Design your dreams here at Hashboosh! This start-up sells crowd-designed fashion

These IIM-K graduates have created an amazing platform for designers to crowd-design their couture and make it sell
Hashboosh is probably India’s first crowd-designed fashion store, where designers can see their designs come to life without too much hassle
Hashboosh is probably India’s first crowd-designed fashion store, where designers can see their designs come to life without too much hassle

What is the only dream of a designer? To launch their own product line, to express their creativity and to have thousands of people wear your creations, of course. Hashboosh is probably India’s first crowd-designed fashion store, where designers can see their designs come to life without too much hassle. At Hashboosh, one has to submit their designs to one of their design challenges, spread the word so that one earns a lot of votes and pre-orders. And finally, if one hits the predetermined target started by the challenge, their designs are sold on Hashboosh’s online store. You can probably understand why, for designers, this start-up is a dream come true. 

Where did they get this idea? “Hashboosh started as an academic project when Dhibin, Ravi, Sethu and myself were doing our Executive Postgraduate programme at IIM Kozhikode. We then started working on different aspects of the business through projects for other papers like finance, marketing and strategy etc, and for the final 10-credit Business Plan project, we submitted Hashboosh’s blueprint as we know it today,” said Javed Anaz, Hashboosh’s Co-Founder. “We got an A+ for the project. By then we were already toying with the idea of taking Hashboosh live, and finally, all of us quit our jobs to start it,” Anaz added.

Design your own dreams: Hashboosh is probably India’s first crowd-designed fashion store

So how exactly does it work? “Our products are designed by designers from around the country who participate in Hashboosh’s design challenges. Winners are chosen by public votes, so the most popular designs are manufactured and sold by us. This ensures that Hashboosh always has unique and fresh collections (40 new styles every month). Our products include kurtis, tops, tunics and dresses at this point and we intend to add to more product categories in the near future,” explained Anaz. Each product carries the designer’s name as part of the branding. “Designers also earn a royalty from the sale of their designs,” he added.

How do a bunch of IIM grads cut it in the fashion business? “All of us were new to the industry, so we did an extensive study of the market, supply chain, production and sales over the first year. During this time, we soft-launched the designer platform, started selling online and through boutiques owned by friends and built the core team,” said Anaz, speaking about when they first launched the platform in February 2016. Since the feedback from the designers and customers was encouraging, by the end of 2016 they started scaling up and began selling through larger stores across Kerala.

Winners are chosen by public votes, so the most popular designs are manufactured and sold by us. This ensures that Hashboosh always has unique and fresh collections (40 new styles every month)

Javed Anaz, Co-Founder

“In 2017, we expanded to Tamil Nadu as well. We also sell online through unique associations. For example, we ran a design challenge in collaboration with voonik.com where the winning designs are sold exclusively on Voonik. We are currently running similar challenges with stores like Pothys as well,” he explained.

If you think the company’s name is outrageous, listen to this backstory, “The hunt for the name was hilarious. We first came up with the name AWDASD. It was impossible to get people to pronounce it and the arguments about changing the name ran for months. Finally, we came up with Hashboosh — which is Malayalam slang for high fashion with a hint of snobbery. ‘Hash’ also represents ‘trend’ and ‘Boosh’, in urban slang, translates roughly to ‘awesome’. So it kind of made sense and fit well with what we do,” said Anaz.

Bringing in innovation, uniqueness and vogue through their designs
Improving Industry inefficiency
A platform for designers to launch themselves into the market
Explore and experiment with a wide variety of fabrics
Bring in something never seen before, something unique

By the end of 2019, the start-up intends to be present in 100 stores across India, set-up exclusive design-experience stores, and partner with at least five online partners. “We would also have more than 2000 designers participating in our challenges,” Anaz added.

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