supportive and being honest with his mistakes for me not to make the same mistakes. And I really appreciate that. You know, that's vulnerable to appreciate that. And, and just to have other business owners that I really value what they do and just having their feedback on things. I think that's important. You can't do it alone. And there's so much that you don't know. And so I always say, you know, educate, educate, educate.
Glynis Tao
But let's talk about the behind the scenes. What were some of the biggest challenges you faced in the early stages of the brand?
Andréanne Mulaire
Well, definitely the time I was told that offshore production should be the thing I should head to because I should cut my costs and then go offshore. The fact that I had the triple threat, is Métis-owned, Métis-designed, Made in Canada and sustainability, I should just only pick one. So those are all things that definitely was very hard to swallow and just to acknowledge because yes, those were the things that I was really believing in and are very hard to grow a company where profits are not huge. Right?
When you make in Canada, you don't get the same profit as when you do overseas. When you have a, you know, an indigenous story where at the beginning in 2005, not a lot of people were very positive about the fact that I was, you know, telling my Indigenous story, and so it was not super popular. But you navigate through those times and again makes what's really important is to stay rooted because the reason I'm still in business today is because I stayed rooted in what I really believed and nobody can take that away.
It is my authentic, story, and it makes me who I am. And it makes me also different than other companies. So I think that's very important because even today it's about, well, why are you special? Like, how can you make yourself special? Because customers want, they don't want the same thing. They want the authenticity. They want the, you know, the real of a company and their story. They're attracted to storytelling to different companies and their different stories. So yeah, it made me who I am differently from other competitors and something that could not be replicated by just copying, you know.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, so it sounds like you have really stayed true to yourself as a designer, as a brand, being B-Court certified too is an amazing achievement, right? Because I know that's not easy the whole process to be certified. Like have you ever faced any pressures to compromise your values in order to grow and how did you navigate that?
Andréanne Mulaire
Well, again, definitely the pressure with the fast fashion, you know, the consummation. So a great example is when Black Friday comes along. It's like, how do you compete with all the brands doing so many amazing deals? And at the end, it's you have to, and this is where, you know, my mentors have always told me, stay true to who you are. Don't give in just because you feel like you have to, because then you'll just be a part of what they're doing.
You're not gonna be on your, you know, you're not gonna be your unique self. So, you know, it's about being creative and when you are a minority in so many aspects, you start to be very creative and think outside the box and find unique ways to look different. So that's what I think we've been, not I think, I believe that we've been like so good at doing that because from the beginning, it's almost, called resilience. It's like going through so many obstacles and trying to say, how do I get out of it? And then you find another way to pivot and find another way to pivot.
It's almost to the point where we are experts in pivoting because we've gone through so many obstacles, you know? And so it's always, I'm sure we're going to go through more obstacles, but it's always going to be okay. What is the right way versus what's the right thing to do in this moment? And how do we stay also true to our values and to what the brand means to a lot of people and to us. so, but to go back to the B Corp, that was huge for us because it like it validated everything that we've been working towards, social responsibility, environmental standards, ethical practices.
But you know, to be honest, like the honest, to be honest, one of the biggest moment that I have more personal, but it's been more personal for me. It was seeing customers wear our clothing to like family gatherings and to share what it means to them to connect with their culture. Like I think sometimes having these stamps or, you know, awards, those are great because it's almost a social proof. But at the end of the day, it's really seeing the amount of customers you build and the community you build wearing what you're making.
For anybody that's an artist, seeing your product sold in a house or seeing somebody wearing your jewelry is the most proud moment that you can imagine. And I think that's what the effect is on a small company versus a huge brand because you don't have that person that gets affected right away.
Glynis Tao
Love that. And I think that leads right into my next question, which is how important has your local community been in supporting the brand from Winnipeg to the broader Canadian fashion scene?
Andréanne Mulaire
So important, you know, it makes or breaks your brand, your business, if you don't have support from your community. Word of mouth. I always say word of mouth is the best marketing tactic because they believe people take who their loved ones seriously versus if we could put so much money in marketing, but it wouldn't have the same effect as the word of mouth or having a friend saying to a friend and also the support of the French community, the Métis community. It makes a huge difference. I'll tell you a story.
So after school, I graduated in Montreal for fashion. Then I decided to go to Toronto because I thought, I'm going to get a job in Toronto. That's where it should be. But then I had a meeting with Michael Silver from Silver Jeans in Winnipeg and he said, come back to Winnipeg. Your community will support you. You'll be able to open your store or your boutique or whatever you want to. You need that support. And he was not wrong. Like it's exactly what I did. I packed up myself. I came back to Winnipeg and I started my company and I've had the, you know, immense support from everybody since then. And I couldn't have done it alone. So I always say my successes is the people that support me, my community, my customers that's been with me for 20 years. I've had customers with me for 20 years, you know? It's amazing.
Glynis Tao
That is amazing and I'm actually quite impressed of how many there are quite a few apparel companies in Winnipeg right. It's like you mentioned silver jeans. Is Canada Goose based there?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah, have their, that's where the old silver jeans where they used to manufacture. Now they have some of the, that manufacture.
Glynis Tao
They do, right?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah. And they have their factory there amongst others.
Glynis Tao
So that's great. It's really great to hear that you're able to build a clothing brand and a successful clothing brand out of your hometown. Yeah. I mean, that must feel great to be able to do what you love in the city that you grew up in.
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah, as much as know entrepreneurship is it's it's not easy but that's the beauty of you know believing in your product and the fact that I get to wake up every day and I know I'm making a difference because I have you know how many people I've employed in Winnipeg and the fact that they love working here they feel like a family I love that feeling coming in and hearing them laugh it's one of the best sounds and you know the fact that I'm able to share a lot of my knowledge and also my values to a lot of customers that wanted to transition in sustainability but didn't know how or what.
And I find our education has really helped them even with our Return to Nature programs, the fact that they can bring it back, get repaired and all that. I hear more and more, this is my first piece and I'm so excited to keep on just growing slowly and those are just music to my ears when I hear that creating impact. And that's another thing that when I started the company, I had made myself, I knew I wanted to create a change. That was the number one. I wanted to reduce it with the waste in the industry, in the fashion industry. I had done some courses at the University of Manitoba in human ecology. So I had done a lot of case studies about the child labor, the behind the scene before actually I did my fashion industry at fashion school.
