Today I went to meet the owner of 'The Sewing Lounge', the retailer that I am going to re-brand. It was a lovely little shop on one of the main roads that runs through Haydock, easy to reach from the centre.
It turns out that the shop is ran by two women, both sisters, who had been worked in the industry, in factories, before going onto different things. Then, about four years ago they opened up The Sewing Lounge. The shop is very busy, and as the owner said, she said that it is always busy, which actually, I was quite surprised about, seems as I thought that the demand for hand-made dresses was pretty low. The shop is small, but it seems the women's talents are in high demand.
After asking them a few questions it became clear that the business was not just headed in one direction, but very much they do a bit of everything. I asked if the women were busiest around the prom period, but they said they can't really say that because of the demand for them year round. They also make fancy dress outfits. I've decided, from the info I gathered today that because the women are pretty open to the direction and there is no specific "best-seller", I'm thinking about focusing on the "prom" side of things.
