Interview with Beatrice Bayliss Founder Emily
We had the chance to interview with Beatrice Bayliss Founder Emily, serious about sustainability. We love her clothes not only because of their quality, craftsmanship and aesthetics but also because of her focus on ethical and sustainable practices. Check it out.
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Could you tell us about yourself and your journey into fashion?
I have loved fashion from a young age, when I was studying fashion at both school and London College of Fashion I learnt more and more about what was truly happening behind the shiny facade of the industry and wanted to try and make a difference to this damaging industry. So after finishing university I decided to launch Beatrice Bayliss, a sustainable, ethical and female-led clothing brand.
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A lot of brands are focused on ethical and sustainable fashion practices which is great news for all of us. Why do you think it’s so important for us to buy sustainable and ethical clothes?
The fashion industry is now ranked the 2nd most polluting industry worldwide, leading to enormous amounts of water consumption, contaminated water supplies, unfair working conditions and poor animal welfare, just to name a few, so trying to make changes where we can is crucial to our future. A lot of garments are made from oil so will take at least 200 years to decompose, so this problem isn’t going away, it is only going to get worse. If you can buy sustainably you should really try to opt for that more environmentally friendly alternative.
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How do you ensure that your products are as sustainable as possible?
We believe that sustainable clothing should be accessible to everyone, without sacrificing style or quality. Our price point means that sustainable fashion is within reach for everyone, and our commitment to quality ensures that our clothing lasts a lifetime and never goes out of style.
We work directly with our fabric suppliers to ensure transparency and sustainability in the supply chain.
We have partnered with Topl, who track the supply chain of each product and showcase this to our customers both via QR codes on our swing tags and on our website.
We use a combination of sustainable and organic fabrics (tencel, cupro, recycled plastic).
We produce our clothing in small batches in the UK, to ensure minimal dead stock.
We adhere to a zero-waste policy; all fabric offcuts are repurposed into accessories.
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You are a young fashion brand. How have you managed to make a place for yourself in this hyper competitive field?
By creating a community within our customer base and providing customers with the education they need to make an informed decision about our clothes and ethics as a business. Our new supply chain transparency with our partner Topl has also help with building trust regarding our sustainability claims.
- What have been the biggest issues you faced while running a young brand and how are you coping with them?
Getting customers to change their mind about buying into fast fashion and buying into a new brand which they haven’t heard before, some customers love buying from new independent designers and brands and others prefer to buy from an established brand which they know and trust. So building that trust and getting our name out in front of people is the biggest challenge we face.
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What was the biggest advice you got?
The best piece of advice I received is just keep going. In business sometimes you have really heard days, weeks even months but just keep going because it will get better, building that perseverance to weather the storm and keep going, you’re building something and it will get better during those periods.
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You have got some vegan leather products in your line too. We often hear from brands who still use leather that they can’t find an appropriate alternative. Do you disagree with it? What sort of vegan leather do you use and where do you source it from?
Yes a lot of vegan leather has plastic and therefore oil origin, but ours on the other hand has an organic cotton base and is then coat is a water based sustainable coating, giving the fabric this leather effect.
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You have got a lot of stockists in the UK and you also got an Etsy store. Did you start your journey with Etsy? Was it difficult to convince the stockists to showcase your clothes?
No we launched our website first and only use our Etsy store during peak for more gifting items. As we find this works better for us as a business. Have a couple of stockists in the UK and then the US. A lot of our stockists actually reached out to us as they only stock sustainable brands.
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What are you looking forward to achieving by the end of this year?
We will be joining several other sustainable brands at the Sustainable Discovery popup at Chelsea Town Hall from the 29th June to the 1st July. Which is very exciting, head over to our instagram, @beatricebayliss, to enter the giveaway for free tickets. We are also hoping to do a popup in the US.
