Hello steemian, hope you are all having nice times. It is indeed another great privilege to be able to make this post.
My target with this post is to share my experience on how I started, the different challenges that could be faced in the industry and how to definitely overcome them.
I was born into fashion, my mon is a designer (unisex designer) she told me that when I was little I use to crawl around the wheel of the machine just to shift her focus to carry me(ignorant me then) I didn’t know that time was money.
Gradually has I was growing then she would give cloth to me to help her loss where necessary and I was also making dress for my dolls using needle using and thread she wouldn’t let me temper with her machine.
My love and interest for it grew daily as I was growing. Then after she is done cutting she would tell me the part to join together and where not to join. I started making dresses for myself I was doing all of this for the love I have for it. Over time with practice, hard work and correction I became who I am today.
As creative and innovative as it is there are still so many challenges one will encounter both during training and during practice.
Let’s start with the training stage, especially in this part of the world people find it really hard to go for training because of the ill manner of treatment that comes from the boss instead of letting them focus on what they are actually there for they turn them into slaves for themselves, there kids, even their family.
Another big issue is the so called senior they believe that once they start training before someone the person must fellow their orders to the last letter which is really discouraging to those who are actually willing to learn and most of the boss will see today actually learnt the hard way and some couldn’t scale through.
There is another issue of lack of finance which aids learning. Some don’t have the fund it takes to aid the learning process although even when the money for the main training is available but what of the equipment needed which will make learning easy and faster. This is another challenge facing our industry.
Also there are no adequate and enough fashion school that these skills can be improved upon. There are fewer universities/colleges that offer fashion programs. They don’t see the need for it. However, if you know how to design but do not have business skills it becomes difficult to thrive in the fashion industry. If we take note those who have formal training are usually better than those who doesn’t. I will advice everyone and everybody whatsoever skill we acquire or will want to achieve let’s add a bit of education to it. Without this it becomes very difficult to compete in the international market.
A suppose fashion shop
There are so many talented up-and-coming fashion designers with great ideas, however there are challenges that hinder their success.
Challenges facing Practitioners
• Lack of innovation:
Fashion designers are suppose to come up with new and trending styles which becomes trendy but when a suppose designer is static and only follows what others have done then it becomes a big issue to further in the field.
Also lack of skill to turn a small scale industry into a large one that will be sustainable for a long time. Sills such as financial knowledge, pricing models, marketing strategies, customers satisfaction all these are necessary to turn them to a successful enterprise.
• Marketing challenges:
Designing of your work is totally up to you but you cannot cover how far your work can go. So therefore designers needs to work hard to get a brand for their work which will enable their work to go into different stores for more sales and profitability.
• Event for showcase:
It is hard for up-and-coming designers to find a adequate platform to showcase their work. Mostly it is all about being well connected to the right people before you can get noticed or to get your brand known. Getting your work showcase to the world may be difficult without the right connections. Practitioners are really struggling to find a sustainable market for it their work.
• Lack of fund:
Countless of people with great and incredible ideas are not able to access necessary funds to enter the market place. fashion designing is a type of business in which you need adequate fund to finance in order to get the right quality.
• Availability of quality fabric:
For a fashion designer to remain in business for a long and sustainable period of time he must make use of high quality and unique fabric. The fabric itself is a main catalyse in fashion designing some people do patronize a designer because of the quality of there textile.
Solutions to these challenges
• Fashion houses should be conducive to the workers and trainees physically, mentally and psychologically and also all form of slavery and exploitation in the name of training should be stopped to enable trainees concentrate and also learn efficiently. Training should be the major in fashion houses.
• A fashion designer needs to associate with liked minded people who they are in the same field. Ask questions and surround yourself with people who are better than you and can also improve you, as you learn your standard will be raise. Fashion is a highly competitive industry so you need to dedicate reasonable and sufficient amount of time to learn new things.
• Fashion designers should get themselves more familiar with the new revolution of technology. Almost all industry if not all and works of life operate their business through the internet. Fashion designers should learn if they don’t know how to market their product through the internet this will bring growth to the business and the industry at large. The growth of online sales has decreased the traditional retail store revenues. Technology has enable changes in means of shopping behavior and provided a lot of tangible and intangible benefit.
• Fashion industry should have an organization that will give loan to their members to help them grow and also be able to compete on a large scale. There are so many up-and-coming incredible designers that all they need is finance and support to come into the limelight.
Just like any other industry, fashion industry can also be challenging but with adequate measures it can be curtailed.
Thanks for reading .