Dresses are expensive and often never worn again. To help people save money, Briella Brown created Your Closet so you can rent designer dresses for a fraction of the retail price. Briella landed a deal with Naomi Simson and Janine Allis on Shark Tank Australia. As of 2024, Your Closet is estimated to be worth $2 million.
Briella Brown’s Background
Briella Brown is a young entrepreneur from Sydney, Australia, with a Bachelor of Media from the University of New South Wales. During university, Briella wrote fashion articles for Dalliance Magazine and UNSW Blitz Magazine. The Sydney student gained experience in fashion and marketing early in her career, which later paid off.
Build Your Wardrobe
Brown was invited to three formal events in one year in 2012. She felt pressured because she knew she had to buy four dresses, as one dress for all occasions was not ideal.
Briela believed that buying a piece of clothing to wear only once was a waste of money. This dilemma gave her the idea to start a luxury clothing rental service. Briela discovered that this type of business was booming in the United States and the United Kingdom, but did not exist in the Australian market.
To raise funds, she took out an $82,000 personal loan and launched Your Closet in 2014. Although she ran the business from home, she was making $35,000 a month when she appeared on Shark Tank. She likely received financial support from her parents to purchase the $200,000 dress.
Shark Tank Appearance
Your Closet was growing steadily, with Briella reinvesting all profits back into the business. She was already doing great, but needed help to scale. In 2016, she appeared on Shark Tank Australia Season 2, seeking $80,000 in exchange for a 20% stake.
Briella, then 20, made the mistake of underestimating the value of the company and could have asked for the same equity for $150,000. Nevertheless, the savvy entrepreneur impressed the Sharks and handled the pitch well.
Jenny Ellis initially offered to join forces with Steve Baxter, offering $80,000 for 30%, but Steve disagreed. Naomi Simson took over and split $80,000 with Jenny for 40%. After calling her father for a second opinion, Briela accepted the deal. At least she had the option of winning back her equity in the future.
After Shark Tank
The night the show aired, Your Closet’s website received 80,000 visits and crashed! In the first three years, the company had grown 100% year over year. As of June 2017, they had rented out $8 million worth of dresses and made approximately $1.6 million in revenue.
The publicity served them well as it helped the founders scale quickly. Your Closet was severely impacted by the pandemic, shipping hundreds of dresses per week to now zero. Thankfully, things did get better, but they are not back to normal. In June 2022, Your Closet was acquired by GlamCorner, an industry leader in the space.
In March 2020, Briella co-founded Avant Studio, an e-commerce site that sells custom jewelry. She co-founded the company with a close friend and served as the Marketing Director until October 2023. Currently, she works as a Brand Building + Strategy Consultant.
Categories: Shark Tank
Source: dut.edu.vn