So I knew that behind the scene more and the waste and the fabrics. so I already knew that we were using it. It was going beyond. And so when I started a company, it was really to reduce the waste, but also to create fashion in a way more ethically and sustainable way. But to see customers seeing our company and then wanting to follow and transition into that slow fashion, that sustainable movement, that's our impact. And I said, yeah, maybe I don't make a lot of money in my pocket.
I'm not a big profit person. But that's not my goal. My goal is to be a CEO that creates impact versus a CEO that creates profit.
Glynis Tao
Can you speak a little bit about your initiatives on like how you divert textile waste, you are reducing carbon emissions?
Andréanne Mulaire
I can go for days because I love talking about that. But so in 2021, we did a really full audit of our whole supply chain. And it's really cool because you can go on our site and when you're looking at different products, you can see how much carbon emission you're saving from that product, water, energy saving. So it gives you real time of the positive impact of that product. So that's one thing. But we also launched a whole return to nature program, which it's like a, it's the holistic approach to reducing waste in our own company. Cause again, on a side note, I always say every company is, should be, should be responsible for their own waste. So whatever waste you create, if it's energy, if it's tangible or whatever, you should be responsible for your own waste. So for us, it was important to look at a holistic approach and see how customers can participate as well.
So our Return to Nature program is based on six programs. Number one, it's repair, where you can bring back any clothing that you have and we will repair it. We also have a 90-day guarantee, so we repair for free. And then second is a resale program, where, okay, you've worn your piece, so you have older piece, you bring it back, and then it's a take-back program, basically.
And then we have our revive and slash zero waste collection program where we will upcycle and reuse waste from our post production. So the season before production remnants, when we've done our big cuts, we have like bags. So we'll do a collection twice a year. It's called the zero waste collection and we reuse those. And that's a fun, creative, one of a kind collection. And then we have three more but that's more on the back end of because doing these programs in order to have it fully circular, there's some research and development that needs to be done. we have the fourth is the down cycle. So that's where we have remnants, but we can't do anything with that. But we do donate to any community engagement or community areas.
We just had a company come in, a nonprofit, and they were filling out punching bags and they came in and grabbed four bags and they're filling those up and then these are for community activities this summer. And so amazing, cool project that we get to hear about. And then we also have our down cycle, is where we have the down cycle and the recycle and we have fiber lab. So fiber lab is our team that does all the research and development for new fibers. That's where we did a collaboration with University of Manitoba.
And we looked at the bi-gradable ability of our fabrics and how do we move to the next phase to finding bi-gradable fabrics. So they're doing the research and development of all that. And our bio cycle and recycling program is where we did, we launched that last fall and we're going to continue this fall where we use 10,000 pounds of our waste and we recycled it in these socks. We did socks for the first time because it's universal.
But that was the one, our goal is to create clothing so we don't have, I mean, fabric. So we don't want to be buying virgin fabric all the time. But ideally would be to recycle your own waste into fabric so then you can just keep recycling. So it becomes a full loop all the time. And at the end of the day, you know, you can't do that forever.
But if you can relieve, if you can keep things in the loop a bit longer, and this is great for any customers, think hearing this, you keep your shirt, you wear your shirt longer, maybe two or three months longer, it takes away so many carbon emission and also water from the landfill. And it just, that's the key of keeping things off the landfill and to be sustainable. It's to wear things longer. And so keeping into the loop, that's the key of sustainability.
Glynis Tao
Do you actually consider all that at the very beginning of the design process then? You're probably considering the end of life?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yes. Yeah, that's a great question because a lot of people, don't know, but when we design our collection, we always design with the end life first, and then we move forward and, you know, we move to the design. A lot of the times, you know, people are looking at a fabric and they're like, that's pretty. Okay, I'm going to design and then they go to the end life. But then that fabric might not be composable or it could be 100% plastic, which will take 200 plus years to decompose. It could have synthetics or it could have zippers or buttons, which is totally fine. for us, either way I design is I always think, okay, well, if anybody had to repair this, how would I repair this? Okay, I need to make sure that it's repairable because that goes into my loop.
I need to make sure that the fabric is as natural as possible because at the end life, it will go to this space, this place here. And so those are the questions that I asked myself. Then a very good example is we do a lot of leggings. So the leggings are one of our best sellers. And I was contemplating on getting a flat stitch, which is the stitch that kind of goes like this. And it's a flat stitch that you see a lot of on big brands' leggings.
The only thing with these stitches is that you can't repair it. It's a very hard way to repair it when it breaks. So this is a decision that I had to make, okay, well, I can't have what everybody else has, but I'll go with my serger because I know I can repair it. And you should have repaired over 800 leggings over the years. And that's like leggings that would have been tossed in the landfill and just discarded. These are leggings that are still in the loop. And so that for me, those are decisions that I make that a lot of customers or people don't even know. It's like, yeah, I guess so.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, totally get what you're saying. It's the flat lock machine. Yeah. So I guess you would do the surge and cover stitch. Yeah. So that's right? That would make it easier to put them at the repairing stage. Do you do all your production and how?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yes, we do. I have just across my door right here, I have the whole manufacturer. So when you come to the shop, you get to see, you know, everything being made. It's almost like the kitchen behind, how do you call that? The open kitchen, open manufacturer. So yeah, I'll take a little video after and send it to you so you can have it.
Glynis Tao
Yes, please. I would love to be able to share that too with our listeners so they get a little bit more behind the scenes look, you know, your manufacturing process, because that's not really a lot, people don't get to see that.
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah, exactly.
They usually see the end, the product at the end and don't see all the things that happen in between. We know when we're at the restaurant and we see the chef cooking, it's so special. It's like, how is he doing that? how's, well, that's cool. You know? And I started doing little reels with my sewers and asking them what's the hardest part of different products. And it's so cool because I get to hear this too. like, oh, I didn't know that was the hardest part of a blazer. What's the hardest parts of this dress? And then they tell me, you know, it's kind of cool now.
