Fashion brand Caramella has opened its first retail unit in Liverpool ONE.
The online women's wear giant has finally hit the city centre in what marks a first for the company. Although what we see today is a beautiful, premium collection stemming from a stylish modern company, Caramella's origins can be traced right back to a humble Instagram page.
Its owner and founder, Mollie-May Cartwright, from Wirral, worked in small independent businesses all of her life before diving into the industry herself. After seeing the buzz of what it's like to run your own company, she knew her path at university wasn't for her.
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She told the Echo: "I went to university to study psychology and I just didn't like my course. I always knew I wanted a business and it wasn't necessarily that I loved fashion, it was the business side of things that really appealed to me."
In 2017, the 25-year-old took the initiative to launch what would be the start of her fashion empire, humbly beginning with an Instagram account. She said: "I set up an account and a store selling clothes to friends.
"I was scrolling through Instagram looking for tops and clothes and suppliers and it just started to snowball from there really. When I say I winged it, I really winged it. You just take risks and that's what I've done from the get-go. I was still working as a waitress and I said to my mum 'I'm going to stop and do this full time' and she was determined for me to go to university and get a degree, but I said it was going to be okay."
Despite hesitation from her mum, Susan Byrne, Mollie went full steam ahead with her business dream which saw the family home taken over. She added: "I had targets every day to survive and we were doing it from my mum's house. She hated it. She'd say things like 'Mollie can you take everything off the kitchen table' because we'd just have boxes everywhere."
After Susan saw the success her daughter created for herself, she eventually got in on the Caramella action too. Mollie's mum left her job of 20 years to hop on as an extra pair of hands and continues to work as Caramella's HR manager.
In 2018, the brand name was so recognisable it was time to move out of mum's house and into a space of its own. Mollie found an office space in Wirral, which is still Caramella's headquarters to this day, and before long she was able to hire her first official external staff member, Erin.
In the space of a year, Caramella saw a 150% growth in revenue and with the pandemic restrictions in place not long afterwards, the rapidly growing online brand grew even more. Before long, Mollie had a full team of 12 staff working alongside her in the Wirral space to try and keep on top of the constant turnaround of packages, orders and deliveries - even her nan who continues to work in the warehouse as a cleaner.
Caramella went on tour with several pop-up stores around the North West, but it's taken up residency right in Liverpool's city centre to offer everyone a chance to shop in person. From today until August 27, Caramella can be found in Liverpool ONE's Peter's Lane in a unit of its own.
Mollie said: "It's so exciting as we've never really had a retail unit to ourselves. I just called Liverpool ONE and asked if they had anything coming up and they had a gap so I said I'd be there!
"It's been hard over the years as we continue to grow. I work seven days a week and it can be hard for people to understand that, but I wouldn't change it for the world. Everyone's always been so supportive and yeah, I love it. Come see us!"
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