It’s a brand famed for its winged pink unicorn mascot, plush pink branding – and hiring a 23-year-old Love Island star as creative director.
As PrettyLittleThing’s co-founder Umar Kamani recently revealed he’s stepping down as CEO, the future’s still “bright” for the Boohoo-owned online fashion giant.
“There’s a lot of the team, including myself, that have been here for such a long time. We’ve worked with Umar, we all buy into his vision and we want to continue driving the success of the brand,” Nicki Capstick, marketing director at PrettyLittleThing, told Prolific North.
“It changes the day-to-day a little bit for us but we’re very passionate about achieving new things and breaking boundaries,” she said. “We are a brand that’s always pushing the dial on trying new brand opportunities and doing new things on social. With Umar not being here, it doesn’t mean that any of that stops. It was a bittersweet moment because it’s obviously very sad that he’s no longer here. It was his baby.”
It seems as though the Northern brand is just getting started, as plans now ramp up for US expansion with the opening of its first warehouse in August, based in Philadelphia.
“At the moment, if you’re a US customer and you buy a product from our site, it gets shipped from the UK. We pride ourselves on being fast, and shipping products from the UK to the US isn’t fast. This will really put us on the map in the US.”
Although PrettyLittleThing operates out of the UK, the US market is now “growing” amounting to around 20% of its sales.
“As it continues to grow, it will be our focus over the coming year,” she said. “It’s a huge, huge opportunity to hit a wider market than we have here in the UK. We have a really strong established brand in the UK, don’t get me wrong I still think we have more to do and more to achieve here, but the US is about the growth opportunity and we see that being big for us over the next few years.”
With 450 staff based at PrettyLittleThing’s Manchester headquarters, surrounded by pink walls adorned with neon signs and blossoms, it’s the heart of its marketing operations too.
Capstick leads an 80-strong marketing team, with 60 of those based in Manchester working across digital marketing, social channels, planning and campaigns. With further teams and offices spread across LA, Miami, Paris, Australia and London, PR staff are always “on the ground”, overseeing influencers, gifting and press appointments.
