Honest Pricing - How Our Pricing is Changing in 2020 at Rose's Wardrobe

Our pricing structure is changing. As part of our mission to be transparent with all our customers, we want to let you know exactly what’s changing, when it’s changing, and why it’s changing. 

PURPOSE OVER PROFIT

Rose’s Wardrobe loves vintage fashion, but wants to ensure it’s sustainable. As a result of this, sustainability is a key point about our clothing - we want to make and sell things that last, don’t damage the planet in the process, and can be loved for many years. 

Since starting, Rose’s Wardrobe has been taking one step at a time in it’s sustainability journey. All our packaging is either reusable or recyclable, our swing tickets, thank you cards, and notebooks are all made from recycled paper and card. Our fabrics are sustainable because we use organic, natural, and responsibly sourced fabrics - many from the ex textile mills in Langholm. The fabric scraps that remain are then either sent to craft groups or we think of new ways to use them in the range. We welcome ideas and ways we could be more sustainable from our customers. 

If we could continue our mission of sustainability at our current expenses, we would. However, as Rose’s Wardrobe is a business, we do need to make just enough profit to allow ourselves to continue our vintage sustainable mission. Rather than up our prices without telling anyone, we wanted to write an honest blog post about why our costs need to increase this year to keep us going. 

OUR CURRENT COSTS

Utilising responsible fabrics is hugely important to our sustainable mission. We often opt for 100% Wool fabrics for their sustainability, durability, and quality factors. The benefits of using natural fabrics include not being derived from oil, using less energy and having a smaller carbon footprint to produce, and, if it does end up in landfill, it will take 5 years to biodegrade as opposed to a synthetic polyester’s 200 years that also gives off harmful greenhouse gases while doing so. 

Unfortunately, the reason why so many fashion brands use synthetic fabric is because it keeps costs down. To give an idea, a mock wool polyester fabric costs around £7.99 vs. 100% wool fabrics £30 - £40. A huge difference, but one that, we feel, is well worth it! 

Fabric sourcing isn’t our only cost. As a new business, we are constantly learning. When we started Rose’s Wardrobe, we calculated the costs of our garment based on the time it took us to make them. Even though we estimated the time it would take us, as so often is the case, garments often took us longer. For example, the ruffle on the Edna blouse takes a lot longer than originally thought! Rather than compromise on the quality, and the special handmade factor that distinguishes Rose’s Wardrobe from other brands, we needed to re-evaluate our time and integrate it into our future costings.

All the other business development for Rose’s Wardrobe - marketing, web updates, customer service - is out of our passion and commitment to growing the brand. Our future pricing will ensure that we not only pay ourselves for the time it takes to produce one of our garments from start to finish - as everyone should be entitled to - but also ensure the commitment to sustainability is sustainable over time. 

OUR FUTURE PRICING

Our future pricing will come into effect by the 1st Feb. To demonstrate how we’ve calculated our new costs, we’ve included an example of our Rosie Skirt breakdown here: 

Costing example (all in GBP)

Fabric 100% wool woven in Scotland £30 per metre - 1.4metres needed = £42

Cotton Lining £6.99 per metre - 1 metre needed

Components (ie zip, cotton interlining, threads & branding etc) = £2.12

Labour £8.21 (minimum wage) x 6hours from adjusting patterns to customers requirements, cutting, sewing and hand finishing = £49.26

The total cost is £100.37, so in order to sustain the business and cover other costs for example website, photoshoots etc we would sell this ‘example Rosie skirt’ for £120 (not what the price is going up to this is just an example). Not all the fabrics we use are priced at £30 so going forward we’ll will need to look at each fabric and piece individually and price accordingly.

We understand it will potentially be quite a big price increase (depending on fabric and style) but we are confident of the quality of our garments so much so that that along with the price increase we will also be offering a guarantee to customers - more details to follow soon!

Thank you for taking the time to read this (rather lengthy!) blog post and hope it gives you some insight into our brand and brand values.

THE TEAM

Rose’s Wardrobe was founded by Emma and Leanne after both having over 12 years of experience between them working in high street, vintage inspired, and fashion supplier backgrounds. The inspiration from Rose’s Wardrobe derived from Emma and Leanne’s muses - their grandmas and great grandma - Patricia, Edna, and Rose. The aim is to produce replicas of the beautiful clothes their grandmas wore, using colours, styles and prints from the 1940’s through to the 1960’s. You can connect with Rose’s Wardrobe on Facebook, Instagram and Pinterest. Have a look at where Rose’s Wardrobe will be here. Read our sustainability statement. Or, shop the collection.