On January 23, 2019, Whitney Lundeen, founder of Sonnet James, a maker of dresses for active mothers, appeared on the Shark Tank in hopes of securing a business partner and financial investor to contribute $350,000 in exchange for 25% equity in her company, a $1.4 million business valuation.
Sara Blakely, a Shark Tank visiting judge and investor who likes to invest in female entrepreneurs, noted that Sonnet James produces dress designs similar to many other producers, but accepted Whitney's deal for $350,000 in exchange for 25% of her company because she liked Whitney very much.
Kevin O’Leary, a regular Shark Tank judge complimented Whitney on a job well done and said that he felt her presentation was the best clothing presentation they have seen over 10 seasons of Shark Tank.
Whitney is a single mom of two boys who developed the Sonnet James line of women’s dresses to allow moms to have one outfit for every occasion. Whether they are in a business meeting, out to dinner, on the playground or riding bikes with their kids, women would have an option for clothing that is comfortable and fashionable for all occasions. Not only has Sonnet James introduced a high-quality product into the mothers market, but they have also created a network of moms which is very important for brand awareness and advocacy.
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As Whitney explained to the Sharks, the idea for her company came about when she got tired of mom-look staples like yoga pants and wanted to come up with something fashionable, but easy to clean. Lundeen elaborated.
“I was going through a difficult time in my life, and so I had this idea of making a dress that my mom could have worn that could have reminded her to play with me when I was little. And I said, ‘Alright, this year, I’m going to take the idea, and I’m going to teach myself how to sew, and I’m going to pattern draft.’ And every night, I would pretty much sit on the kitchen floor crying, trying to teach myself how to do two things I didn’t know how to do.”
The Sharks asked Lundeen to explain what she meant by the idea of the dress reminding her mom to play with her. Holding back tears, Lundeen says that she had a challenging childhood that included some abuse. She explained.
“My parents did the best they could with what they had. I found when I became a mom, I couldn’t engage with my kids as much as I wanted to. And I wanted something that could help me be the mother that I had always wanted to be, and something that could remind me every day when I put it on what my priorities were.”
Whitney wanted something fashionable, yet durable enough for rough and tumble play. She made her own dresses out of four-way stretch modal spandex. On New Year’s Day, 2013, Lundeen resolved to make her own dress line and she designed 12 different styles of what would become Sonnet James dresses. Next she sourced fabrics and started making dresses for moms.
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She got her business going back in August 2013 with a successful Kickstarter campaign that raised $58,245 and provided proof of product-market fit. That’s when Sonnet James became a real business. The dresses are playful and durable. They have the classic lines of designer dresses, but they’re safe for “play clothes.” Sonnet James designs cost between $100-$160 and come with a three-day, no hassle try-on guarantee.
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Whitney developed the Sonnet James "playtime" dress line to remind her to be a mom who is present and plays with their kids while feeling confident and put together. The dresses in the Sonnet James line are all washable and made of quality spandex fabric that has stretch and compression so that it retains its shape throughout washing cycles. Whitney has designed all of the dresses in her line as well as taught herself how to sew and how to design and create a website.
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Sonnet James operates a direct-to-consumer (D2C) revenue model through their website (see below) and had $1.2 million in sales at the end of 2018 with a 75% product margin. The average order size is 2 dresses and their rate of return is 23% which is below the retail average of 30%.
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Sonnet James dresses are made in San Francisco, from fabric produced in New York City and printed in Los Angeles. As part of a community of supportive women, it is important to Whitney that the fabric and the production house work environment are a healthy place for the seamstresses to work. As she told The Hive Magazine, even though she may pay more for the production and thereby make less profit, she wants to maintain a close, one-to-one relationship with the production end of her business. It is “important to me to feel good about where these dresses were being made.” And what is her advice for other mothers who might want to start their own business? Despite all the snags, fears, problems and long, hard hours of work, Whitney says simply: “Just do it!”
So how well has Sonnet James done since the Shark Tank investment by Sara Blakely? Sonnet James is still in business and still designs out of Whitney's home in Palo Alto. As of June 2021, Sonnet James is thriving and reported revenues of $6 million.
COMMENTARY: Sonnet James is a classic example of an entrepreneurial success story driven by incredible passion and drive and very little capital. Sara Blakely, the Shark Tank investor who accepted Whitney Lundeen's offer of a 25% share of her young company, noted that Sonnet James dresses were not much different than those made by other garment manufacturers. So what is the secret to Sonnet James success? The answer: POSITIONING, STORYTELLING and MADE IN USA
Sonnet James does not owe its success to being first-to-market, product differentiation, lowest cost producer, or even great apparel designs. Instead, Sonnet James has succeeded where others have failed in a very crowded women's apparel market through crafty storytelling, product positioning and manufacturing in the USA. Whitney Lundeen has positioned Sonnet James as a designer of "playtime" dresses for moms -- a new women's apparel category. Whitney's successful appearance on the Shark Tank is a marketing storyteller's dream. A true "rags-to-riches" story. Whitney's success post-Shark Tank has produced a lot of "free" publicity which is worth its weight in gold.
I don't know how much Sonnet James spends on paid advertising, but going from $1.2 million in revenues at the end of 2018 to $6 million by June 2021 can't all be due to positioning, crafty storytelling or manufacturing in the USA. The "Made in USA" label probably contributes to Sonnet James success for several reasons:
- Job Creation - Made in he USA means creating jobs right here in the good ole USA.
- Quality - Made in the USA has always stood for better quality compared to goods made in China, India or other Asian countries. Economists at The Boston Consulting group found that 60 percent of Chinese consumers are willing to pay more for products labeled “Made in the USA” than for those labeled “Made in China.”
- Better For Families - Products made in America are better for consumers because they must follow American consumer protection laws and safety standards. Many foreign countries have far less extensive product safety standards than those in the United States, frequently leading to recalls and safety issues.
- Addressing Poor Conditions - Many countries do not enforce the same worker safety and child protection controls of Western countries. It can be hard for companies to compete on cost with regimes willing to exploit their own people. You’re supporting a higher standard of working conditions when you buy American-made.
S0nnet James has identified or created a new category or "Blue Ocean" as described in the book Blue Ocean Strategy in the women's apparel market: "playtime" apparel for women. In 2020, there were 15.6 million single mothers living with young children in he USA. There are presently 43.5 million mothers (ages 15 to 50) in the USA. The COVID pandemic, inflation and the Ukraine war with Russia has put a brake on U.S. birth rates. Whether birth rates will continue to decline remains to be seen, but something that Sonnet James needs to keep a careful eye on going forward.
Courtesy of an article dated February 14, 2019 appearing in Business2Community, a tweet dated January 23, 2019 appearing in Twitter, an article dated February 3, 2019 appearing in Tiny Beans, an article dated May 2019 appearing in the Shark Tank Blog, an article dated January 14, 2019 appearing in Shark Tank Products, an article dated April 21, 2021 appearing in Infoplease and an article dated August 28, 2017 appearing in Made In America Movement
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