From local markets to global retail: Behind the ‘organic’ growth of Never Fully Dressed

Never Fully Dressed (NFD) reflects somewhat of a success story for the UK’s fashion industry. What started out as a market stall on London’s Portobello Road has now become a global player, having just opened its second store in the US, the first on the country’s West coast. Yet, despite the company’s evident growth, founder Lucy Aylen has remained steadfast in her mission to retain an approachable, community-led essence for the brand.

“Starting at a market is where that sense of community began, whether that was conscious or not,” Aylen elaborated in an interview with FashionUnited. “As an entrepreneur - although I’ve only started identifying myself as that in recent years - it can be quite lonely when you start out and have no colleagues. So that community was built at the market, surrounded by other traders and a growing customer base, many of whom still shop with us today and have been on the same journey with us.”

US store openings highlight the changing landscape of retail

While NFD’s presence is one intentionally rooted to its origins as a small business, its growth is something that cannot be denied. For e-commerce, for example, the company’s platform has seen a year-on-year increase of 47 percent. Its geographical reach also extends beyond its home turf of the UK, having further secured a presence in core markets such as Ireland, the Middle East and the Netherlands. It is the US, however, where Aylen’s attention currently lies.

Following a series of pop-up stores in New York and Los Angeles designed to test the playing field in the country, the brand pursued both cities as locations for permanent locations. While New York received a flagship last year, NFD opened its first LA store just last month, permanently bringing its Mediterranean-inspired charm to the West coast. Stepping foot in the City of Angels was a natural progression for the brand, and for Aylen, who had lived there shortly during her teenage years.

“We’ve grown so organically in the US,” Aylen said, describing the two stores on each coast as a “hug” for the country, as well as a “strategic” decision. Having previously struck up wholesale partnerships with Revolve and Anthropologie in the region, NFD already had a good idea of what US consumers were looking for and set about removing prospective challenges that could get in the way of its future plans – whether that be in marketing or a reliance on certain products.

As such, the US now accounts for 20 percent of NFD’s overall business, a figure that not only considers takings within its stores but also from the brand’s now expansive community spanning coast-to-coast. “The stores really enabled us to maintain that community focus and feel grounded in the States so that it became a new little home,” Aylen added.

Rental becomes the next venture

Naturally, as time has progressed alongside NFD’s lifespan, the brand and Aylen have continued to adapt to the requirements of the rapidly changing industry. Moving on from street markets, e-commerce was unsurprisingly a core addition to the brand’s ecosystem, only then to be topped by the first local UK store, which had - at the time - contributed 80 percent to the turnover. The pandemic once again reversed this trend, moving everything online again.

This, however, opened up new avenues of exploration for brands and NFD itself, which last week took its first steps into the increasingly popular rental market. Through a newly launched partnership, NFD products will now be available to rent via Urban Outfitters-owned Nuuly, with seven garments making up the initial launch in the US. “We’ve never done rental before, whereas pre-loved is already a big programme for us, but it’s been a part of conversations for years,” Aylen said. “It’s exciting for us to just see how that market works for the brand and it will grow from here.”

The launch only further emphasises Aylen’s insistence on organically adapting and listening to the market, which has been turbulent in recent years due to pandemic-induced issues and the resulting cost-of-living crisis in the UK and beyond. In order to react, NFD does not entirely rely on specific trends, instead placing importance on an overarching five-year plan to deduce what to work towards.

“We’re very agile as a business, but we still know our customer, so we do buy to that,” Aylen elaborated. “We don’t work too far in advance. We are currently working on spring/summer 2025, which is the furthest ahead that we have ever worked. We work on all time frames at all times, so both long-lead times and reactions to a gap or incoming trend. We’re not too trendy but if there’s something we want to develop or trade into because it has had a good reaction, we’ve still got factories that we can do last minute trades with. Leather has a longer development time, for example, but wovens can be turned around much quicker and we’ve got a great factory in the UK for them.”

There is also not one particular demographic that NFD zones in on, preferring to remain inclusive towards its broad audience of women in their 20s to 70s. While this may present some challenges in the way of marketing or fit, the brand prides itself on its range of adaptable, multiwear products, some complete with clasps or removable elements allowing for customisation in styling. One trend that Aylen has perceived across the brand’s consumer group, however, is a sense of renewed maturity within fashion that has ultimately fed into the longevity of clothing, backing Aylen and NFD’s more seasonless, less trend-led approach to design.

“I think all consumer behaviour has changed in the sense that people are much more conscious in how they shop, and not necessarily from a sustainability point of view, but even economically,” she added. “People are being more mindful about everything, from planet to pocket. You have the actual value of a product and the perceived value of a product, which has to be high. It just makes us work harder at a product-level compared to where we were four years ago. It’s a different ball game and that comes from, among other things, the education of the designers we work with.”

Miami store and London Fashion Week participation on the horizon

This renewed focus on product has reflected well on the company’s financials, Aylen said, with slight price increases not seeing much consumer resistance. “That’s been an encouraging thing,” she added. “I think our price architecture is broadened because we don’t want to alienate the consumer that might have been with us on that journey at an earlier stage when a dress was 79 pounds, whereas now we’ve made it sustainable with better internal procedures, so now it's 120 pounds. As long as you keep that open communication and you’re honest about your pricing, you will continue to attract the right customer.”

Awareness of the consumer feeds directly into the choices Aylen makes for NFD’s next steps. For example, while New York and LA will serve as the main city hubs, a store in Miami is next on the list, with the city mirroring the brand’s penchant for colour while remaining in close proximity to South America, a growing market for NFD. This process in the US as a whole is still a learning experience for the brand, however, as consumer demands and state-by-state legalities currently define movement in the region.

In spite of this, such growth comes on the back of strong financial performance for the brand overall, with trading up 30 percent on the year prior in the current period. Ireland, Germany and Australia were highlighted by Aylen as increasingly strong performers, yet the US remains at the centre of current efforts. There are also plans to continue broadening NFD’s offering via new product categories such as the recently launched swimwear range; nightwear, for which sales have already been strong; and gym apparel, each of which will be carried through in varying drops throughout the coming year.

2024 will also mark NFD’s first entry into the fashion week sector, with plans to bring the brand to London Fashion Week’s September edition through what Aylen discreetly described as a “fun activity”. “It will be more of a community-focus rather than driving sales and product,” she noted. “It will really just be about female empowerment.”