By Izzie James.
I sat down with Ailis Osobase and Clara Smith to discuss their small business ‘Bottoms Up The Brand’. Walking around Durham, you’re likely to see people sporting their trackies, from the DUCFS exec team to the Durham University Hockey Club. In our interview, Ailis and Clara discuss the difficulties and rewards of owning a small business whilst studying at university.
IZZIE: To start things off, explain to me how you came up with ‘Bottoms Up The Brand’?
CLARA: We started Bottoms Up as part of our school enterprise challenge. We were given £100 to start any business we wanted and we knew that to stand out amongst other brands we needed to have a unique product and it needed to be perfect for our target audience – girls aged 11-18. We wanted to create a product that was comfortable, while still being flattering, and with an aspect of personalisation to ensure that we had a product for everyone. We settled on our straight leg trackies (which still to this day is our USP) with personalisation across the seat. These sold like wildfire around school and by the end of the 3 months challenge we had sold over 500 pairs. While most teams shut down their businesses, we were keen to keep up the momentum, and now we’ve sold over 5000 pairs and continue to sell to schools and universities all over the country.
IZZIE: Clara, as Financial and Logistics Manager, what have you learnt through your time at Bottoms Up?
CLARA: I have learnt a lot from this business as I’ve worked many roles throughout our time. So my main role at the moment is communicating with our local suppliers and managing our orders and financials, but from the beginning of the business my main role has been tracking our stock and working the more financial side of Bottoms Up. I’ve had to teach myself a lot about Excel and now I would say I’m mildly obsessed with spreadsheets. I’ve also had to learn a lot about data analytics and stock prediction. As our stock comes from abroad our orders have to be put in months in advance and so I use analysis to predict what kind of sizes we’ll need, which has been really tough but incredibly rewarding.
IZZIE: Ailis, as Marketing Manager, what techniques have you used to promote your brand?
AILIS: In the launch of Bottoms Up, I very much focused on the visual elements first, so the designing of our logo and smaller details such as a colour scheme for us to stick to. The main aspect of our brand that I emphasised was our ability to personalise each order, as I saw this as essentially our USP. I’ve since learned the value of brand partnerships too, both with other companies as well as “influencers” who I feel could be a good match for us. I must say, some of our recent collaborations in Durham like DUCFS and charity ‘Let’s Get Our Knickers in a Twist’, have been real highlights for me. I’m lucky, too, in that a lot of our consumer traction has been simply through word-of-mouth. Building on this buzz through social media is my usual port of call. I’ve loved sharing photos on Instagram of our customers over the years, and still find it extremely cool that people have been able to spot themselves or their friends on our page.
IZZIE: How did the COVID-19 pandemic affect your business?
CLARA: As for most small businesses, COVID was a bit of a nightmare. Ours started with the trade route from Italy (where our suppliers are based) to the UK being closed and so our tracksuits were held up for months in customs. This was crazy for us. We are all self-taught and none of us had the knowledge on where to go from here. After months of angry emails and refunds we were lucky enough to get our tracksuits and resume production! It was a crazy time for all of us, especially as we were operating via zoom the entire time as opposed to being sat in our school dining room! But for us the pandemic and following lockdowns had a few positives – we were lucky the comfy loungewear was in extremely high demand and so our sales on singular pairs increased massively, which was very new for us as we were so used to catering to schools and societies! It was definitely a hard time for us as a small biz but we came out of the other side better for it.
IZZIE: How does ‘Bottoms Up’ promote size inclusivity?
AILIS: Size inclusivity is something we have really valued from the start. I remember our first tag line launched on Valentine’s Day being to “love your bottom”. Although definitely one of my cheesier first attempts at marketing, it really was what we wanted people to get out of buying from us. With the recent growth of our business and the better functioning supplier network we’ve created, I’m happy to say that we are now a truly size inclusive brand. With both our hoodies and tracksuit bottoms ranging from UK sizes 6-16, we feel proud to be able to cater to a range of sizes and body types. In doing so, hopefully everyone can purchase from us and feel confident in our product.
IZZIE: How have you navigated managing a small business whilst being at University, as well as being in different locations from the other creators?
CLARA: We definitely learnt a lot from operating during COVID, as this gave us the time to learn how to work efficiently on zoom and we actually haven’t had an in person meeting since before the pandemic! Working with a team definitely makes it easier to balance uni work and life with running a business but it is by no means an easy task. Going into university we had to be really decisive with everyone’s roles to ensure we could each do our work separately, however being able to sort that early on really helped. We are also lucky to be surrounded by an incredibly supportive and hard-working team, we’re all so passionate about this business and I think that’s the most important thing.
IZZIE: What advice would you give to other small business owners who are studying at University?
AILIS: Firstly, not to underestimate the workload. Even if your business is still relatively small, it’s an inevitable commitment as you’ll want to avoid letting customers down or falling through on promises made. However, if you are passionate about what you’re selling and have that initial love of your business idea, putting in the work will become enjoyable rather than a chore. To make the whole process more manageable, you’ll need a collaborative team with varying strengths, and a supplier you can count on to deliver or otherwise communicate with you effectively. From there, it’s just a little faith and patience that keeps the whole thing moving!
IZZIE: And finally, what are your future plans for ‘Bottoms Up’?
AILIS: Next year, the majority of our team will have graduated from university, and we plan to really capitalise on this. Our more short-term plans include the launch of our website which we expect to have up and running in the coming weeks. I’ve loved partaking in the whole design process of this, and it’s particularly exciting since we’ve solely taken orders via email and Instagram DM for some time now. However, we felt this perhaps wasn’t a sustainable option for much longer if any of us hoped to have a life outside of Bottoms Up! Down the line, we are also keen to expand our collection of loungewear. You’ll have to wait and see, but I can say that I’m really looking forward to these next steps- we’re starting to feel less like small fish in a big pond, and it’s exciting to think where that might take us.
For more BottomsUp content, follow them on social media: @BottomsUpTheBrand on all platforms
Also keep an eye out for their website, going live on the 15th of May! https://bottomsupthebrand.com/password