‘The Hive’, the acceleration programme for emerging fashion brands developed by the ISEM Fashion Business School in Madrid, Spain has just launched its third edition.

The acceleration programme for emerging fashion brands developed by the ISEM Fashion Business School, a university centre attached to the University of Navarra that is the first business school specialising in fashion companies in Spain.

Launched by the educational centre in 2019, the main objective of "The Hive" acceleration project is to try to help emerging Spanish fashion brands to uncover their full potential, to grow and consolidate their presence within the Spanish market, and also beyond national borders. Since its foundation, it has been a "club" of emerging companies, as ISEM itself likes to refer to the programme.

Spanish brands such as Mimoki, Bleis, Lonbali, Figara, Laura Vecino, Jo-Sephine Clothing and París 64 have previously participated in the programme.

The third edition of the programme involves the incorporation of the total of 19 new emerging companies. These include Spanish fashion companies Adeba Madrid, An&Lee, Ana Cristina PD, Arbusá Joyeras, Baltei Studio, Birinit Petit, Camacha, Clooui, Culto 1105, Dragon Girl, Mimush, Muscari, Nait Nait, Olibati, Opere Plumari, Suma Cruz, Vanylu, Wasacs and Zubi.

ISEM launches new edition of start-up accelaration programme

From this moment on, each of these emerging fashion firms, or rather their founders and managers, will open up to a period of two years during which they will try to use all the tools and knowledge necessary to consolidate their respective business models within the ever-competitive and complex world of fashion.

The new emerging fashion brands that have joined ‘The Hive’ were joined by Pablo López, co-founder and CEO of the menswear fashion label Silbon.

On the day of the inauguration of the third edition, Pablo López, co-founder and CEO of Silbon participated in a talk with María Martín-Montalvo, director of institutional relations at ISEM. During the meeting, López tried to place special emphasis on the importance for fashion firms of knowing how to combine the creative part with the financial area, which all companies need to have in order to guarantee their optimal functioning and future growth. A condition for which, López pointed out, "finances start with design".

Beyond that, the executive tried to raise awareness among the participants in this new edition of the ISEM acceleration programme so that they open up, with caution, to enter into the development of new lines of business. A diversification for which he defended that they should undertake from a clear perspective of their possible profitability.

He ended the meeting with an assessment of the current omnichannel reality that prevails in the sector, and for which, López said, it is "impossible to measure what services the physical shop provides to the online store and vice versa and how profitable each of them is".

"In the case of Silbon," he declared, "the digital channel has a 30 percent share of our sales, but 90 percent of digital sales take place in cities with physical shops.

This article was originally published on FashionUnited.ES. Translation and edit from Spanish into English by Veerle Versteeg.