When two friends with same interests, lifestyle and ethical ideology start a company together, it can’t be anything but amazing! And now we’re not talking about ourselves, but the Finnish brand HALLA X HALLA, founded by two ambitious girls from Finland.
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Halla Halla eco-friendly swimwear
Halla Halla swimwear is designed so that it fits an active lifestyle on land and in the water. Swimwear moves with you, is durable and made from eco-friendly material. Swimwear fabric is made from recycled plastic bottles and fishing nets and manufactured into high quality lycra.
1. Your ideology is that you only produce a certain amount of products. You are super popular and your demand has grown a lot. Is it still your preference to grow your business from where it is now? And also globally?
Our demand has really grown a lot lately, and of course we are willing to grow as a company. The first year we have focused on conquering the market in Finland, but in the future we’ll focus more on going international as well.
2. You don’t need to reveal your business strategy, but if you have a certain growth plan, are we going to see halla x halla for example on the fashion week catwalks around the world?
Becoming internationally known is totally in our future plans and we’ll start working on that soon. For now we don’t have any plans for walking at the fashion weeks – but many other big dreams though!
@villeleh
3. Tell us your thoughts about the fashion industry today and about current trends? What good and bad sides do you find about it?
In the fashion industry today, there are many good things – but also so much to improve. The consumers are more aware about the environmental effects of the fashion business, that gives the pressure for companies to produce their products with sustainable development principles and more ecologically. On the markets there are more and more ecological products and they’re pursuing to make their whole production process as transparent as possible for the consumers.
The downside of today’s fashion is absolutely the so-called fast fashion -thinking, where the consumers are waiting for the new products every day with a low price.
4. At the moment the sea is close to your heart, but would you be interested involving in other environmental issues and environmental protection through your own business?
We aim to work as ethically in every aspects of our lives – in our everyday in life as well as with our business. Close to our heart is also the protection of everything that’s alive, not only protecting the sea.
5. How do you see the fashion education in Finland and the level of teaching in fashion?
Our time of studies was very prolific and we appreciate the small classes and intimate, personal teaching in the Finnish University. During our studies we learned so much about all the divisions: designing, styling, making patterns and sewing. Everyone had the chance to decide what interested us the most, and we got to learn more about the specific subjects. The biggest learning experience has actually been outside of school – doing things and making mistakes. During our studies we wish there was more business and marketing related studies, because that’s something that entrepreneurs really need.
6. How strongly do you want to enhance the Finnish/Nordic roots now and in the future in your brand?
We are very proud or our roots and we’re calling ourselves the ”Nordic Swimwear” brand happily, now and in the future. Our slogan ”Nordic swimwear inspired by the tropics” describes our brand very well, our products are very basic, Nordic style – but with a hint of tropics. Most of all our Finnish roots are shown in our attitude and our great work ethic, our attitude of ”not giving up”.
@vanhamies
7. You don’t bring yourselves up at all on your social media or your website – is there a reason or explanation for that ? How do you feel of the entrepreneurs being anonym among the brands?
In the first year we wanted to focus on the product in our marketing strategy. For the media though we are willing to tell our own story, that’s a big reason for the brand’s existence after all. We haven’t excluded bringing the so called founder-story in our marketing, but that might be later in the future.
8. Will halla x halla expand to other types of clothing and accessories in the future?
For now we’re only focusing on evolving as a swimwear brand and to grow our brand especially in the field of active swimwear. In our fall collection we are showing also leggings that fit the active lifestyle of our brand, suitable both in-water and on-land activities. We already have many ideas for new production categories and we love to reply ”never say never” when asked about new products – anything is possible.
@joeypalmroos & @ddoooris
9. Is your dream to always work in the fashion industry? If you ever end up selling your brand, do you still feel like you’d stay in the fashion business?
The fashion world has been our dream for a long time, and at least for now we’re planning on staying in the industry. As mentioned before, you never know what’s going to happen in life so never say never works for this as well. We’re seeing our future with very open minds, though.
10. You are two friends who started a business together, just like us! Do you have any tips for remaining friends and not letting the friendship go into a whirlwind while working on a business together?
The first and most important thing in entrepreneurship between friends is to go trough the facts that both want from the business. The common vision about the whole business and the goals must be shared between both, and in the beginning it needs to be sure that both are involved in the business 110 percent. Business partner friendship works as a great relationship: you need to be able to talk about everything, you need to be able to compromise and the investment must be mutual. Even though we work most of the year from different continents, we communicate every day and as for each other’s opinion to the most irrelevant and smallest things. We realize talking about business almost the whole time, but that doesn’t matter when it’s about the shared dream. But it’s also super important remembering to talk about other things in life.
Shop Halla X Halla here and follow they on Instagram @hallaxhalla
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