Showpo founder Jane Lu failed in her first business venture and landed herself in debt.
Lu candidly reveals her back story in the latest episode of stylist and presenter Jules Sebastian’s Youtube series Tea With Jules.
Lu, whose parents are from China, started her career as an accountant and business analyst, and she landed a job with a big company at the tender age of 18.
“I always thought the business finance world was a secure world, and as an immigrant, that’s what my parents had instilled in me. But once I started my job, I realised I hated it,” she tells Jules.
So when one of her friends asked her if she wanted to start a business with her, Lu jumped at the opportunity.
“It wasn’t a good business idea, but I hated my job so much so I used it as an excuse to quit,” she says.
One month in to launching Fatboye Group, a concept store featuring emerging designers, her business partner told Lu she didn’t want to do it anymore.
“All of a sudden, I had no job, my business failed, I was in debt and all this happened in the middle of the global financial crisis,” she recalls.
Luckily, Lu soon met another like-minded girl who wanted to start a business – an online store. And so Showpo was born in 2010.
“I wasn’t driven by business success, I wanted to prove people wrong because they thought I had been an idiot for quitting my job and when my first business failed, people were like ‘I told you so’,” she tells Jules.
However, her parents had no idea she had left her corporate career. Jane told them she was still working as an accountant, and said Showpo was just a side business.
“Every morning, I would pretend I’d go into work. I’d put on my suit, grab my empty laptop bag, get on the bus with my mum and go into to the city,” she recalls.
She didn’t tell her parents Showpo was her full-time career until two years into the business.
During the interview with Jules, Lu also shared how the first years of the business were very lean as she was in debt, and she had learnt from her failure.
“We bought stock on consignment, which meant we didn’t have to pay for it until it had sold. We found photographer friends who took photos for us as favours, and models who would pose in exchange for free clothes, and I built the website up myself,” she says.
“One night, I was walking through Pyrmont after a night out when I remembered I had flyers in my bag, so I thought I might as well do some fly-dropping in the middle of night. I was constantly hustling and bustling,” she recalls.
The business is now a global, multimillion dollar company and in 2016, Lu was listed in the prestigious Forbes Asia’s ’30 under 30’ list.
“The best part is that my parents, who gave up so much for me to immigrate here, don’t have to stress about money anymore. I can’t believe I can offer them that,” she tells Jules.