RetailBX.sg - Sharing of Article - From Sewing Buttons to Owning 16 Shops

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Buy Malaysian Campaign: From sewing buttons to owning 16 shops
The New Straits Times Online 2009/02/19

KUALA LUMPUR: Thirty years ago, a friend who ventured into the clothes-making business taught Helen Read to sew buttons.

Today, 55-year-old Read is the owner of one of the country's most famous plus size clothing lines, Ms Read, with a yearly business turnover of RM15 million.

Then, mother of a young son, Read would spend a few hours in the afternoon sewing buttons, having given that friend a small loan to support her business.

In 1982, when her friend had to move to Ipoh and was looking for someone to buy over her business, Read offered to take it. She went on to supply to retail chains such as Kimisawa and Mun Loong.

Read, who was always gunning for a challenge, ventured into making something more difficult, and chose to specialise in jackets.

And when everyone else was buying a new car, Read bought a RM100,000 pocket-welting machine which cut down the time needed to sew each jacket pocket.

In the late 1980s, the recession hit and Read almost lost everything, because the retailers she was supplying ran into problems.

"The banks wanted to foreclose on me. I summed up my courage to meet them and explain my business plan and they agreed to give me another year."

After that, having learnt that collecting payments was as important as sales, Read stuck to a few established retailers, including Isetan.

In the mid 1990s, Read took up the offer by Jaya Jusco to make plus size clothes.

When they asked her to make jackets, she suggested that they give her retail space for her own label.

"Surprisingly, they agreed. So, I stood outside the store for two weeks before Christmas at different times and tried to gauge their market.

"I realised that most customers were size 12 and above, so I insisted I wanted to make plus size clothes, although they wanted me to cater to the sizes 8 to 12 market."

When Read wanted to market her own clothing line, she faced challenges because she was an "unknown" brand.

"Shopping centre operators were hesitant to give us ground floor space. But all that changed when the 1997 economic crisis hit and mall operators did not have enough popular retailers willing to take up ground floor space."

She learnt a lot from the trying times.

Since three years ago, Read has only been producing for her own label, making up to 12,000 pieces a month for her 16 outlets, one of which is in Singapore.

Read has also resisted moving operations to China because she does not want to let go of her 150-strong workforce, who, she said, had families to feed.

She operates her manufacturing plant just off Jalan Chan Sow Lin here.

And she is clearly proud of her local graduate designers.

"My designers are from colleges like Mara, and they are really good. The only challenge now is to find skilled sewers."

Read has plans to take her business to new heights. She is working on getting a licence as a franchiser. She is closing in on her aim, as the first two franchise shops could be operational by the end of the year.

"I want to franchise Ms Read in Indonesia, India and Australia. I am also working on a winter collection," she said, adding that Ms Read was essentially about lovely wearable clothes.