Glynis Tao
So what's next for Anne Mulaire? Are there any upcoming projects, collections or partnerships that you're excited about?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah, well, we're going to continue to grow, expand the circular program, the take back and the repair, and then also try to do more recycled textile to textile recycling. But we're also working on opening a boutique in Banff, which is a dream. I'm still working hard on that, but that's going to be something that we can really bring made to Canada, indigenous owned in Banff. So I think customers will, and for all international, that's the way I see international people coming through, you know, to see the thing real, what's real about Canada. I think that would be really nice. Yeah. And then just to continue to do some really nice collaboration with Métis artisans and, but those are the big things.
Glynis Tao
And you are mostly D to C right now, you sell off your website. Do you do wholesale and do you stock anywhere?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah, we don't do wholesale, used to in 2008, I had a lot of stores and I had to pivot because of the market crashed. And so that was one of my pivots. And then we went just direct to consumer, which again was easier for us because we didn't have to use as much fabric. I could create smaller runs and answer demands on, you know, when they came versus when I was doing wholesale, it was just a lot right off the bat. If they didn't pay on time. Like it was just a lot of management, but we're looking at maybe opening again, the wholesale department next year and just having selective things. I think it's important to try to get Canadian made t-shirts. I find like, again, I know where they, your t-shirts, have to be a certain price point, but there's something being said about Canadian t-shirts being well-made. I think we've had the experience of wearing crappy t-shirts enough, but good quality t-shirts, we're going to start to want to embrace that and to want to invest in those. Just other pieces that we can offer, that would be good.
Glynis Tao
If you could give advice to a young entrepreneur or fashion designer, what would it be?
Andréanne Mulaire
Thinking about everything I went through, I would say starting with your why. So know what you stand for before you launch anything. I believe it's going to guide you with every decision that you have to make, but also don't wait till everything's perfect to launch. You know, just start something and then learn as you go, but always surround yourself with people that share the same values and the same visions. And yeah, I believe that's how you build something that lasts.
Glynis Tao
And just, I guess, reflecting back over the last 20 years, you know, building the brand, how has it changed you as a person?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah. Well, I'm definitely more patient now, but it has opened my eyes to seeing what's happening more outside. You know, in the beginning, you're very inward and you're very focused, but I was able to just open my eyes and seeing more of what is happening around me and letting fate kind of just do its thing.
Glynis Tao
Are you able to sort of step back a little bit more and be able to sort of look at things kind of on a broader view, know, macro level than a very micro level? Because I think when, you know, starting out as a new designer, you got your hands in like everything, right? And having to do everything.
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah, no, you're right. If I think about, you know, physically, physically in terms of my workload, I think another very important thing is, is finding the right people for the right jobs. The resource, a lot of companies will say resource or HR is always, it's a lot of work, but it's very important and take your time. Sometimes it's okay to take your time for that, but having the right team allows me to step back and just to work more on the company versus in the company.
And that's something I've learned too over the years of you're working so much in the company. If you do that too much, then you start not to see what is happening because you're so focused on one thing. And also just the importance for any entrepreneur is to really take at least, you know, if possible. I try to do that is, is, you know, a me day or a weekend every season, because there's a reason why there's seasons, things change.
And it's also your, a person also change and in order to refresh to, you know, to be the best self for the company. Cause you're there. If you're not your best self, then everybody else is suffering around you. So it's important to be your best self around your company, about your, your employees and to take time for yourself. Cause that's the number one thing is you become a workaholic. It's so easy. Right. So, and balance is, very hard. A lot of people will say, I try to balance it. I've been working on balance for 20 years, but you know, being able to put a few things like hiring the right people and if sometimes it doesn't work out, it doesn't work out. But you keep your goal is always to hire the right people. And when you have strong core values and you hire and you fire with those in mind, you'll get the right people.
Glynis Tao
That's great advice. Where can people find you if they want to get in touch with you?
Well, they can find me on the website and they can send an email there or through our Instagram. We have Facebook, we have LinkedIn, we have a YouTube channel too. yeah, if they just search Anne Mulaire or I guess we could put that in the caption.
Glynis Tao
Yes. We will put all your contact info.
They can come and check out the boutique in Winnipeg. It's a really nice experience. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, sorry. I didn't maybe forgot to say we have the boutique connected to Anne Mulaire we'll I'll take a video for you too. So you can show it to them. It's connected to the manufacturing facility.
Glynis Tao
So you have like a design studio and a factory and then a store. Please send us a video of that or if that is a bit is it on your website?
Andréanne Mulaire
Yeah, you have this location that says the boutique, a little picture of the boutique, but I'll send you a video of the manufacturer and then going through the boutique and
Glynis Tao
Okay, yes. And I will add that to the Reels highlight when I post it, because I'm sure people would want to love to see it. I would love to see it. Next best thing to flying to Winnipeg, right? Thank you. You are so lucky.
Glynis Tao
Thank you for sharing your story with us. It's been so inspiring to hear how you've built a brand rooted in heritage, sustainability and purpose.
Andréanne Mulaire
You are so welcome. Thank you so much for the time, like the space that you let me blab.
Glynis Tao
My pleasure. And for anyone listening, you can learn more about Anne Mulaire and explore the collections at annemulaire.ca, your website. And thank you again for joining us today.
In this episode, we are joined by Shannon, owner of Simply Merino—a sustainable clothing brand based in Vancouver and specializing in Australian Merino wool. She shares her journey from teacher to fashion entrepreneur, and discusses how her values around sustainability, transparency, and community support have shaped the brand. The conversation explores the early challenges of running a business, the benefits of using natural fibers, and how customer feedback plays a central role in product development. Shannon also reflects on her recent trip to Australia to visit wool suppliers and offers a look at what’s next for Simply Merino, including upcoming product launches and textile recycling initiatives.
