Alumni
Alumna Leah Salimbene Talks Private Label Footwear Design Versus Branded
With degrees in Merchandise Product Development and International Manufacturing and Product Development (IMPD), Leah Salimbene has been designing footwear for the past seven years in Los Angeles. She designed at Seychelles and BC Footwear before moving over to Dynasty to do private label. She recently helped host a very special day for our Footwear Design students at Dynasty. This is her industry story.
Tell us a little about yourself and what you do at Dynasty: My love for fashion developed in high school while taking figure drawing classes for an AP art assignment. When I started at FIDM, I enrolled in Merchandise Product Development and assumed I would work in clothing design one day. FIDM really taught me the importance of blending my creativity with my problem-solving skills and the importance of a designer being business minded. This is still a skill I’m working to develop in my career especially now that I’m working in private label. I think this was the leg up I had when interviewing at Seychelles right out of design school. I never imagined designing for a footwear company but seven years later and I can’t imagine designing anything else.
For the last two years, I’ve been designing private label at Dynasty for brands such as Kohl’s and Target. Before I moved to Dynasty I worked for Dynasty’s branded division at Seychelles designing for BC footwear (five years).
What was it like to transition from brand (Seychelles) to private label (Dynasty): For five years, I embodied BC Footwear. At the time, I began I was 21 years old, living in a major city, and loved vintage clothing. I was not only the designer but I was the target customer. Moving to Dynasty would give me experience with a broader spectrum of customers.
The transition was relatively smooth because I had worked on a couple private label projects under BC. I had an idea of what my new job would entail, but the first year was still a major learning curve.
How do the challenges differ between brand and private label? The key difference in designing private label vs. branded is taking yourself and your personal design aesthetics out of your work. When you are designing private label, it is all about the client’s customer base and creating a product right for them. Instead of just designing product that looks good I need to understand who their customer is, their product history, and where they are going as a company so I can design the best product possible that suits their need. The private label business is very competitive so it’s important that the products reflect all of these elements. The other major difference in my job now vs. branded is that I’m designing for several different companies at a time with very different needs. When working for branded you stick to one customer and one design aesthetic and direction. Now I’m constantly flipping my design headspace to juggle my workload between customers.
What do you like most about your job? Coming into the position, I thought the lower price points at which I’m designing now would be limiting on my creativity, but the challenge has been very rewarding. Sometimes my job is more creative problem solving than designing. I think I am a better designer for it. Another positive surprise is the impact mass quantity production has on pricing. When the order is larger I can afford to play with more expensive materials or embellishments which is always fun for me.
Any advice for current FIDM Students? Be open to broader range of job opportunities, especially right out of design school. When I first graduated, I didn’t know enough about the industry or what I wanted out of my career to be so specific about what I wanted to design or for what company. When I submitted my resume to a footwear company I never thought I would get a call back, let alone be loving my job as a shoe designer years later. Then, when I was designing branded, I didn’t think I would like designing for private label more, but it was just the next step I needed in my career at the time.
What is your biggest goal right now? At the moment, I am trying to learn as much as I can about growing a business together with a client. It’s one of the assets we bring to the client as a private label company. At Dynasty, I am learning about multiple companies at the same time and their constantly evolving buying strategies in order to provide a customized line of footwear. We are a partnership and it is essential to know just as much about their business as we do ours. That means I need to be learning and evolving constantly!
Anything else you’d like to share? Advocate for yourself! Know your skills and be able to speak about them confidently. My mom has always pushed me to be better at this. Every moment of success I look back on I can pinpoint this as the consistent factor in all of those moments.
Categories: Footwear Design & Development International Manufacturing & Product Development Merchandise Product Development Alumni Industry Partnerships
