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Posted: Fri 25th Jan 2019
Industrial Jewellery is a modern jewellery brand created by designer and Enterprise Nation member Hila Karni.
Inspired by industrial materials, the handmade collection features intriguing pieces of sophisticated jewellery. Here, Hila lays out the story of how she set up her jewellery business.
The business was originally my final project in design school many lifetimes ago. I started presenting it in trade shows in the 'talent' section and gradually gained stockists and experience, making the collection bigger.
This year we're celebrating 10 years in business and have moved to make not only jewellery but a large variety of accessories, including our new range of leather goods.
It's always a challenge deciding where to invest and what the best growth path is for us while maintaining our identity and unique advantages.
One of our biggest challenges was deciding how to grow in terms of our product range, landing us with small leather goods and putting us through a learning path with hand-made leather goods and the challenge of how to best translate our design aesthetics into a new product.
We've had some amazing stockists join us in the last couple of years from our 'dream list', such as Galeries Lafayette, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Victoria and Albert Museum in London and many more.
On a personal note, growing a business with a team of creative women beside me while raising two kids and loving what I do daily has to be the biggest achievement.
The next big goal is to expand our product range. Now that the first designs in our leather goods collection have received such amazing responses from clients with several pieces selling out in the first month, we know the way forward is expanding with more styles and sizes for bags, as well as small leather accessories.
We're also set to increase our B2C operations this year with a better online presence and hopefully our first store by 2020.
Funding is always our biggest challenge. In the past, we grew organically using our revenues for investing in growth, however the bigger our goals become, the harder it gets to self-fund.
I find Maria Allen very inspiring. She has grown her business tremendously in the last few years and has done so with a great attention to details and keeping her brand fresh and relevant.
Donna Wilson is also someone in my field I really admire. Although her designs are very unique, she's found her way into mainstream with some impressive collaborations with John Lewis and SCP. She also prides herself on a lot of local manufacturing and keeps very true to herself and her brand identity.
Make sure you surround your with positive people you can trust to help you through the rough patches and tell you the truth even when it's hard to hear.
Make sure you do the things you're excellent at and find great people to do the things you're anything less than excellent at.
Enjoy every accomplishment, big or small, as this will help push through the low times and keep you up when things seem to be heading down the wrong path.
We're proud to have entrepreneurs like these as members in our amazing community of small business owners. Join today for the full range of member benefits!