About Shannon
Shannon is the owner of Simply Merino, a Canadian clothing brand based in Vancouver that creates ultra-soft, sustainable everyday essentials for the whole family. Made exclusively from Australian Merino wool, Simply Merino offers cozy sweats, elevated basics, swimwear, and sleepwear designed with a minimalist aesthetic and a commitment to conscious living. With all production done locally in Canada, Shannon is closely involved in every stage of the process—from design to manufacturing—ensuring both quality and transparency.
Driven by a deep commitment to sustainability, Shannon has grown Simply Merino into a purpose-led brand that goes beyond fabric choices. Under her leadership, the company has diverted over 15,000 pounds of textile waste from landfills through its recycling initiatives. Her values as a mother, environmentalist, and small business owner continue to shape the brand’s mission. Whether it's educating customers on the benefits of natural fibers or building long-term supplier relationships, Shannon is redefining what it means to build a thoughtful, values-led sustainable fashion business from the ground up.
Lead with your values to attract the right customers to your brand.
Be transparent to build trust and connect more deeply with your audience.
Involve your customers, but stay true to your design principles and brand identity.
Be prepared to learn through trial and error if you’re starting without industry experience.
Focus on niche communities that naturally align with your brand’s values.
Local production supports quality, ethics, and long-term operational flexibility.
Stay mission-driven, especially during the early challenges of running a small brand.
Interview themes
What does it mean to build a values-led fashion brand?
Simply Merino’s growth has been rooted in a deep commitment to values rather than profits. When Shannon took over the business, she was driven by her passion for sustainability, natural living, and creating something meaningful—not the idea of building a fashion empire.
Her background as an environmentalist and holistic health practitioner naturally informed the direction of the brand, which prioritizes natural fibers, ethical manufacturing, and thoughtful design. This purpose-led approach has shaped everything from her material choices to how she communicates with customers.
How can transparency strengthen brand loyalty?
In the early stages of running Simply Merino, Shannon hesitated to show the reality behind the brand because she felt small compared to polished competitors. Over time, she realized that being open about the production process, working from home, and the brand’s modest beginnings actually created deeper trust.
Today, she actively shares how garments are made, who makes them, and why certain decisions are made. A major turning point in this journey was visiting her Merino wool supplier in Australia and sharing that story with customers. These behind-the-scenes moments help reinforce customer loyalty and show that the brand is committed to full transparency.
How do customer relationships influence product development?
Shannon’s design process is closely tied to feedback from her community. While she remains the final decision-maker on what gets produced, many product ideas originate from customer suggestions. For example, her expansion into women’s wear and eventually men’s designs was a direct response to customer interest. However, she only moves forward with designs that reflect her own sense of style and comfort, ensuring that each piece aligns with the brand’s identity. This balance of listening and leading helps ensure the line remains both relevant and authentic.
What are the challenges of growing a sustainable fashion business from scratch?
Taking over an existing brand presented challenges Shannon hadn’t anticipated. While there was an initial customer base, she had no fashion or business background and had to learn everything through trial and error. Early production issues with manufacturers led to faulty products and difficult customer situations, compounded by the stress of juggling a young family and limited financial resources. The early years were marked by exhaustion and self-doubt, but those experiences laid the groundwork for later resilience and clarity around her business values.
How can niche communities drive organic brand growth?
Without a traditional marketing strategy, Simply Merino’s growth has largely come from word-of-mouth and community support. Shannon discovered that homesteading groups, outdoor education networks, and families interested in natural living were particularly drawn to her products.
These niche audiences helped spread awareness about the brand, and their interest shaped how Shannon continued to position and market her garments. This grassroots growth strategy proved more effective than paid advertising, aligning naturally with her values-led approach.
Why is local manufacturing a strength, not a limitation?
Keeping production in Vancouver has been a cornerstone of Simply Merino’s operations. By building long-term relationships with local manufacturers, Shannon has been able to maintain quality control and streamline communication. If issues arise, they can be resolved quickly and in person.
Beyond logistics, she sees local production as a way to support the skilled labor force in her city and ensure ethical working conditions. Recent shifts in consumer awareness—especially during the COVID-19 pandemic and after tariff changes—have only increased interest in Canadian-made products.
How does sustainability go beyond fabric choice?
The brand’s sustainability efforts extend far beyond its use of Merino wool. One of Simply Merino’s most significant projects has been collecting and recycling fabric scraps from production—over 15,000 pounds so far. These scraps have been sent to North Carolina for processing into new yarn, which Shannon plans to turn into products like socks, hats, and blankets. This focus on circularity demonstrates how the brand is committed to reducing waste and continuously improving its environmental impact.
What advice does Shannon have for women starting sustainable fashion brands?
Shannon encourages aspiring founders to be honest about their motivations and prepared for hard work. For her, success came from being transparent, staying aligned with her values, and building genuine relationships with customers. She cautions that the road is slow and often financially difficult in the early years, but that staying mission-driven can lead to long-term fulfillment. Her journey reflects the importance of storytelling, adaptability, and owning your identity as a founder, even when the business is small.
Chapters
00:00 The Journey to Sustainable Fashion
02:58 Building a Values-Driven Brand
06:09 The Role of Natural Fibers in Fashion
09:06 Transparency and Customer Involvement
12:04 Challenges of Running a Small Business
14:56 Growth and Community Support
17:49 The Importance of Local Production
21:07 Sustainability in the Supply Chain
23:59 Educating Consumers on Sustainable Choices
26:58 Lessons Learned and Personal Growth
30:04 Future Goals and Innovations
33:04 Advice for Aspiring Entrepreneurs
Transcript
Shannon
I try to explain and educate. But it's my job, I feel, to educate customers or potential customers the importance, and again, not only my shop, but to understand what they're buying and who they're buying from just to make sure that they feel good. I know that so many people don't have the means really to buy slow fashion or educate themselves on the importance and if my customers are choosing my shop to buy something from me when I know most people are financially in a hard time like that that fills my heart and it makes me understand the importance of what they want. You know, like they want to know who they're buying from and I'm honored that they're buying from us.
Glynis Tao
Welcome to Chase Your Dreams, a podcast for fashion entrepreneurs who want to build a purposeful and profitable clothing business so they can make a living doing what they love. I'm your host, Glynis Tao, an apparel business consultant and SEO specialist with 20 years apparel industry experience. I'm also a mom to a wonderfully energetic little boy named Chase.
