was kind of organic. I started getting inspired again when I really got back to the creative piece of true design—picking fabrics, designing fabrics and creating my own silhouettes. I realized, ‘Wow, this is really about a lifestyle and a brand, and I think people might like this.’ That was exciting when it really clicked. What inspired you to expand into tweens? We started with girls’ 12 months to 6 years. As my kids got older, we began adding sizes to the brand. When Belle grew out of the 6, we added an 8. We had customers who were growing up with us also. They would say, ‘I need a 10. My daughter is getting bigger, and I love the brand.’ And now that Belle’s a tween, we started a tween line two years ago. Tween can be a difficult market, right? I think at first figuring it out was a challenge. At that age, tweens are starting to be more body conscious and trend aware, and they are less interested in dresses, which is really the core of our kids’ business. There’s so much tween out there that is very slick and short and tight, and we wanted to do something that’s tween appropriate, but that’s on-brand. We took our classic beachy, boho styling and
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tweened it up a bit—and it took a few seasons to get the right mix and fit. I think we finally hit it with tween, and our business in the segment is really growing. Tween tastes change so quickly. How do you keep up? Belle and her friends are a great resource for us. She and her friends do our photo shoots and they’ll say, ‘We like this, but we wish it was more like this.’ Or, ‘We think these things are trending now, mom. Can you do something like that?’ They know more than I do, especially about that age group. We try to listen to them all the time. And after tween, you branched into women’s. We’ve always done a little bit of women’s here and there, but we’ve really found that women who buy our kids’ clothes really love what we call a reimagined mommy and me look. It’s not necessarily the same print for mom and daughter, but a similar aesthetic. A lot of children’s brands seem to be branching into women’s and maternity. You have a built-in customer base already,
and hopefully if they already like the brand, it translates. Your beautiful beach sombrillas quickly sold out this summer. Any plans to dive into swimwear? We tried swim for a little bit, but I think that small boutiques tend to go to a swim manufacturer to buy swim. I think our plan for growth will really be dressing kids from head to toe. We’re looking at expanding into shoes, tights, socks, hats and mittens and all kinds of things. Now that the brand is more established, doing more lifestyle pieces like that would be well received. Like your Luna Leggings collaboration that launched last month! We loved collaborating with Luna Leggings. We feel the brand’s tights and leggings have the same free spirit as Pink Chicken so it was a great match. The designs are colored perfectly and work back to our fall collection, and it’s really great to offer our customers something really fun and new. I’m also excited to announce we’re doing a T-shirt collaboration with Lucky Fish in Spring/Summer ’14. We have always admired
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