So for the last 12 weeks some of you are probably wondering why we went MIA? After posting on our stories daily & uploading a few posts a week regularly.
Let me fill you in with whats been going on through that time....
Mankind Apparel is a single man operation. Running day to day production and admin is all done by one person. Although I get a lot of help from family, friends and other individuals that promote the brand, majority of the tasks are done by myself. So when times get busy producing physical products, the first thing to go to back of the priority chain is our social presence and our ability to create content.
In the time I was forced to step back from posting & creating I knew I had to have some kind of a presence on peoples timelines regardless of how long we were going to be absent for. The aim was to run double the amount of ads we usually do and up the marketing budget. Along with re-sharing any content we were tagged in. This kept us visible to around 25-30k people weekly across Instagram and Facebook. Definitely not ideal timing to vanish with just dropping our first overseas cut n sew collection.
Now I can’t figure out if what happened next happened by chance or strategic calculations. During those 2 months we recorded our 2 most profitable months to date. The thing that’s even more puzzling is majority of those sales came through the retail store and not the website. So were the ads the root cause of the increase in sales? I’d like to believe they somewhat played a part in converting all those customers.
So why were we absent in the first place?
In short my Partner and I unexpectedly bought a house we got offered in a private sale. Definitely wasn’t as simple as just signing on the dotted line and handing over our life savings that’s for sure. From the beginning we had many hurdles to jump over, one being that the property is a 1960s house and had been neglected for years. That meant that it gave me 8 weeks to completely renovate it and make it liveable for our family to move in.
Another obstacle to add to the mix was that my partner had just given birth to our then 5 week old son. Ahhh we seem to like to add fuel to fires around here.
So as you can see it didn’t leave much time, if any to be focused on Mankind. Luckily enough I do my best work under pressure and we came out on the other-side in a better place than when all the madness began.
The renovation a success.
Our new born - healthy and loved.
And last but not least my family housed and new HQ for the Mankind office secured. Maybe not the absence you expected, but a huge milestone for my family and the business.
I want to give a huge shoutout to everyone involved! From the people that helped keep the business flowing without fuss. To all my tradie mates that soaked up the extra work load I couldn’t handle with the renovations. Nothing goes unnoticed.
8 years ago my partner began her working career, I was unemployed with practically no money and about to restart my career in a different field of employment.
Today we have 2 kids and have just purchased our first property in Auckland.
I just want to say, regardless of what goes on in your life, keep chasing those dreams because literally anything is possible when you put your mind to it & show up everyday.
But for now the show must go on!