Welcome to Chase Your Dreams podcast where we dive into the stories behind purpose-driven brands and the people shaping the future of fashion. Today, I'm joined by Shannon, the owner of Simply Merino, a Canadian clothing brand known for its incredibly soft, sustainable everyday essentials crafted exclusively from Australian Merino wool. From cozy sweats, t-shirts and swimwear to elevated basics for women, men and kids.
Simply Merino is redefining comfort with a focus on minimalism, quality, and conscious living. Based in Vancouver, Simply Merino designs and manufactures all of its pieces in Canada, allowing them to be personally involved in every stage of creation. At the heart of the brand is Australian Merino Wool, an incredibly soft, temperature-regulating, and durable fiber that's also naturally renewable, biodegradable, and doesn't release harmful microplastics when washed.
Shannon's commitment to sustainability goes beyond fabric choice. In fact, Merino has kept over 15,000 pounds of fabric scraps out of landfills through its own recycling efforts. In this episode, we talk about what it means to build a values led brand, how Simply Merino is tackling textile waste head on, and the challenges and rewards of growing a fashion business from the ground up. So let's get into it.
Welcome Shannon. It's so nice to have you here today. Thanks for joining me on the podcast.
Shannon
Thank you so much for having me. That was a really great introduction. Thank you.
my pleasure. I think you have an incredible brand that's quite unique because you make all your clothing from Australian Merino wool and you make it right here in Canada.
That's right, we're very lucky, right in Vancouver, off of Clark Street.
Glynis Tao
Great. So I love to get to know you a little bit better. So let's go back to the beginning. Can you tell us about your background and how you got into this business?
Okay, yes.
Shannon
Before or like my last life, I was a teacher and I befriended one of the parents in my class and I loved her and she has three kids and just like, I actually just kind of wanted to be her to be honest. And she ran, she started Simply Merino. So she started it in 2010. Her husband is from New Zealand and her mother-in-law is a Merino wool supplier.
She talked to me about her business and I loved it. Fast forward a year, I had a kid and then we were hanging out and I just asked her how her business was. And to me from the outside, it looked easy. It looked like she had everything put together. She was easy breezy. And she's like, well, I can't do it anymore. I have to close the doors. It's just too much for me. There's too much going on. And I just can't do it.
And so I talked to my partner and I was like, oh, you know, like this would be fun. He's an engineer at the time. I think he was doing his MBA and just really go, it'd be fun thing to do. So I asked her and I approached her and I was like, Hey, like, do you, do you want to see it go somewhere? Or do you want to just close the doors? And she's like, I would love for someone to take it. And like someone who I love and trust.
So we bought her inventory and at the time it was just babies and pajamas and thermals and very small, all made in New Zealand. So that's how it started. So that was nine years ago. There's been many years of learning experiences, many tears. It was great. It was a great thing not to have started it from the ground up.
It was also very hard in the same way because I already had some customers, not many, but they had this expectation and I just, I honestly had no idea what I was doing and had to learn from all of my mistakes. But that's where it started and nine years ago and it's been growing every year and I'm very fortunate and I fell into this, but it's my passion and it's just been a really great journey.
Glynis Tao
Wow, that's amazing. That's a great story. So no background in business or fashion.
Shannon
You know, the more women that I meet who are small business owners, they don't have much business background either. It's just the passion that comes with it. And I was always an environmentalist and I got my degree in geography and just like really that was my passion. And I think because of that, that's really helped our business succeed and it wasn't about the money.
Does that make, like, it was more kind of like, this would be a fun thing to do, never expecting that it would be my full-time job and I don't teach anymore. But yes, no fashion, although I did make my grad dress when I was in grade 12. So there's that. I have some fashion.
Glynis Tao
There you go. That's great. I think really having that passion is a really important factor, right? In any business, I think you can learn all those other aspects, but the passion really carries you through the hard times and the challenges. So how did your own lifestyle, whether as a parent, a creative or a conscious consumer, shape your vision for the brand.
Shannon
Well, so I had my firstborn who was one at the time and I guess it was just well and then I had my second one a year or two after and that it yes it was important for my kids to wear natural fibers and understanding the health impacts of non-natural fabrics and synthetics were extremely important to me always. And having kids, it was even more important. But that was kind of like the drive of the beginning of the business of the natural fabric for kids. Then understanding that my customers also, the moms also wanted something and therefore I wanted something. Like the balance was hard. Everything was just, I don't really know how to answer the question.
The lifestyle, I guess it's, yeah, I'm always an outdoorsy person. I'm always a natural person. I did my holistic health practitioner course and lived on Salt Springs. So that has always been important to me. And that is true in our brand as well. And then it's like the natural colors and the beauty of the wool that is enhanced and not necessarily the styles.
Glynis Tao
Yeah. I can really see that come through in your branding aesthetic and your color palette. A lot of the nature natural colors. Why did you choose Merino Wall specifically? Because I know you took over your friend's business and they are already working with a New Zealand wall, did you say? So what really drew you to that fabric over others?
Shannon
It was just the properties. I knew Merino wool before with the bigger companies and loved it and understood it. And it was just the amazing qualities that it has, like the hypoallergenic, fire resistant, natural, wicking. The list goes on and the fact that it's renewable, it's natural.
That always intrigued me, but the business started with Merino wool. I can't pivot and say, okay, now we're gonna only make things in cotton where it's like 90% cheaper, which would be good with the financials, but it was always the heart of the brand.
Then understanding it more, we went to visit Australia and our supply chain and Merino sheep farms and like understanding the work that goes into it, the love that goes into it, the stories that are into it just inspires me more to work with the fabric.
It's such a beautiful fabric. Beautiful.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, I mean, your fabric is really, it's, you use mostly knits, right? Knit fabrics and it looks so soft, you know, it's so comfortable compared to what you normally think of when you think of wool, kind of that maybe itchy, scratchy kind of feeling, but your clothes don't look like that at all.
