FAQ

How long is a typical engagement with F2F?

We tell everyone who comes through our door that building a line is like being pregnant and giving birth to a baby (see blog)! There is a gestation period whereby the process and the product must become intertwined and it takes time, patience and understanding since most of the process can turn out to be quite unpredictable (not to mention occasional nausea and morning sickness)! In each “trimester,” there are milestones that we must hit before anything can go to market or to the retail public. Launching a new line in under a year is not something that we have found to be a model for success, and anyone joining our team needs to come in understanding that rushing the clock is a potential recipe for disaster. We know what it takes to get something off the ground, and one year is the benchmark.

What can I expect from F2F after we engage with each other? How does it work?

Typically, we commence with a “jump off” meeting which becomes the springboard for sitting together as a team to lay out sketches, fabrics, colors, line plans, and ideas, and consists of general discussions about building the time and action (t&a) calendar and next steps in the process. Our t&a calendar is something that we all feed off of as a guideline for how the season should start and finish. However, we also know that general time and action calendars fall off course due to unforeseen circumstances and are always evolving and changing to accommodate the real time flow. In the near future, we will be posting on our blog an example of a real t&a calendar so that you can see clearly from start to finish what the process entails.

What is the general industry standard for putting a line together and what should I anticipate as the overall t&a?

We like to say that for a start-up brand, months 1 thru 6 will be spent on development, and then months 7 thru 12 will be spent on production. After the first year of working together, the routine will be streamlined and fine-tuned so as to get on a multiple delivery fashion calendar schedule.

Will you help me to stay on calendar?

YES! We feel that calendar and t&a planning are the most critical parts to manage in the fashion cycle because without a calendar there is no delivery and without delivery there is no business! In order to stay on calendar, we need to create a calendar. Once we determine your annual seasonal delivery plan, we can then generate a time & action, which will then become the guideline for how we stay on track with timing. Let’s note that the clock doesn’t stop ticking. When you delay decisions or payment or decide to change any aesthetic variable (i.e.: color, size, spec, design, trim, add new styles, etc.), the calendar, will without fail, shift out.