Dynamic Doncaster-Based Entrepreneur Has Supercharged Her Women’s Clothing Business

A dynamic Doncaster-based entrepreneur has supercharged her women’s clothing business from annual revenues of £100,000 to £2.5 million in just three years. 

Leesa Sharpe (52) is the Managing Director of LJ’s Boutique, specialising in plus-size fashion for women – and puts her incredible success down to shear hard work from the LJ’s team and a good investment in marketing.

When the pandemic hit, Leesa was forced to close down her high street boutique in Armthorpe.

“Being told to close was quite scary because, like many people at that time, I didn’t want my business to fail,” explained Leesa. “I knew I had to diversify and made the big decision to work harder on the e-commerce route, which started with me sitting at home every night creating Facebook videos.”

Leesa had expert knowledge in the fashion industry, having created a brand which caters for women up to size 28 to feel stylish and confident in their clothes – but support was needed to find this target market at scale. Having grown an incredible 871% during the pandemic, they needed to look at a more professional company to run the website and drive it forward alongside the LJ’s team. 

“I was given a strong recommendation for MultiWebMarketing by the Doncaster Chamber of Commerce,” said Leesa. “I could immediately see their expertise with their award-winning heritage and ability to scale up my entire business.”

Over the past year, the two businesses have partnered to build an entire marketing strategy, including market research, SEO optimisation, a new website and a fully-fledged marketing strategy.

“We launched with a marketing support plan based on our current website, and the improvements were instant,” Leesa added. “Even though we knew that we needed a new website, the team helped scale up our sales way past the seven-figure mark.

“We eventually took the plunge to redesign the whole website and give the business a massive boost to take us to the next level.”

This project involved the creation of new, bespoke e-commerce tech with a super-fast Google-friendly website which triggered a further 60% sales increase in an already fast-growing business.

Leesa said: “I just thought ‘wow’. It was absolutely brilliant, and now my main challenge is to find a much, much bigger warehouse to continue with the growth of the business.”

MultiWebMarketing’s Operations Director Adrian Blatherwick has been the driving force behind the marketing drive. He said: “Working with and supporting local companies is always great for our agency, and being able to help impact LJ’s Boutique in a positive way has been a pleasure.

“I think what stood out most for us is that Leesa and her team have a hunger to grow and are always open to ideas; it’s been exciting to help with that journey.”

LJ’s Boutique has set some more lofty ambitions for the future of the business as it looks to scale up the operation further and reach its target of having 75% of its stock manufactured in the UK.