Shannon
It's not. Sometimes, you know, there are a small percentage of people who can't wear it no matter if it's really soft or not. But I'd say like 99% of our customers. Yeah, it's it's so soft and it's easy to wear. And it's just because of the microns are so low, which means it's just like a really soft fiber as opposed to wool from other sheep. Merino sheep just have really fine fibers.
Glynis Tao
Simply Merino is known for its quality, transparency, and sustainability. How do those values show up in your design and production process?
Shannon
Well, we try to be as transparent as we can. Design wise, well, I always kind of go with what my customers and followers want to see. It's over the nine years of learning social media, because I had no idea what I was doing. People want to see who's behind the brand.
People wanna know what we do, where we have our products made, who makes them, how we design products. But I really try to get my customers involved. For example, a lot of our newer products, it's because people wanted them. If a lot of people are asking for a certain item, then I take them on the journey of trying to make the item that they want, right?
So it's always been important, it was never at the beginning of the business. I felt like I had to hide everything because we were so small. You know, like we were working out of our bedroom and then our garage. And it just was, for some reason I felt embarrassed because you follow people on Instagram and everything is perfect and they have the most perfect showroom and just like, I wasn't there and I wasn't transparent in that.
In those days, I wasn't with our business per se, but like, it wasn't until recently that I felt like it was so, it's so important to tell the whole story, you know? But that's what the feedback that I've got from the people who are our customers. So it was a learning experience for how much they want to see, how much transparency they want to see.
Glynis Tao
Hmm, okay. So from what you're saying, it sounds like you involve your customers in the process of the designing and production parts and taking their feedback and turning them into garments. Your pieces are beautiful and simple and functional. So how do you approach your product development for everyday essentials and what makes a garment worth producing?
Shannon
Great question. someone told me this a while ago. I can't remember who and I can't remember how long ago, but they're like, you need to make something that fits you well, that you love. Not everyone will love it. The fit won't work for everyone, but hopefully some people will. Hopefully like quite a few people will, right? So I never make anything that I wouldn't wear. You know, if a customer wants something like a tube top or something like that, I'm not gonna make it, you know, especially if I think that it won't work and I wouldn't wear it. So I do take into account what my customers want, but at the end of the day, I need to make something that I love with the colors that I love, with the different types of fabric that I love. So, as long as I trust myself and I am honest, then I think that I'm making a good product. And if I do make a sample that I hate, I'm not going to make it. You know?
Glynis Tao
So you're like the final decision judge that says whether or not this is going to go through or not.
Shannon
100% and it's just me. I'm designing it. I'm getting it made. I'm trying it on.
Glynis Tao
And it's nice to have a business like that where you're making something that you also love yourself, right?
Shannon
Yes. I wear my brand all the time.
Glynis Tao
That's amazing. So you do all your production in Vancouver, Canada. Yes. Has it been challenging to keep your productions, products Canadian made and has there been a renewed interest in making Canada products since the tariffs have been announced?
Shannon
No, it's never been an issue making anything in Canada. Vancouver has so many skilled seamstresses and manufacturers. I know right now there's a lot of manufacturers that don't have enough business because a lot of the American companies said no to Canadian made and they're out. So it's a really great time for Canadian apparel businesses to start making or thinking about making in Canada. But no, you know, it took a few years to find ones that we love. We've been working with the same three for, I don't know, five, six years. So they're our friends. know, if there's something wrong with, you know, there's always going to be some quality controls and if there's a seam that's wrong or it's like uneven, it's so easy for us to get in the car and they fix them, you know, without like, there's not even any hesitation because we have that relationship and because it's there, we're local.
Yes, there has been more interest in Canadian made, but that was, you know, when COVID started, everyone wanted to support local. Everyone wanted Canadian made, which was great. COVID actually really helped our business because everyone wanted to be outside and then they understood Merino wool and supporting small Canadian businesses. So yeah, that time was great for us. And again, right now, because of the tariffs in February, when there is a lot of fear regarding the tariffs, we had great sales, but will it last? I'm not sure, but I'm really glad that Canada or Canadian brands are being showcased and understanding the importance of Canadian made. And it's not as hard as one would think.
Glynis Tao
Great. So you recently took a trip to see your Australian wool supplier. Can you tell us a little bit about that? Sort of what you saw, what learned?
Shannon
Yeah, well, we took our kids and it was a family trip and we've always been kind of working with it. We've been working with the same supplier and through emails and perhaps some phone calls. But on our end, we're thinking that they're a huge supplier and, you know, intimidating and coming from our little small shop. So we really want to understand them. We want to build that relationship. But also understand the process of processing Merino wool. So we went down there, we met our supplier in just out of Melbourne and it was so lovely. It's such a small facility. You know, it was funny because like you have these grandiose ideas and then you walk in and everyone knows your name and just like, it was just so interesting to understand how they knit and dye and what they're doing for sustainability. And it was just a really great experience and for our kids to understand like this is where our wool comes from. Also, we got to visit one of many Merino farms, but especially one that our wool actually came from. So we go there and
We stayed there overnight and it was just the most beautiful experience. The farm was incredibly beautiful and it's just so magical. And they were so excited to see a final product. They've never seen anything that would come from their sheep. So we got to show them and give them some of our product from their farm.
It was just so magical. It's hard to kind of put into words how important it was for me, just the passion and the understanding of the transparency is just, it was so great. I want to go back, but probably not for a few years. It was so great though.
Glynis Tao
Oh, that sounds amazing. Just to meet the people face to face. People grow your fibers, raw material, right? It's starting point.
Shannon
It's starting point and how many businesses are able to do that, right? Like we shook hands with the farmers who sheared the sheep to make it. It is just, it's just so special, so special.
Glynis Tao
This reminds me of a documentary I saw. Have you seen it? It's called Fashion Reimagine.
Shannon
I don't know if I have.
Glynis Tao
My gosh. It's a great film. It's documentary that follows. It's a UK brand, Mother Pearl. They're a creative director, designer, and they wanted to have the same thing, right? Full transparency with their supply chain where they source their materials. they were going to sourcing for wool and cotton. So, yeah, the whole documentary takes them along the journey.
