Well, in case you have been wondering what we have been doing…..it is all about getting our inventory product numbers and color and descriptions in order so that the in-store point of sale will talk to the e-commerce site.  It all seemed so simple! James (our awesome IT guy) would just make it work – right?  until…. we took the webstore photos on a white backdrop the first time, who knew? and so after

the crazy editing, we are now taking them on the blue screen.  FYI, we have over 1500 sku’s which is a lot of product types for a store our size, and that’s a lot of pictures.  Then there are naming pictures and colors for the products no two colors can be the same name unless they are exactly the same rgb# value, then there was changing duplicate numbers, and then there entering more appropriate product descriptions so once we got things on the site, people would want to buy them!!! we are down to the final days though and testing will begin and the launch will come soon!!!!

We had a cool mention on splendicity.com who visited SA VA earlier this month on a press trip.  They visited a crazy amount of places in Philly while here and were kind enough to put us on their blog.

otherwise, we are designing and making all sorts of new clothes!!!!!  Keep your eyes peeled!!

The store is open, the launch party  and Philadelphia Fashion Week are over, and now it is on to the website.  It took us a bit longer than expected to test our site and make sure that all of the technical aspects worked and we are working  but we are testing this weekend and the site will be fully functional this week. We are really trying to create a new platform for buying on line and participating in our fashion community.  And, now that we have a minute to breathe we are starting to reorganize our holiday deliveries to reflect some of the most popular items, and its time to get started on spring (more than a 20 look fashion show previewing silhouettes, it needs to be much more well rounded!)

There is a good reason that I have been absent from blogging over the last week, it was the first Philadelphia Fashion Week and we were crazy busy! All in all, it was a great event.  It was different than the Fashion Weeks of New York, Paris, Milan and London which are typically for industry insiders to plan buying and editorial shots for the coming months.  This was opened to the public and showcased regional designers.

As you know, we had the SA VA launch party only 10 days ago, showing 30 current looks available in the store.  And Fashion Week (in fall) is when designers show their spring collections.   Since we make all of our clothes at SA VA here in Philadelphia, we work on a different time line and have a few hundred styles per season.  So, we chose to show a preview of silhouettes that are inspiration pieces for our spring collections.   (and yes, we only had 9 days between shows and 5 days to sew all of the looks and make all of the jewelry!)  These looks, among many other styles will be available in many textures and colors this coming March.

special thanks this week to everyone working in the Garment Center and Product Development who did an amazing job in preparing for this show in only a few days!