Looks do matter in today’s world. The way you dress and the way you behave are tools that lead to first impressions in the viewer. You should make yourself presentable to be successful either in personal or professional life. You need to make a personal statement about your lifestyle and professional commitments through the dress you wear.
But are you aware of the latest trends in fashion? Do you know how to dress up in the best for an occasion? Of course, you care that you don’t want to be a fashion disaster when it comes to dressing up.
So when you are not a fashionista but you still need to dress up fine, what are you going to do about it? Hire a fashion consultant. Your job will be done. Your fashion consultant will guide you in picking up a suitable dress as well as coordinate it with matching accessories so that you look presentable and are able to make an impact with your presence. Here in this article, we will be providing a few tips on how to become a Fashion Consultant.
Fashion Consultant Meaning:
A consultant is someone who gives advice on matters.
So a fashion consultant is a person, who would give suggestions, recommendations, and advice to individuals, companies or groups regarding fashion trends and styles. They help an individual in fashion details and they help a company in design and merchandising aspects for its better business prospective.
They even work for fashion houses to build its reputation and provide clients with fashion inputs and their knowledge in fashion details so thereby they even grow as independent and most sought after fashion consultant.
Fashion Consultant Salary:
The salary a fashion consultant earns depends on many factors. Location, client base, your area of expertise, work experience and customer satisfaction decides how much a fashion consultant is able to earn.
If you are working in a city which prides itself to be a fashion hub, expect your earning to be around the range of above $75,000 annually. But note that your work experience also counts here. When you start out as a fashion consultant and depending on your customer base, you can expect above $25,000 annually.
If you need to average it out, then you could as well say that a fashion consultant may earn around $50,000 annually provided he has considerable work experience and increasing customer demand.
Fashion Consultant Job Description:
What do we say about the scope for a fashion consultant? They are innumerable in number. And as the experience increases, you would see a remarkable shift in the number of customers needing your services. So what are the places and instances where a fashion consultant is in demand? How does a fashion consultant put his experience and creativity at work?
What does a Fashion Consultant do?
1. For assembling an individual’s dress for an occasion:
Media barons, corporate leaders, businessmen, movie stars, marketing leaders, etc are people who are always required to be well dressed for every occasion. Their impeccable dressing sense also counts if they need to be successful in their respective fields. And mind it, they are not fashion experts. But aren’t they well dressed to the occasion every time? Here, fashion consultants come to their rescue.
Whether it is a big day when a deal will be signed or a business meeting, a conference, parties of the elites or overseas travel, fashion consultants help them in selecting wardrobe to suit the occasion.
2. Coordinating fashion accessories with a dress:
Isn’t accessorizing a necessary part of dressing up? Whether it is the Louis Vuitton clutch or the Omega Watch, has it got to be a Hogo Boss blazer or an Armani suit? Subtle, loud, charming or quirky- the fashion consultants help people coordinate the accessories with their dress according to moods and occasions.
3. Organizing a complete wardrobe for an individual:
Suppose an individual is promoted to a high rank in his profession or life and he needs a complete wardrobe rearrangement, then wouldn’t the services of a fashion consultant come in handy? The fashion consultant would set up a full perfect wardrobe based on the person’s profession and lifestyle.
4. Advice during group workshops and seminars:
If budget is a constraint when you need to hire a fashion consultant, you could do well by attending seminars and workshops held by fashion consultants. They give tips and tricks on how to get dressed for occasions and what to avoid or what is the flavor of the season. You can adapt their suggestions and incorporate them in your wardrobe and daily dresses.
5. Classes for organizations:
When high net worth corporates and offices want their marketing employees or chief officers to dress up perfectly while in meetings with clients and customers or conferences, then such chosen employees and officers are given training by fashion consultants to dress accordingly. This helps the company to maintain its brand image and reputation. Why, haven’t you seen all the big honchos and corporate leaders having perfect dressing sense? Here, all the credit goes to their fashion consultant.
6. Consultation for fashion details:
When companies in the retail sector start their fashion brands then the fashion consultants come to their rescue. Based on the consumer targets and budgets of the retail company, the fashion consultants give valuable tips on what is to be kept on the shelf of the stores. Be it the latest colors of the season, fashion styles or the running items, the fashion consultants have a thorough idea about it all.
7. When fashion consultant turns personal shopper for clients:
For big stars and high society partying type individuals who are at the public gaze always, it becomes necessary that they do not commit any fashion blunders. Famous stars like the ones in movies, sports, music or dance usually have vague ideas about fashion styles which need some fine-tuning and polishing. So the fashion consultants help them by personally shopping for them or with them and help in their choices of selecting clothes and coordinating accessories.
