A local couple has proved that you can build a flourishing fashion empire in Adelaide and keep it in Adelaide.

For a business to grow from two staff to 74 in seven years, with balance sheets showing turnover that more than doubles each year, would be remarkable for any business, but in SA’s fashion industry – where the trend has been for businesses to fold – it’s extraordinary.

Australian Fashion Labels is owned by husband and wife team Dean and Melanie Flintoft, who started the company in 2007 with their founding label Finders Keepers.

Finders Keepers fashion. Photo: Supplied

Dean says Australian Fashion Labels will soon launch two new labels, bringing the company’s total number of brands to seven, each producing 11 collections of 100 pieces each per year. That’s almost 150 pieces of clothing to sew and sell each week – it’s hardly surprising the Flintofts found they needed extra staff.

Australian Fashion Labels was borne from adversity.

When the GFC hit Adelaide in 2007, Melanie and Dean closed up their Rundle Street retail store, Loco.

“No-one bought $200 dresses anymore, so we needed a new plan,” explains Dean. “We started a new label – Finders Keepers – which Melanie designed herself but we had it manufactured in Indonesia to keep the price point under $100.”

Seven years later, Melanie is the creative director at Australian Fashion Labels with 25 designers working under her. Dean is the managing director.

As well as Finders Keepers, the company produces garments under the labels Cameo, Keepsake, The Fifth and Jaggar, with a men’s label and a new mature women’s label soon to be released.

Australian Fashion Labels brands sell in 3500 stores in 20 countries globally, including Harrods, Neiman Marcus, Nordstrom, Nasty Gal, Anthropologie and ASOS. It has an online store, Fashion Bunker, and earlier this year opened a retail store on the corner of Rundle Mall and Pulteney Street, BNKR, the first in a series of stores to open in major cities around the world. The business also produces fashion accessories and homewares.

So how have they achieved such success?

“It’s all about talent,” explains Dean. “The Adelaide design school (TAFE Adelaide campus) is next door to us and all third-year Fashion Design students spend time in our business doing work experience, so we cherry-pick from the best of them.”

He says most Australian Fashion Labels brands are designed for girls in the 16 to 30 age bracket, so it makes sense that most of their designers are around 23 to 24 years old. “The designers are the girls they are designing for; they wear the clothes they are designing.”

Sometimes the TAFE students don’t even finish their certificate before they are snapped up by Australian Fashion Labels.

“We often do strange things like employ people without a lot of experience but lots of vision,” says Melanie.

“Starting as a receptionist with us is a good way to end up as a designer,” adds Dean. “You can always train someone who is talented for the job, but you can’t teach talent.”

A Cameo label design. Photo: Supplied

The fortunate thing about being one of the only fashion businesses in Adelaide, he says, is that there’s no competition for that talent.

“If we were in Sydney or Melbourne, it would be a different story. Sometimes interstate fashion houses try to poach our staff, but they want to stay in Adelaide. So do we – Adelaide’s been good for us. We’re both from Adelaide. We want to live here. Our families are here.”

Running an international business, the Flintofts do have to travel a lot.

“Every two months we are away for two to three weeks, but Adelaide is quite central to Asia, the US and the eastern states,” Dean says.

And these days, he adds, technology such as email, the internet and social media means you can be based anywhere.

“Social media has been a big contributor to the success of the business,” says Dean. “A lot of girls become obsessed with brands and follow them and share them on Facebook and Pinterest.”

While the design and marketing work is carried out locally, most of the product is manufactured overseas, which helps keep down the cost.

“We have a full-time team in China and a fittings team in Adelaide,” explains Dean. “Most of our product is made in China, and some leather pieces are out of Indonesia. We went through 35 factories before we found the right ones.

“We try to keep a little bit through Adelaide. It’s expensive, but the quality is good. There is one factory left in Adelaide and we don’t want him to close down. If he closes down and another fashion business starts in Adelaide, there will be nowhere for them to go.”