They wanted to know exactly where the wool was coming from and the farmers and then, you know, the whole knitting process and everything, right, along the whole supply chain. It's a great film. think you would love it.
A lot of customers today are seeking out sustainable options. So how do you educate your audience about the benefits of Merino and the ethics behind your brand?
Shannon
While I try to put as much information on our website, we've got quite a few different pages that talk about the sustainability practices of our shop and the supply chain and so forth, but also social media, a bit of a broken record of the wrongdoings of fast fashion and not necessarily just talking about my brand, but how it's important to choose quality over costs perhaps or like knowing where your product comes from and who makes them and what it actually means. mostly it's social media to be honest. And again, it's like the kind of the question answer if whatever people want to hear, I try to explain and educate. But it's this constant thing because, you know, social media it's like three weeks later I have to do it again because there's different people who see it or didn't see it.
But it's my job, I feel, to educate customers or potential customers the importance and again, not only my shop, but to understand what they're buying and who they're buying from just to make sure that they feel good. I know that so many people don't have the means really to buy slow fashion or educate themselves on the importance. And if my customers are choosing my shop to buy something from me, when I know most people are financially in a hard time, that fills my heart and it makes me understand the importance of what they want. You know, like they want to know who they're buying from. And I'm honored that they're buying from us.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, that must feel really good and reassuring, guess, to have the feeling that your customers understand and appreciate what you do.
Shannon
Yeah, 100%. Seeing so like, really don't know what I'm doing, you know? I'm trying, like I'm figuring it out, but I really, I'm just, I don't really know what I'm doing.
Glynis Tao
Well, let me ask you this question. What has your community of customers taught you throughout this journey or inspired you to do differently?
Shannon
To be honest, I feel so grateful for my community of customers because they've really embraced me and seem to appreciate me and what I do and what I make and how we make it and how transparent we are and that we're trying. And I think the bottom line is that our customers know that we're trying to be a better business, a sustainable, like we care. I think they've just taught me to follow my heart, that's what it is. To follow my heart because for so long I just kind of, for the first three or four years of owning this business and working so hard and just crying at nighttime because it was just me and.
I kept saying that I was a teacher, but I hadn't taught for three years because I wasn't, I never felt worthy of the label that I'm an entrepreneur or a business owner. I never felt like that. I still am like, no, you know what? No, I am proud now and I'm able to say it, but that's because of my community of customers who have taught me to be proud. You know? They're important.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, absolutely. And this is a good segue to lead me into the next question about, okay, challenges and lessons learned. What were some of the biggest challenges you faced early on as a business owner?
Shannon
Well, like I said, we had no idea what we were doing. And in this industry, I think it's different now, but everyone was very hush-hush of where they would make their garments, right? Like no one would say where they would make them because they didn't want anyone else to come in and take over their space. So it was so hard to find a manufacturer. And the first manufacturer we had did not go well, had the wrong machine and basically, like I said, I already had some customers, so they were waiting on our restock of the products that have already been made and she had used the wrong machine, so when you put it on, it stretched and the threads broke and I didn't know what, like we didn't have a lot of money and customers were upset.
But I didn't refund them. I didn't know what I was doing. I was like, okay, well, sorry, this is what happened. If you want to fix it, we'll pay to get it fixed. Or I can't remember what we did, but I wasn't, I didn't do that well. I felt like it was our error. What we should have done was just like, you know, scrapped it all and then just started fresh. But I still feel bad for that because those customers walked away with, you know, not so great product.
As well as like, I had two small kids and I, it was incredibly hard. The balance for women, I'm sure there's balance for men as well, but I would resent my baby for not sleeping because I had to count stock. I had to fill orders. I had to, I would get mad at her for not sleeping right away at nighttime and I, I've, it hurts my heart because it was such a hard time. Cause I couldn't figure it out and I felt like I had to do everything right away in order for our business to grow. Now, you know, nine years later, I have a lot more spare time because I would, I'm able to, have some employees that help me. When you start out a new business, you have no help financially. You have no finances. And with kids, it was really hard.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, so you had a baby already, right? When you had taken over the business and then you had your second child too. How old are your kids now?
Shannon
10, almost 11 and almost 8.
Shannon
Yeah, it's good times now and it's fun for them to see our business now. But I almost think like it would have been easier if I started something now rather than when they were really little when they depended on you so much, right? Yeah, it's hard.
Glynis Tao
And this is a family business, Is your husband involved in it as well?
Shannon
Yeah, we own it 100% and then we have a few employees that help with packing orders and customer service, but that's it. So it's just us. And now, you know, when we first, the first few years, I'd never say that like, oh, we're a big business. I never would say a big business, you know, it was, I was embarrassed that it was just us.
Glynis Tao
My gosh, I have to show you this post that I made on Instagram about the same thing because I had a clothing brand before. You know, those early days when I was cutting and sewing, making everything myself on my kitchen table, I was hiding behind it and saying, pretending that I was like this large corporation. You know?
Shannon
Yeah, I know had this facade right and just kind of hid behind the products and I don't know if storytelling was a big deal back then, right? Right now it is. Yeah, it's funny how we felt ashamed of working hard in our kitchen table. I still work on my kitchen table, by the way. That's my office.
Glynis Tao
There's nothing wrong with that. That's great. you should show us more of that behind the scenes. I'd love to see it.
So let's move on to talking about growth. What were some pivotal moments that helped Simply Merino grow from an idea into a successful business?
Shannon
It was a slow growth, you know, we've been growing every year to a really great pace for us. Like I said, we're very small. We have no intention of becoming this big company. don't think being bigger means better, right? Like there comes more problems and I just that is not of interest to me.
To be honest, COVID really helped us. Like that was a pivotal moment where we were sought after in a way, right? Like we ticked off quite a few check marks for what Canadians wanted at the time. So we were very fortunate to get a big boost of sales during that time. And it was organic growth and then certain people found our shop and organically shared it. And I felt like that was part of a lot of our growth too. When bigger names tend to share something, people listen. So we had a few great people who, again, just shared our shop and helped us grow in that. And then I think that was our biggest growth during the first year and a year and a half of COVID. And then it's been growing since, but I felt like that was like a big push.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, and I think, I mean, we talked a little bit about educating consumer. Just in terms of like the brand itself and building awareness and trust for a, I guess a lesser known, let's common fabric like Merino wool. Yeah, how did you build this awareness, especially in the Canadian market?
