The Fastest Growing Fashion House In The Country: Shivani Poddar of FabAlley

Shivani Poddar, CEO of FabAlley, had an epiphany at 25. While traveling across India for her corporate job, she noticed a huge gap. In the country, there were no homegrown brands that sold trendy yet affordable clothes. She took a leap of faith after realizing this. After quitting her investment banking career, Shivani founded High Street Essentials Pvt. Ltd.

Shivani quit her investment banking career to start High Street Essentials Pvt. Ltd. “I knew that e-commerce was the future and so bringing the two together would be the best way to start a fashion house,” she recollects. 

A fashion landscape where a gazillion apparel brands come and go every week?

Shivani, along with her team, conducted extensive surveys to understand the fashion needs of urban Indian women. “We are a rapid fashion brand,” adds Shivani. Their focus on creating capsule collections made FabAlley one of the most purchased brands across e-commerce giants like Amazon, Myntra, and Ajio. 

In a recent chat, she talked to us about what it takes to helm one of India’s biggest fashion houses. The last hour of my workday is for strategizing and planning for the days ahead. In 18 months I got the opportunity to work across the country in cities like Pondicherry, Bangalore, Kolkata, and Chennai among others, and also abroad in Singapore. From an illustrious career in finance to your fashion brand.

what inspired the switch?

While working at Avendus as an investment banker, I got to meet many young and brilliant entrepreneurs whose journeys inspired me to do something of my own. I’ve grown up seeing my entrepreneur parents charting their journeys and stories, so I knew I’d take up entrepreneurship at some point in my life. While working on fundraisers for many eCommerce clients at Avendus, I realized there’s a huge gap in online fashion, and not just online, but fashion on the whole in the country.

Also, I knew that eCommerce was the future so bringing the two together would be the best way to start a fashion house. When we started HSE, I was a 25-year-old entrepreneur learning the ways of business and it taking it one day at a time. 

Having said that I envision this company to serve women with the best of fashion for decades to come, and so this honestly just feels like the beginning. In a scenario where we have a new fashion brand coming up every day,

what made you confident that you could make it work?

While there are thousands of fashion brands in the country today, each stands for something unique. Both Faballey and Indya, have their unique customer base and service their needs in a way that no other brand can. I was doing very well as an investment banker and had thought of working in the field for at least 8-10 years before starting something of my own. 

My single biggest achievement has been building HSE as a house of brands that people love, that employees love to work for, and that gets all the love from the numerous underprivileged women and children whom we as a company are humbly able to support in getting educated, trained vocationally and building a life for them. In my journey as an entrepreneur, there have been so many ups and downs and so many instances that have made me feel like I didn’t have it in me to stand up the next day. 

From designs to sales, everything is available in numbers, and understanding these will chart out your future as a fashion professional. It’s amazing how you can switch up your look from morning to night or from one day to the other wearing the same outfit but with a simple addition of some statement jewels. This is the best way to repeat your outfits and look stylish every time. Traveling is another way I like to unwind.

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