The Art Of Brand Storytelling With Imogene + Willie
An American Love Story
‘for lovers of good denim and other treasures’
We’re delighted to be able to share the story of one of our favourite brands Imogene + Willie and to have the chance to speak to the I +W team.
Co-founders Carrie and Matt Eddmenson are master jean makers, and natural storytellers.
Their story starts with an email sent out at 3am telling a few hundred people about their dream; ‘We simply want to sew in the back of the store a good jean for both men and women that fits perfectly.’
15 years later, it’s a story of success with two shops, a team of 75 and I+W jeans sold around the world to a loyal community of customers and fans.
But theirs is also a story of obsession, struggle, heartbreak and refusing to lose hope…
‘The hopeful rise of a fallen dream’ by Imogene + Willie co-founders Carrie and Matt Eddmenson
Q: The story is so captivating because it’s honest and personal. A true love story. You share how I+W was born out of struggle and how it’s grown through risks and uncertainty. Why do you think it’s important to share the reality and did it feel scary to do so?
A: The evolution of our business is not unusual - many businesses face the challenge of staying true to their initial mission statement when up against financial and operational hurdles trying to stay afloat. We try to remain transparent when we make the wrong call, have to backtrack, etc. In 2018, at a pivotal moment in our history, we decided to scale back and start again in order to grow in a sustainable way. I have no doubt that these decisions were made with some fear of the unknown, but ultimately the gut check leads us in the right direction.
Q: In the beginning of I+W, you sent an email to friends and family with the hope of selling 250 pairs of jeans. You now have two shops, a team of 75, and sell your jeans around the world, it’s no longer just your family and friends buying. How has the relationship with your customers changed over time and as the business has grown?
A: We are grateful for the growth of our community and business, but ultimately it does mean it is harder to stay connected with everyone who is a customer now. In the early days, Matt & Carrie knew almost everyone who ever walked through the doors of our shop. Our stores remain a huge priority for this reason - interactions that take place there are the touchpoint that has remained a constant as we’ve grown. Our Customer Experience team is also hugely valuable, allowing us to stay connected one-on-one with those across the globe. They offer interactions beyond online service: they provide remote fittings, and reach out to express our appreciation for customer support. We also utilize other methods of staying in touch, including our email newsletters and social media, as well as community events.
‘In some ways, our story was all we had. It was our identity, our guiding light, our foundation on which to make business decisions. All of our marketing was (and mostly still is) us telling our own story.’
Q: How does having such a clear and strong story help with running the business in terms of decisions, marketing, hiring…working with people internally and externally?
A: In some ways, our story was all we had. It was our identity, our guiding light, our foundation on which to make business decisions. All of our marketing was (and mostly still is) us telling our own story. Our people are hired based on their ability to tell our story. Our partners and people we work with are those who know our story well enough to share it. This is how our community was built, and we owe everything to our community for holding us up for these 15 years.
Q: How do your customers respond to your story?
A: Our customers are incredibly thoughtful and attentive; they don’t miss a thing. They expect us to be transparent and communicative enough for them to make informed decisions when purchasing. They appreciate hearing our process, because it’s a way for them to relate and stay connected to us. Our customers hold us accountable if we ever don’t meet their expectations as far as quality or practices. In turn, when we DO, they spread the word of our company like the gospel.
Q: You’ve focused on doing things well and ‘forever on the quest to make the perfect jeans’. How does the brand story help you communicate that commitment to quality products?
A: While so much of what we communicate has to do with sourcing and production practices, ultimately our products need to speak for themselves and hold up to the expectations of our customer. They come to us to purchase investment pieces, ones that they can trust will serve them for a long time to come. With that, customers provide ample feedback as to fit or fabric, as well as give us their trust that our pieces are timeless designs.
Q: Your story and purpose is one of doing things well, made in the US, supporting community and people. Was it hard starting and growing a business while being uncompromising in your values? Does that get harder as the business expands?
A: It was definitely hard, and in fact, staying true to these values nearly led to our downfall. Starting the business was feasible at such a small scale with the resources available to us. As we started to grow, we were up against production and sourcing practices in the USA that were limited and expensive. Some of the biggest decisions we made surrounding how to make these factors more accessible ended up being mistakes in the long run and put us in very hard times. Fortunately, we had the opportunity to restart and learn from what went wrong about six years ago, starting a new period of growth for the business that has been more sustainable. Now that we are celebrating 15 years since opening, we are so fortunate to have been able to preserve our value set while growing and to have now reached a size that is able to support smaller businesses with the same values.
Q You share your story consistently and beautifully, weaving it into everything you create and do. How do you use it so effectively as a marketing strategy?
A: Thank you for such kind words! We strive to remain a creative-led business, which means we have creative minds at the helm of all strategy. In turn, everyone who has a hand in the process of whatever we do has a beautiful and unique way of sharing their version of our brand story. Through the passion of our team, we are a very united front on how we market the brand. Each of us is an ambassador of the brand and represents it with pride. So while we have an exceptional team in-house that focuses on conventional marketing, those for whom the brand voice and image are deeply ingrained, everyone in the company shares a collective responsibility for marketing in a variety of ways. For instance, our retail team introduces new people to the brand when they walk in our stores, our web team creates an engaging and smooth user experience on our site, our creative team tells stories through photos and videos, and our development team tells the story of textiles through the mills and artisans we work with.
Q What advice would you give to a business owner about how to create a story to share and sell their work?
A: Stay true to yourself, stay true to your identity, even when outside forces try to get you to be more conventional, follow a playbook, conform. Patagonia’s founder Yvon Choinard is known for saying, “Every time we've done the right thing it's ended up making us more money,” and I think this is an amazing principle to follow, based on what is right for you and your people.
Q Which other brand stories do you love and admire?
A: We’ve had the privilege of partnering with some of the folks we most admire in our space, such as Vidalia Mills, Crescent Down Works, Save Khaki United, and Little River Sock Mill, who are each carrying on the legacy of American manufacturing that has been fading around us over the years. Similarly, the folks at Musgrave Pencil Co. have withstood a century of industries and resources changing around them, remaining steadfast to their old traditions. And then there are people in our community, like Cameron and Whitney Weiss of Weiss Watch Company - they own some of the most state of the art technology in the country in their facility, but meticulously do everything themselves in order to offer a perfectly-made product. This list could go on and on!
Q: What’s the next chapter for Imogene + Willie?
A: As we begin to celebrate our 15th anniversary, we are simultaneously looking back and looking forward. We see this as a time of reflection, a time to celebrate how where we started got us to where we are now. With this in mind, it’s an opportunity to revisit the early days and invoke nostalgia for our community while enforcing the values we were based on. This year is all about partnerships, because no one (and no business) is solely responsible for their own success, it comes from the support of others. Looking ahead at our next 15 years, our goal is to keep this momentum going, allowing us to better the lives of our people and leave the planet in the best condition possible.
supper + song at Imogene + Willie. Gathering community around music.
Questions answered by Jackie Berkley, Director of People + Culture at Imogene + Willie
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