On Monday I had the chance to interview Beatriz Orozco. She has a lot of experience in Fashion Business, Trends and Retail.
Beatriz where are originally from?
I was born and raised in Mexico (Guanajuato)
What was your major in?
Product/Fashion design
When did your passion for fashion began?
Since I was a kid, I dreamed about working in fashion, I used to collect fashion books and magazines, I remember having my room walls covered by collages, moodboards and watching runway shows on tv and online all the time.
Why did you move to France?
I wanted to live in a fashion capital to go fully into the industry, I chose Paris for being the place where historical fashion events took place.
I wanted to grow professionally and personally, I arrived in Paris as a student and worked my way up.
What are the challenges you had to face while being abroad?
You run into difficulties you would not have in your country, such as different work culture, language, discrimination, you have to learn how to deal with rejection, stay strong and be confident when times get rough, you need to be 100% committed with your goals and not let yourself get distracted.
When you arrive in a new country even though you already have professional experience you need to start over, get relevant experience and build a new network, and sometimes this can make you feel you are behind where you want to be. You must learn to keep yourself motivated, be ready when an opportunity knocks on your door and make the most of it.
In your experience, what does a luxury brand needs in order to stay on
the top of mind of the consumers?
Luxury brands need to show transparency to their consumers, it is not enough to sell a beautiful, luxury product, consumers nowadays are more aware of a company’s practices and take them into account when they purchase, speaking about the company culture, sourcing, production practices, social responsibility, sustainable practices, they must communicate, how as brand they are contributing to their society, show why they are different from other brands.
What was your experience with ELLEME like?
I was working for Elleme as a product developer, I was involved in every stage of the collection, from the inspiration to the production, participating also in other areas like design and photoshoots.
Working for Elleme was very challenging and exciting, being part of a fast growing brand is great because you grow and learn with them simultaneously, letting you grow not only on your domain but from the rest of the team. Elleme is a brand that is disrupting the industry and I am happy was able to participate in the development of their firs RTW collection, definitely we will be hearing more from them! It opened the door for me to work together with other brands.
What advice will you give designers and Fashion Brands during the
pandemic? Be resilient and pay attention to what is happening in the world, be relevant. Create a community and showyour brand personality, show that you have empathy, connect with people, you need to create an emotional link with your audience and once you have this be coherent with your product offering.