Need we say more, opportunities and explorations are endless as a fashion consultant.
Fashion Consultant Courses:
Courses to be a fashion consultant are in plenty. But it all matters on how you grasp it and if you individually have a panache for dressing and fashion. There are bachelor degrees or certification courses for pursuing fashion as a career.
Bachelor degree programs:
Fashion designing courses usually span 2-3 years. Degrees offered gives exposure to not only the fashion aspect but you also get to study about the type of garments, interaction with various local artisans, international and regional styles in fashion and history and trending or evergreen fashion styles. During the end of the course, projects are undertaken so that you get a practical sense of what you have learnt.
Certification courses:
Certification courses are usually specific courses meant for specialization in any topic of fashion designing. Certification courses for fashion designing is very common and popular. You may go in for specialization in retail garments, fashion designing, image building, clothes designing, garment merchandising or textile research.
As well as you have certification course to be a fashion consultant wherein you are taught about the different aspects about what a fashion consultant would be expected to deliver to the clients in terms of fashion, styles, and trends. But certification course to be a fashion consultant would be preferable when you have gained work experience and you feel that you can make a mark in your field.
Becoming a Fashion Consultant:
You do not become a fashion consultant by gaining a degree. Gaining work experience is what counts to become a fashion consultant. Once you are done with degree course or a certified course, your next obvious step would be to get employed in a reputed company or fashion firm where you get exposure to different stages in fashion designing right from the initial sketching part to the end, where your customer is satisfied with the dress. You can work for top-notch fashion designers in their fashion houses or design studios.
Once you have work experience and you are confident that you can work as a freelancing fashion consultant, take the leap. If you aren’t confident enough to work independently, then you can be hired as a fashion consultant in a designing firm. And most importantly start networking and show how you have dressed your friends or family so that your customer base starts growing and you gain familiarity and name. That task of customer building takes time so you can as well plan it in advance and start designing for close friends while studying to become a fashion designer. So by the time you have joined a job, you know that you have built a strong customer base and do follow the suggestions and feedbacks what you get from the networking sites.
Fashion Consultant Interview Questions:
If you would want to work in a reputed fashion house as a fashion consultant you better be prepared well in advance for the interview. Questions asked may be common or standard as in other workplaces and they may be tricky so that they get to know how well you are suited for the job.
Consider these standard questions for a fashion consultant interview:
- Why do you want to work with us?
- Tell us about your work experience.
- How well do you know about this company?
- How are you going to put your skills to use in our company?
- How are you going to solve customer dissatisfaction, if any?
- What are your future career goals?
Consider some tricky questions like:
- If I am a customer, how are you going to sell this dress to me?
- What suggestions would you give to me to improve my dressing sense?
- How did your personal dressing sense evolve after your work experience?
- How will you handle if a customer throws tantrums at you?
As tricky or as standard it may sound, your work experience in the fashion industry will surely help you out in answering all the interview questions satisfactorily. And when you have practical knowledge regarding the latest trends in the industry or if you have any design style which is your USP, then facing these questions and responding to them will be easy and uncomplicated to you.
What are the competence necessities a fashion consultant needs to possess?
A fashion consultant needs to possess basic skills like qualification and work experience. A certified course from a reputed fashion institution is an added bonus. A fashion consultant should have a flair for marketing and networking. And most importantly a fashion consultant should be a fashion icon himself with a keen interest in the latest trends and styles. He should be able to grasp the customer’s taste and be able to dress the customer according to his style while seeing that the customer is also satisfied.
Some other skills which a fashion consultant needs to have and which cannot be ignored are his ability to pursue customer leads and travel when and where it requires. Establishing and maintaining a customer base all the while when adding new customers is a must. Fashion trends change day by day and season by season. So with the ever-evolving trends, it is very necessary that the fashion consultants should keep abreast of all the latest happenings and styles in the world of fashion.
Jobs like that of a fashion consultant are always in demand because people always want to dress up well and for some, it is a matter of their lifestyle and profession. With more and more people being fashion conscious and social networking sites and internet promoting the latest fashion trends, fashion consultants are finding their hands full in it.
So follow the latest trend, design something unique and appealing with your own personal touch and help the client in making his presence felt to the world. Have your own vision and your own design, you will have a flourishing career as a fashion consultant then.