Shannon
Gosh, um, I don't really know. I don't think it was me. I don't think I did anything different. I felt like maybe I pushed more of the the properties of Merino wool and why it was important for that time of our life, but I honestly think I don't think it was much about me. I think it was other people who shared about us and educated their followers or customers or whomever. But I don't think it was entirely me.
Glynis Tao
Right. Yeah, no, that's really interesting. You say that. do you like, I'm just curious to know, I guess from a more business standpoint, a point of view, right? Because the podcast is really more intended for fashion printers and business owners. just your sort of insight on all this. So like what marketing or customer strategies helped you to create the loyalty for your brand and getting those repeat customers?
Shannon
Great question. Well, we've really never paid for any marketing. So Google AdWords we did for a year, I think, but we don't invest in a lot of marketing. Again, like I didn't have a strategy by any means. There's just by chance certain groups, so a lot of different groups like natural fabrics and when our shop is featured in these groups such as like homesteading families. Homestead is huge right now. So that's farms and you know natural lifestyles. It's huge. We gained so many new customers but I didn't know about that community, right?
So it wasn't, I wasn't searching for different ways of marketing. It kind of organically just happened. So these different communities and groups shared us and then I understood, wow, these outdoor communities really want wool. I'm going to market that or like hashtag outdoor or
work with outdoor schools, which we've done many times, right? So I didn't have a strategy. It was all kind of like what I experienced and then I followed through from that. Does that make sense?
Glynis Tao
That's really interesting. I think every company does things differently. Yeah. It's interesting that you share that and these communities that you just happen to, I guess, come across that you didn't know before.
Shannon
No, you know, obviously I knew that but I didn't know that how much interest they wanted or invested in natural fabrics, right? And I was like, So it was by chance. But I don't think it's for every fabric. If this is for, you know, fashion students or fashion businesses, it's not for every fabric. But I think it's listening and understanding where the need is or your niche market, right? And then kind of market it through that.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, very good advice. I love it. So let's talk about the future. How has your brand and your vision evolved over the years? I mean, from the beginning, when you first started to where you are now, how has your vision for the brand evolved?
Shannon
Well, like I said, it started just as kids because, you know what, 10 plus years ago it was very hard to find any pajamas that weren't chemically treated with fire retardants and Merino wool is naturally fire resistant. So the brand focused on kids and still does. But when I started making, first I made a long sleeve shirt for women.
And then it kind of just naturally just progressed into more of a women centered brand. And again, it's kind of like what people were wanting. You know, there's the basics for kids, but you can't really go too much more with the kids line. But for women, there's so many different products that you could make
And to be honest, it's more inspiring for me because then I, like kids, yes, of course it's important. They are important, but these I get to have like different styles and different fabrics. That's been exciting too. I've really, I've been more using different types of weaves. So like waffle and fleece and a thicker rib. That's really exciting. That really helped. Kind of like my inspiration for the brand.
Glynis Tao
Do you have any new product, collaborations, goals on horizon?
Shannon
Okay, yes, so I'm bringing out new products, not all the time, just the products that I feel are worthy of making and the need for them. I'm making some men's underwear, because our Merino underwear for women is one of our biggest selling products. And I have a little boy and he needs some wool underwear, so I'm making those. So kind of like making a bit more for men, not much. I really am more focused on women and a few items for men and obviously kids.
So we've saved over 15,000 pounds of our textile waste in production and last summer we shipped it on a train to North Carolina where they are recycling it. So our next big project is making products out of our recycled wool. So that is like, that's my excitement for the next probably year. So yeah, that's the, and the goal, the goal is just to keep doing what I'm doing and not focus on numbers per se, but just focus on my true self and what my values are for our brand.
Glynis Tao
That sounds amazing. So the scraps that got sent down to North Carolina, did you say, are actually going to be repurposed into something else like turned into another fiber that you're going to use?
Shannon
Yeah, so they are shredding it and they have already shredded it and now they are just testing what kind of thread or yarn that they can make it into. So they would have to add either virgin wool with it to make it stronger or not, or maybe cotton or something. And then we're going to see what we can make.
It's kind of a testing period, but yes, it's going to become wool again, not necessarily a fabric, like a knitted something or other, know, socks and hats and maybe a sweater and a blanket, but all from our recycled textile waste. I know, I know. So that's what I'm really looking forward to for sure.
Glynis Tao
Yeah, wow. So last question. So what advice would you give to other women or mompreneurs starting their own sustainable fashion brand or starting their own sustainable fashion brand?
Shannon
I would say go for it and don't be afraid of storytelling. Be transparent. Stay true to your values and what is important to your brand, whether it's design or the fabric. But if you're a true sustainable fashion brand, then you have to work hard and you have to earn that title.
You know? So, as long as you have a passion and you have a drive, then do it. It's hard, but you gotta do it. You gotta try.
Glynis Tao
Yes, you gotta try. Yeah, no, I mean, I really feel what you're saying. Just really, it truly comes from the heart. I can feel it.
Shannon
I think that if you're doing it just for the money, don't do it.
Glynis Tao
No, don't do it. It's not a business to get into to get rich fast.
Shannon
Exactly. It was you know, five years. It took us five years to even make any money. Right? Don't do it for money because it's likely it's not going to happen. But if you're doing it to make a change and to do it to do something better, then yes, of course, do it.
Glynis Tao
Where can people find you if they want to get in touch with you?
Shannon
I would say email or social media. I'm the one behind social media, so any messages go to me. My email address, shannon@simplymarino.com. Those are the two best ways to get a hold of me.
Glynis Tao
Thank you so much, Shannon, for sharing your journey, insights, and inspiration with us today.
Shannon
Thanks for having me. That was so fun.
Glynis Tao
That was great. If you're listening and want to experience the comfort of sustainable Merino wool for yourself, head to simplymerino.ca.
