Business Name and What It Does
Fashion. Bg Ltd. offers print-on-demand clothes and accessories with clients’ photos and drawings through the online shop dress-to-impress.com. The dresses are suitable for kids from 3 years old to women up to XL size.
Silvia Kabaivanova, founder of dress-to-impress.com
Beautiful scarves from chiffon are also offered in sizes 140 x 90 cm, suitable for the summer as pareos.
The products are printed with sublimation, which creates absolutely zero waste. There is no need for water in the dyeing process. Sublimation is used on polyester, which is recyclable.
“We care about our planet. We use sublimation to print on polyester to create our dresses and scarves. The heat transfer sublimation printing process is an eco-friendly and completely sustainable printing technique. It is simple and efficient in creating bright and colorful prints on fabric. It is a fantastic technique that’s used by top fashion designers all over the world.“, says the founder, Silvia Kabaivanova. “Dresses are printed after an order is made, so we are not wasting materials for production, that is not sold and our production is sustainable.”
She also says that the advantage of designing your dress, scarf, or phone case is many:
– to keep your memories on a piece of clothing or an accessory
– to create original presents for your friends and family
– to create matching designs with other products
– to possess unique products that no one else has
– to have fun
Personalization is a big trend that will become more and more popular. It is a great feeling to be unique and know that you are the product creator.
This is the first dress that Silvia created, inspired by the bag
To inspire people, the founder Silvia Kabaivanova creates a dress or scarf with a drawing or a photo for almost every foreign city she visits. She is not a professional painter; she just likes to draw and create. The dresses she makes are for herself and advertising purposes.
Her daughter also made drawings for several dresses. They traveled together to European cities and took photos in front of the sights they pictured – Casa Batllo in Barcelona, the Toy Museum in Munich, and Turin.
“When you plan to visit a country, you probably go to take a look at its landmarks in advance over the internet. You plan which of them to visit and what to do there. What if you are prepared and you visit the city in a dress, picturing a building or scenery from this city? If you like the idea, why not design and make a dress on your own? Take a look at the dresses I made before visiting Florence, Barcelona, Brussels, Munich, and Frankfurt am Main. And you should know that I am not a professional painter or an artist. So, you can do it too if you just like to draw and create. “
Founder’s/Owner’s Story and What Motivated Them to Start the Business
Silvia Kabaivanova is the founder and owner of www. fashion.bg – the Bulgarian fashion directory, founded in 2001. As a fashion media owner and journalist for so many years in the fashion business, she also wanted to create a product. She had good connections with sublimation printing companies and clothing manufacturers, so she offered print-on-demand clothes and accessories. All products are produced in Europe.
The products are sold through the online shop dress-to-impress.com, and recently the service has also been offered on Etsy, looking to sell to more people in the USA.
The shirt is created from a photo of the pattern of the bag
“I like to work on different projects, experiment, and learn. I am a very active person and I also have a lot of knowledge about the internet. 20 years ago, I started my own company and my initial business was web design and web development. At that time, I also created www. fashion.bg site about the Bulgarian fashion industry. We publish fashion news and trends, but we also sell women’s clothes, produced in Europe. We recently started selling them on eBay as well. For 3 years I am also a Chairman of the Bulgarian Fashion Association – a cluster organization, supporting Bulgarian fashion. Due to my work, I have the opportunity to travel a lot and almost every time I create a product to remind me about the place I have visited, this is my signature”, said Silvia.
A model poses with Silvia’s Barcelona dress and a matching phone case
“The products we offer are giving happiness to people, that’s what I like most. We have created dresses for kids with their drawings, we have produced dresses with photos of beautiful places that mean something to their owners. Recently, we created a scarf with the family coat of arms repeated on the fabric. Our clients are from the USA, Canada, UK, Australia, Bulgaria, and other countries all over the world.”
The Challenges the Business/Market is Facing
Nowadays, fashion faces a lot of challenges. Overproduction and fast fashion are big issues that we all need to fight. Consumers should understand that they must buy only sustainable fashion to reduce pollution and save our planet’s resources.
‘Buy less, choose well, make it last’, Vivienne Westwood said. It means you should choose only high-quality products that you will keep forever in your wardrobe. A good technique is to ask yourself before buying something, ‘Will I wear this item 30 times?’ Buy it only if the answer is yes.
There is a big competition among designers and brands. To be successful, a brand should find its niche. And, of course, to pay attention to sustainability, which is a must nowadays.
In the past, the process was design-produce-sell. In the future, brands will follow a different scheme – design-sell-produce. And the process has started with print-on-demand products, made-to-measure, and personalization clothing.
The Opportunities The Business/Market is Facing
Online sales are the best way to find new clients. I advise startup designers and brands to create their website and online shop and develop it daily with more content because it will become more valuable and successful with time. Many small brands prefer to rely on their Facebook page or to be listed only on other fashion platforms, but in this way, they are dependent on their conditions and are more limited to growth. Of course, social networks and marketplace platforms should be used as an additional way to achieve sales.
There are big opportunities for sales of print-on-demand products. You can create your brand easier with a small investment and grow when you start getting more orders.
Advice to Others About Busines
I have been working as a manager of my own company for about 21 years now, and I can say that when you are persistent, you can have a lot of success. A key factor for your success is information about the market and your knowledge about the business. You should read online magazines, attend workshops and seminars about the important topics in your business, talk to many people and participate in clusters and network organizations, and visit or exhibit at important trade fairs and exhibitions. Knowledge is power, and you shall improve your knowledge daily to stay on top of your competition.
And if you find your niche and be original and unique, that is the best you can do.
From my experience in digital marketing, I can give you some tips for the success of your online store:
- Choose a good domain name that includes the name of your brand. The domain name should not be long so that users can remember and type it easily.
- Add an XML sitemap to your site. It is a file that lists your website’s important pages so that Google can find and crawl them all.
- Create a profile in the Google Search console. You can follow your website performance by keywords and your position in Google search, monitor who links to your site, add your sitemap, and much more.
- Create engaging content. Add a blog to your website, where you can give your readers tips, information, and professional advice. It will make you look more reputable and drive traffic to your site from search engines. Adding valuable content can attract more visitors because people can share your blog articles on social networks.
- Make your site secure. You can achieve that by adding an SSL certificate so that your web address starts with HTTPS:// rather than HTTP:// Google gives a ranking boost to secure HTTPS/SSL sites.
- Generate powerful backlinks. You also need to create engaging content on your site, which I mentioned above. Even if it is only the content about your brand, there should be a reason why someone links to it.
- Optimize your site for mobile phones. You should ask your web designers if your site is not mobile yet.
- Use keywords in your titles and your content. Add enough texts, and try putting your most important keywords first. It is also valid for your blog posts.
Having your own business is amazing; it gives you the freedom to do what you like and has a new daily experience. That’s what I like most – that I am learning new things every day!
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