NOW HEAR THIS

Emma Meek of Miss Bush Bridal has a powerful voice and speaks with passion and without fear of reprimand. She is fast to criticise, but not without thinking. And she demands what she herself delivers

The only way that anyone in the UK bridal industry has survived Covid is on the strength, ingenuity, selfsacrifice and tenacity of the few. In an industry that conspires to prevent retailers from making a profit, that encourages a retail base that is too big to be sustainable, that cashes in

on impossible dreams of the majority, a minority of inspirational and indefatigable women have held their ground in the most remarkable way.

The non-furloughed director, social media star and probable home educator, who has been putting in a full working week while fighting banks, insurance companies and

evolving contingency strategies, should now be invited to envisage future retail.

I want to thank the group of boutique owners who have been my ‘bubble’ for the past three months. Business owners who have helped me tune out the noise and rage, have helped evolve communications and strategies for our clients, shared risk assessment documents, owned up to some dark nights of the soul and felt able to collaborate freely.

Not for us home baking and suntans. Not for us a clamour to buy new wedding dresses. For the serious – the business owners who may have a ‘passion’ but not a ‘vanity’ – this has been three months of tightened belts and, ironically, elasticated waistbands.

The emotional toll has been great. It started with emergency firefighting, adrenaline-fuelled and furious. It passed through ugly crying, despair at reaching out to Councils, banks and MPs. Anger and hostility at trade shows and brands that couldn’t read the room as far as pushing new collections and then, after finally hitting a wall, pushing through it to re-imagine retail.

None of us know if a sample dress is ‘safe.’ Relative to the normal insanitary condition of some best sellers, the ones you can’t bear to release from the shop floor, the stock looks pristine right now.

Lockdown cleaned and refreshed, the dresses are safer than a supermarket sweep. Now, whether we are waving carcinogenic wands at the dress, creating a viral soup of steam or spraying with disinfectant, soon our we could be left with a laboratory set of samples with competing chemical reactions; fizzing and radiating dubious health benefits. Quarantine for 72 hours? Stick them though at 60 degrees? Communicate risk to brides, already fragile and fearful?

What now for our balance sheets when we value our samples at zero to reflect the rigorous abuse they are about to face?

New dawn, new day; declutter, deep clean and communicate care. Brave faces and big girl pants for all.

Reopening is a myth. Most of us we were never closed. Three solid months of digital marketing, virtual appointments, flash sales on Insta stories, of-the-scale customer service, sending out dresses, having deliveries to home and credit control.

We became the whole of our companies, not just directors. I have enviously eyed the furloughed, my feelings moving to insane jealousy. Upskilling? More like racing to keep up. I am numb and knackered and yet, now, I have to emerge from my chrysalis of crisis, wings fluttering, projecting joy and confidence whilst staring into the abyss of a still paralysed events industry.

Full diaries, even with weekday appointment charging, are encouraging. The BBL sitting, untouched, gives a sense of security. My clients paid their balances, I have paid my bills and I go back to work at zero; flat lining on what was looking like a phenomenal year.

My lesson from lockdown is that I have no casual clothes. I made feature of it on Instagram. “Ha, ha, ha, I only have capacious black dresses with weird sleeves.” I have no casual clothes because I have precious little leisure time. I have never had time to walk or bike ride other than in a ferocious spin class, condensing exercise to 45-minute bursts. I don’t see the summer or weekends. I don’t have two tandem days off a week.

As British boutiques go, Miss Bush is one of the oldest, successful to a point. Successful if you put aside the self-sacrifice of not owning beige shorts with pockets in the side.

Success, now, needs to be measured by change. Should my self-sacrifice, and those like me, help hold up an industry that knowingly pollutes, over supplies and doesn’t listen?

The talent that exists in bridal retail should be given a say, not an award. The vox pop of our industry is written off as rabid or we hear the same sententious voices. The dynamic group of woman and men that I have been in regular contact with have shown that the Bridal House of Cards depends on them. They have flexed, pivoted, pushed and shown the way. Authentic voices, compassionate customer service, innovative thinking, solid digital skills and contingency planning. Empty platitudes, pointless shoe pics, sterile social feeds and ‘Friyay’ memes are for the past.

These are serious times we need serious business owners to take the industry forward.