Not even the sense of doom and gloom that has descended on much of the world ever since the sudden, unannounced arrival of the novel coronavirus pandemic in 2019 has succeeded in diminishing what Junette Stuart believes is people’s innate desire to enjoy their lives.
This state of mind, she believes, is not a function of a reckless absence of mindfulness of the enormity of the threat that the pandemic represents, rather, it is a philosophical position that millions of humans possess which dictates that good times or bad, life simply has to go on. It is that philosophy, Junette believes, that still keeps alive, the industry from which she makes a living.
This is her seventh year running a business of her own in the clothing industry. Junshazyna’s World of Fashion and Interior Designing Enterprise was established in 2013. Its original home was located at 86 Jedidiah Drive Friendship, East Bank Demerara. These days she also runs an outlet at 106 Croal Street, Georgetown. She is also ‘trying out’ a mobile boutique initiative and, she says, she is “seeing results.”
Over time, she has extended her enterprise beyond fashion, venturing into interior design including soft furnishings. Utilising the skills that she possesses, Junette has also over time, worked to hone her skills as a Fashion Design Instructor.
Because she believes that it takes more than ‘a good fit’ to please, Junette has immersed herself in an approach to fashion that extends beyond simply measuring and creating ‘to order’. There are, she says, issues of body shape, skin tone and people’s personalities that dictate “what they look good in”. What people wear, she believes, is a reflection of what they are. It is a philosophy that continually challenges her creative imagination.
The route that brought her to where she is today is a somewhat convoluted one. At another time in her life she had undergone training which she felt was leading her in the direction of Human Resource management. Afterwards she had done an extended stint as a garment instructor with the Ministry of Culture. Simultaneously, she had studied home furnishing and merchandising.
These days, it is fashion that gets most of her attention, though she insists that for all the aptitude and talent in evidence here in Guyana, the country is still some distance away from possessing a bona fide fashion industry of its own. To get there, she believes, we need to have our outlets operating at a level where at least sixty per cent of what they offer must have been locally created. She does not envisage us reaching there in a hurry. Cost, she says, is a factor here. Exclusivity can be expensive. Elsewhere in the Caribbean the facility of a tourist industry has made the fashion industry a more lucrative pursuit. Local creators depend heavily on a limited domestic market.
Junette believes, however, that positive changes in the wider Guyana economy will eventually see a more lucrative fashion market taking shape. Even now, she believes, the desire amongst fashion-conscious women for exclusivity in their appearance is beginning to create the outlines of a fashion industry.
Fashion, Junette says, is in constant demand. There is the demand that goes with the casual persona and that which attends the formal outlook; then there is an even broader market that derives from the tastes of ‘the working woman’. Her strategic planning painstakingly targets each of these niches.
During the final three months of the year, her eye on seasonal demand, her entrepreneurial interest shifts to interior design and decoration.
Seemingly possessed of a life-has-to-go-on disposition, Junette does not appear to be overly preoccupied with the distractions of the prevailing coronavirus pandemic, having long grounded herself in the philosophy that ‘it is what it is’. Whatever lies ahead, she says, her immediate plans are pointing in the direction of the most lucrative worldwide commercial season of the year… Christmas. Much of her time, currently, is taken up with the creation of various types of decorative things.
Not that she is indifferent to the pandemic and its impact on business and earnings. She concedes that she remains focussed on making business decisions immediately, with long-term goals in mind… so that last July, even as COVID-19 was raging, she established an outlet at 106 Croal Street in Georgetown.
That notwithstanding, she believes that the impact of the pandemic has resulted in changes in consumer tastes. The current demand, she says, appears to be much more for casual clothing though even COVID-19 has not been able to entirely stem the tide of weddings and other formal events that keep alive the market for specialty dress.
Junette believes that she continues to hold her own on account of her constant preoccupation with the need to apply strategies that adapt to changing situations. She believes that her Mobile Boutique initiative was a novel idea which, in the longer term, will simultaneously impact both sales and marketing. She believes, too, that she has become proficient at understanding what a consumer wants and delivering it. When you accomplish that, she says, you create an invaluable market.
Mindful that creative thinking can be exercised to fit in even with the requirements of the COVID-19 emergency, Junette is offering face masks as part of the ensembles that she creates.
These days, Junette’s creativity takes her in various directions. She has, she says, created a limited market, primarily among males, for ‘re-styling’ favoured pieces of clothing through the strategic replacement or re-styling of collars and sleeves or the creation of some eye-catching design adjustment.
In 2019 Junette took the novel initiative of creating and distributing her own fashion catalogue as a marketing tool. Beyond that, she has grown to understand the role that the media can play in promoting the fashion industry.
Now moving in various directions, simultaneously, Junette is offering both workshops and more involved training sessions for persons interested in being part of the world of fashion. The response, she says, has been more than a little encouraging.
Fundamentally, Junette has long been persuaded that not even COVID-19 can suppress people’s innate desire to look and feel good. She believes, however, that to grow, the fashion industry has to adapt. It has to invent different ways of satisfying constantly changing client tastes. No less a challenge, she says, reposes in the need to satisfy the demands of a market that has become more demanding at a time when other needs have arisen and in circumstances where there isn’t as much money ‘going around’ as would normally be the case. Designers, she says, will be challenged to search for additional creative ways to please clients. It is a challenge for the fashion industry as a whole.
Junette Stuart can be reached at telephone number: 694-6825
