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This is a show for burnt-out fashion designers (and TDs, PDs, patternmakers and beyond) who want more flexibility while still doing work they love. As a freelance fashion designer, you can build your fashion career on your own terms. Freelancing in fashion is the only way to get freedom in your day (instead of being tied to a desk). Whether you want to earn extra money on the side, fund your fashion brand, or replace your salary, the FDGP podcast will help you get there. Listen in for actionable tips and strategies to kickstart or grow your career as a freelance fashion designer, build your confidence, and create the life you want. Hosted by $100k+ fashion freelancer Sew Heidi, the show features interviews and strategy sessions with successful freelance fashion designers from around the world who've ditched toxic fashion jobs and taken control of their own destinies. This is the only place to get REAL insights from REAL freelancers who have built REAL careers on their own terms. (Formerly the Successful Fashion Freelancer podcast.)
Heidi [00:00:03]:
A lot of people wonder what's the difference between a consultant and maybe a freelance fashion Designers, or what is the term consultant even really mean in the fashion industry? And the reality is it's ultimately just semantics. Some people call themselves consultant as opposed to a freelancer because the word might feel like it has more tout or more authority or something like that. On paper, the difference between a consultant versus someone who is, let's say, a freelance fashion designer or a freelance technical Designers, a freelance product developer, is that a consultant tends to, well, consult, meaning they will provide advice and guidance and ideas and high level strategy to a brand. So they might tell them that next season, the the trend is going to be neon pops of color and leopard print. That's very on brand for me if you know me. Whereas a freelance fashion designer would actually design the collection with pops of neon and leopard print. So those are if we really get down to the nuances of the words, those are the differences between a consultant. You're not if you're acting exclusively as a consultant, you're only advising.
Heidi [00:01:21]:
You're not actually executing. Whereas someone in the freelance designer or technical or whatever other type of role is executing as well. Now there's a lot of crossover in the line between what is a consultant versus what is a freelance designer, etcetera, is very murky. The reality is if you are a freelance fashion designer or a technical designer or a PD or or anything, the reality is you're likely also consulting because most of the time you're not there exclusively executing. Do this thing, and you're doing that exact thing without providing any type of guidance or support or ideas or thoughts on how it should be done. Or, you know what? Actually, that is maybe not gonna be the best route. We should do it this way, and here's why. So the reality is that most freelance fashion designers and most freelance TD's, PD's, etcetera, are also consultants.
Heidi [00:02:18]:
If you want to sort of pitch yourself as a consultant exclusively, you can do that. Again, it's a matter of semantics, and it can just get a little bit mixed up with the names. I do, however, see this is not based on data. This is based off of my sheer perspective that consultants, as I mentioned earlier, can tend to have a little bit more clout and have a little bit more expertise in the industry, just based off of using the name consultant. And so there can be a perception as to the value that you might offer and what you can bring to the table just based off of calling yourself a consultant. I do see people calling themselves freelance fashion designer and consultant, which I think is a great way to pitch it. And the reality is that you can do consulting in any space. You could do maybe trend analysis.
Heidi [00:03:11]:
You could do brand development. You could do things on collection development, technical design, product development, market research, maybe networking and industry connections, just providing industry connections and introducing clients to relevant contacts such as manufacturers, suppliers, retail buyers, etcetera. And so as I mentioned, the line is very fuzzy, but you can, sort of cross over into both of these roles. If you're interested in becoming a consultant, you're going to wanna treat that very much like you would treat any other type of freelance career in the fashion industry. If you've listened to my podcast before, or if you've read some of my emails, you know I talk a lot about finding a niche. And as a consultant, you're also gonna want to pick a niche. Right? As I mentioned earlier, this might be in the trend space. This might be in in developing a collection Paid merchandising or something in the technical design space.
Heidi [00:04:09]:
You could also develop your niche based off of a category. So maybe you do all types of consulting, but only in the kids wear, maybe the sustainable kids wear market or something like that. Beyond that, the best way to build as a consultant is to gain firsthand industry experience. And so what you are typically going to wanna do is build this either through working with some clients or through, working in full time jobs. And the knowledge and the experience that you gain in those roles are what is going to allow you to have the ability, have the knowledge, have the expertise to consult with brands Paid to tell them you should do this Paid don't do that, and here's why, and let me connect you with this person and that person. As a consultant, ultimately and this is true for a lot of freelance roles in the fashion industry, but having a network is going to be paramount to your success. You're going to want to, attend various fashion events and industry seminars and trade shows to connect with other other professionals. We did a survey, and and we surveyed a bunch of fashion industry professionals, including a bunch of consultants.
Heidi [00:05:21]:
And everybody who was a consultant said that networking, which sounds, you know, a little bit silly, is the number one way they've grown their careers. Getting out there, letting people know what you're doing, a great way to start picking up projects, etcetera. You can use platforms like Upwork to see what's available. Typically, the jobs that in my experience that I see on Upwork are a lot more execution based, but there's definitely a consulting component in there. LinkedIn is a great platform to network on. I'm super, super active on LinkedIn these days, and I think it's a insanely valuable industry platform. So that is sort of how you wanna think about building out some type of consulting offering. And, again, that could be packaged inside of your service based, packages where you're actually doing executing, or it could be something completely separate.
Heidi [00:06:13]:
The cool thing that we learned in our survey, and this is something I would have said going in, but after we got all the survey data, is that if you wanna be a consultant, this is definitely a freelance role. There's typically not any roles inside companies where you are consulting. You might be brought in to be a consultant on a specific project and advise and offer guidance and maybe provide network connections. I could see some type of maybe ish, some permalance type of gigs as a consultant. But for the most part, we're seeing consultants working exclusively on a freelance capacity. So it's really up to you to decide if you want to offer consulting services exclusively or if you wanna offer consulting and execution services. The reality is that what I see out there with most brands is they want someone who can do some execution as well. So I personally feel, and this is something that you could learn maybe after doing some research into your market, into your industry, talking with potential clients, working through some projects, and seeing.
Heidi [00:07:18]:
You might find that because of your specific niche, you can offer consulting exclusively. But based off of everything that I've seen and the 100, if not thousands, of freelance fashion designers and TDs and PDs, etcetera, who I've crossed paths within one way or another over the years is that consulting is very much typically mixed directly into execution. I do know there are people that do offer exclusively consulting, but it is typically a little bit rare to find that sort of, arrangement. So that is the difference between consulting and being an actual, air quote, freelancer. Again, it's just semantics, and likely if you're freelancing in some capacity, you are doing both services.