Photos: Alisa Connan/Bluebella
Bluebella has doubled its original target and raised over £1 million through crowdfunding to fund a major expansion in the US. The brand hit its £500,000 target nine days early on the equity crowdfunding site Crowdcube and an additional investment took the final total to £1,088,700. Chief executive Emily Bendell said: “We are thrilled to have doubled our target and the extra investment will allow us to push forward with exciting plans for the US and other foreign territories. There is huge opportunity in the States for British brands and the fantastic response to our crowdfunding shows that there is a real-optimism in the UK, too, as we move forward from Brexit.”
“Our hope is that a positive deal can be sorted with our European partners early in 2017 and we can press forward with exciting investment plans,” she adds. “After all the uncertainty of 2016, there is a lot of optimism that 2017 could be a good year for fashion and it is great to see investors reflecting that positivism by backing Bluebella.”
Bluebella, which signed Tigerlily Taylor as the face of the brand, is on track for sales to hit £1.7 million this year and £4.7 million next year, helped by the US expansion. The global lingerie market is forecast to grow by 17% per year to $40 billion in 2020.
