Selling and Marketing a Collection (Online)

Having the skills to sell and market your own fashion collection is highly important, especially due to the current changing nature of consumers and the way that buying habits have changed. It is also increasingly important for fashion designers to acknowledge that they need to have skills in spotting issues and considerations that should be taken into account when embarking on designing, producing and delivering or releasing a new fashion collection.

In order to survive and thrive within the fashion industry, designers and even fashion retailers need to keep abreast of current practices in their industry.

This short course is delivered entirely online and introduces key aspects of how to understand the way in which the fashion industry works and functions as a commercial environment. This course introduces you to some of the broad aspects of working through the processes of design, production and showing a collection. The skills acquired on this course could also be applied to a number of other fashion-related product areas.

With the fashion retail landscape changing rapidly and new generations of consumer emerging with heightened expectations of how products are communicated to them, the ways in which they will wish to shop in the future means that designers and retailers are faced with a situation that they cannot avoid; they have to understand how to market their products to their consumers better than ever before. Independent designers and online and in-store retailers regularly spend large sums of money on market research and intelligence to keep track of the shifts in expectation. This course will assist you with understanding how you might apply this type of thinking to your own products.

You will have the opportunity to work with an experienced tutor who will assist you with your understanding of the subject, facilitate and encourage discussion and provide feedback on your progress. You will have access to a range of online resources such as guest lectures, live critiques, podcasts, e-books, interviews and films created with industry professionals.

You will also be encouraged to attend relevant exhibitions, trade events and shows wherever possible.

Course materials will be available through the Solent Online Learning Portal| and you will work independently, at your own pace, on a series of exercises designed to encourage a self-reflective approach to your personal knowledge development. Group discussion and a sharing of knowledge, experience and ideas will be actively encouraged in order to create an online ‘community of learning’ within which you will develop a network of colleagues.

A final assessment will take place at the end of the twelve-week course, for which you will be required to submit electronically a final piece of work.

Where possible and appropriate you will be encouraged to relate this unit to your own working practice.

Course delivery

The course combines practical exercises with input from industry experts as well as current supporting theory. You will be encouraged to reflect on your progress while working through the course materials and exercises and developing your verbal and written communication skills.

Who is the course for?

• Independent designers and design-related staff
• Independent boutique owners and staff
• High street/head office designers and managers
• Those thinking of setting up a fashion business or label
• Those thinking of a future career in fashion
• Those wishing to refresh or enhance their existing professional skills and improve and update their CV
• Those interested in learning more about fashion design.

Key details

• Unit code: UPDU049P
• Duration: 12 weeks
• Online attendance: scheduled learning sessions.
• Expected total study time: 100 hours
• Location: online
• Credit: 10 credits at Level 4 (First year degree level).
• Certificate: 10 credits
• Fee: £350

Contact

For further enquires or to apply for a place on this course, please contact Lisa Mann.

Email: lisa.mann@solent.ac.uk|
Telephone: +44 (0)23 8031 9386