Entrepreneurial success in the traditional startup playbook — be it for beauty, consumer goods or tech — usually looks like scaling a business, gaining external investment and eventually exiting after it’s acquired. This pathway is less common (and harder) in creative industries. But experts and investors agree that small to medium-sized fashion brands have a thing or two to learn from the startup world.
The typical pathway for a designer starting a brand includes graduating from fashion school, doing an internship or two, launching a label, and scaling it through a combination of wholesale, fashion show press, and mentorship via talent incubators. But the struggles of independent fashion brands are by now well documented. In January, beloved avant-garde label Y/Project closed after struggling to find a buyer without designer Glenn Martens at the helm. In 2024, there were a series of closures across independent brands including Dion Lee, The Vampire’s Wife and Calvin Luo.
