Josephine Philips, founder of Sojo talks about sustainable fashion, tech and being a woman in business
The last couple of years have been very interesting for women in business, especially in tech. Female-founded tech-powered tools have been taking the world by storm – By Rotation founded by Eshita Kabra and Kids O’Clock headed by Laura Roso Vidrequin are two good examples – yet only 2% of Venture capital money goes to female entrepreneurs.
Josephine Philips, founder of Sojo, created her business at 23 years old and she has already raised 2.4 million dollars in funds and signed partnerships with amazing brands such as Ganni. We spoke to her on our podcast Pretty Good Business, about being taken seriously as a young woman in the tech space, sustainable fashion and starting a successful business straight out of university.
Can you tell us more about your business?
In a nutshell, Sojo connects customers to local seamsters’ businesses through an app. Our bicycle delivery service helps people get their clothes altered or repaired really easily. I like to describe it as a Deliveroo-like service, but for clothing, alterations and repairs!
How did you come up with the idea?
I feel like it’s a stereotypical entrepreneurial journey, but the idea came to me from a personal problem. I made my move away from fast fashion about two years ago and I turned to secondhand clothes as a sustainable way to shop. But when you shop secondhand all the items are one of a kind so you can’t ask for your size. So I was finding pieces that I really loved that weren’t my size and there was nothing I could do about it because I wanted to alter them but I didn’t know how to sew. I didn’t know about local seamsters or anything like that – I found the whole process difficult. People my age are used to having things at their fingertips thanks to technology, so I thought I might as well create a tech-powered solution myself!
I had the idea in my third year of university, so the moment I finished my last exam, I was full-time on Sojo. Between my first and second year of university, I worked at Depop HQ, which gave me a great experience in the sustainable fashion, tech startup space. I suppose it was a bit of foreshadowing because I really enjoyed working there.
When did you think, “I’m going to start this, I’m going to do it”?
I would say it was when I was facing the problem myself. I was going from shop to shop and realizing that every time I tried to buy something, I couldn’t because clothes were never my size. I wanted to alter the clothes, but I wanted it to be an easy process.
What was the process like?
I had the concept in my head, and for three months, I was just trying to educate myself on the startup landscape and what it takes to run a company, build a company, or found a startup. That was lots of books, an obscene amount of podcasts, and also going to a lot of events. After that, I did a lot of market research because something that might be a problem for one person won’t necessarily be a problem for a large number of people, so I had to make sure that my idea was scalable.
Then the day after my exams were done, I set up a test run to essentially prove the concept. I got people to fill in a form about what they wanted to be done to their clothes. I posted on Instagram asking if anyone wanted to try it and we ended up being oversubscribed, which is fantastic, a great way to get market validation.
And then I did it myself, I cycled around London, I dropped the clothes off without taking any commission because it wasn’t an official business yet, and that proved to me that the service was definitely needed. So I put my savings from selling clothes on Depop towards getting two recent graduate software engineers to work part-time on building the app.
Do you think that people are starting to care more about the longevity of their clothes?
Yes, definitely. Our mission is to make clothing alterations and repairs mainstream. We are really trying to change the culture around how you look at your clothes.
The lack of consumption is the key to sustainability. I think the pandemic has done great things for slowing people’s relationship with buying in general, and then specifically with fashion.
How did you approach the seamsters?
A lot of them don’t have an online presence, so I found them through recommendations, Google searches and just walking around the streets. And then, I would physically go into the shop to introduce myself and the business. There was tentativeness at first from all of them because, for a lot of them, they’ve never had an outside involvement in their business and they’ve also never had technological involvement. And the notion of getting things altered without seeing the person or pinning it was complicated to ‘accept’ for them. But now we have some amazing partners, and they can see how Sojo can help them expand their businesses and reach a different target audience.
So how does the app work?
First, you go on the app and type in your postcode. Then we’ll show you your local seamsters, and you will choose which one you want to use. The aim is to have two options for you, a high-end and a low-end, so you can pick the pricing that you would like to go for. And then essentially, you put in what you need to be done, and we show you the alterations and repairs that the seamster can provide on them. We also have small tutorial videos showing you how to take measurements, etcetera. Then you add to your basket, you schedule the collection date and time, and we sort out the rest.
What would you say you have learned about building a business?
So many things! Every aspect of building a team or hiring or being a manager, or trying to convey your message. And then also building an entire community on social media and learning how to do social media marketing and creating content. So basically creating a brand but also everything about investor relations and fundraising. I feel like the question is so broad, and the learnings are so so extensive because, as a solopreneur, I have been involved in every single aspect of running the business. I think that every day is a learning curve.
The app is only in London for now, are you planning on expanding? How do you see your company’s future in the next couple of years?
Of course, 100%, we are expanding. Now that we sort of proved that there’s a market for it, people are interested in it, it’s working in London, people are happy, we definitely want to expand in the next few months, and will expand to other UK cities. In a year, we hope to be in all the major UK cities, and then we are coming for Europe and then worldwide domination, you know how it goes!
What would you tell a woman that wants to start a business in tech?
Build your confidence. The confidence for me came from the fact that I knew the market so well, I had done everything concerning the business myself, from reaching out to seamsters to biking orders around London but also the marketing and the community building. Just learn everything there is to know about your business and your market so nobody can tell you that you don’t know what you are doing.
Is there a project or achievement you are most proud of?
A few months ago I had a full feature in British Vogue, and that’s got to be an achievement and a half! It’s very much like a career highlight. And knowing that I created something meaningful enough to get that kind of accolade is wild. So I think that’s definitely something that I’m really, really proud of.
