Secondly, we created a Twitter account.

The link to our twitter is:
http://twitter.com/euroflections

We began by tweeting about our blog and then started to venture in to tweeting about specific artists (for example Jedward) which helped us to pick up fans. We've only been tweeting since about midnight on Friday and already we have had many of our tweets retweeted, favourited and even had over 20 random people from across the world follow us. We feel that the twitter account we set up has been an invaluable tool in promoting our blog and drawing people in to read our content. After 36 hours, we have 22 followers, having had 30 at one point, and we are confident that with more time and more content we could attract many more.

Our twitter is important, as it directs anyone looking for certain things to our blog. Over the past 24 hours, fans of Jedward, Aggun, Gaitana and Eva Boto have all found our blog through our twitter profile, when googling and searching would have taken a much longer period of time. The Eurovision blogging market is competitive, but we feel twitter is the perfect forum for our wit and charm, in order to win people to our blog.


Also, we created a youtube account ( http://www.youtube.com/user/Euroflections ) which shall be used as a way of communicating further with social media websites.

Sustainability of the Eurovision Blog:
One of the biggest potential problems with our specific blog on all things Eurovision is that after the event, you could argue that there is no longer any point for our blog. The purpose of the task is to primarily create a name for ourselves on the internet through social media and we hope to achieve this amongst the massive community of people who follow and love the Eurovision Song Contest.

Furthermore, to justify our specific topic we have gone in to more detail on this because we feel it needs to be addressed for you to really gather the full potential of our series of social media blogs. After the Eurovision we will be looking at other peoples opinions of the contest as well as the aftermath of the contest, both on Baku and Azerbaijan as a country but also on what the artists do.

Then, before we know it, the Eurovision Song Contest 2013 season will begin, in about late July or early August – we’ll start to get line-ups, news headlines as well as updates from the winning city. Then, before we know it it’ll be main season again and unlike this year where it was quite rushed to the late date that we set the blogs up, we’ll have time to further review the songs and perhaps even full National Finals with live blogs.

The future is very bright and the sustainability of a blog of this type is brilliant – it really has the potential to take off and so many people, both in European Committee countries and other areas of the world such as Australia enjoy Eurovision. This is indicative that there is a large market for a blog of this type and we hope to fill the gap in the market!

We're more than happy to answer any questions you may have!

Just read some of the blog and looked at the twitter page and I think it looks great I am going to a eurovision party this year and the drinking game looks really fun. Good luck with the task.

Edit: Oops, didn't realise the boardroom already started

Thank you for the lovely comments!

Shame that the viewers opinion wasn't taken in to account seeing as all but one (who reasoned it as being the fact she didn't like Eurovision) have said ours deserved to win.

Hope you continue to watch the DS Apprentice!

Bump for the latest task!

Good evening, and welcome to our pitch, where today we will be bringing you our fantastic new clothing line ....


We're here to present to you our first collection if sixteen items, which we feel really exemplify our tagline of 'Keeping music environmentally sound!

If the words fashion, festivals, music or nature appeal to you then our brand of clothing is for you. The concept behind our indie clothing line Music Meadow is that we’re combining two aspects that are a big part of people’s lives, especially in the summer months. These strands that we’re using were inspired by our target customer, which I will now explain.

As everybody knows, music festivals are the highlight of many people’s summer and we have created a clothing line to suit the needs of anyone that will be hanging around the outdoors. Our range of stylish and comfortable clothes will appeal to both male and female as we have created a carefully planned selection of clothes to suit all needs. In our collection we have combined comfort and style, while keeping inconvenience to a minimum. It’s a well-known fact that “indie” is a hugely popular fashion and in addition, indie music is also becoming more and more popular. We feel now is the exact time to be releasing a clothing range that combines both indie fashion and music. Festival chic is an area in itself at the moment, and we would like to take advantage of that. We have no doubt that this will grasp the interest of festival goers and people who love the outdoors in general.

The outdoors also plays a big part in our line. We have decided to make our clothes eco-friendly by using organic materials where possible. The colours we’re using are very earthy, cool colours to enhance the theme of our line. As festivals are set outdoors and anyone that goes to them is, presumably, very comfortable with nature, it is extremely appropriate to have an eco-friendly clothing range. Nature-friendly fashion is becoming popular amongst fashion buyers, including celebrities such as Emma Watson. So, aside from being great for the earth, it’s also becoming a popular trend.

A specific event that was a major influence in our collection was this years Coachella festival. Coachella is the first major festival of the year, taking place in LA to an audience packed full of trend-setters. Our collection is hugely inspired by some of the main trends we saw at Coachella, as well as our own personal ideas. Celebrities such as Katy Perry, Chloe Sevigny, Vanessa Hudgens, Austin Butler, Nina Dobrev & Ian Somerhalder, and their festival wardrobes all contributed to our vision. Ultimately, we’re incredibly satisfied that we could see every piece within our collection working at such an event. Festival fashion is a huge deal - having found numerous magazine articles on the subject, advising people on what works best, we really feel it’s the perfect market to explore.

If you’re not into festivals, and eco-friendly clothes aren’t on the top of the list, the best thing about our collection is that it is still suitable for you – we feel our clothes have an appeal beyond the festival. We’ve designed the clothes so that they are simple and bang on trend for the summer. The clothes we’re producing are very stylish and they wouldn’t look out of place as day-to-day wear anywhere, with many of our pieces being classic style staples.

We believe that both male and female buyer s would absolutely love what we’ve come up with and we’re hoping that you’ll agree!

Our place in the market
Music Meadow is almost unique in the duality of the concept behind it – it focuses clearly on two strands important to those within our target market, music & the environment, leading to the result of an ethically produced, environmentally friendly, fair trade range of festival wear, that features organic materials – perfect both for festivals and for everyday life in the summer.

As our name suggests, music is a big inspiration for our collection, with the festival being the place our design is geared towards. Everything we have included in our collection we feel is something a customer could wear at a festival, which we feel is reflected in the practical appeal of the clothing in order to meet the different demands of the festival experience. We don’t, however, feel that in order to be practical you have to sacrifice on the style front.

The environmentally friendly side to our collection places us firmly in a particular niche of ethical clothing; however this niche is a rapidly expanding one currently infiltrating the mainstream markets. Brands such as People Tree, Loomstate, Feral Childe and Studio NY are all equally as well known for being as environmentally friendly, while major players on the high street such as GAP and H&M have recently began releasing specifically environmentally friendly and ethical collections. However, during our researching process, we realised that most environmentally conscious clothes are either aimed towards the higher ends of the market, or lacking in personality and vibrancy, a gap in the market we feel we can exploit.

From a design perspective, we feel our collection is lively, youthful and energetic, a perfect fit for the festival season and the summer in general. Reminiscent, on a stylistic level, of the likes of Topshop, Topman, American Apparel or House of Holland, we feel there are numerous outlets for the type of clothing Music Meadow represents. As well as on indie clothing based websites such as Modcloth, Music Meadow would fit naturally as a concession into stores and online in places such as Urban Outfitters, Selfridges, Topshop/man and ASOS, reflecting it being both current, on trend and somewhat aspirational, yet at the same time moderately priced and attainable to its target market.

Instead of putting a specific age range on the target market of our brand, we decided to aim it towards people of certain interests. In our case, we decided to go with a line of clothing for festival goers and environmentalists. The feel of our collection is earthy, relaxed and casual but chic and our target market is anyone that description appeals to.We feel that, coming up to the summer months, there is an abundance of music lovers all around the country flocking to numerous different festivals taking place. We know comfortable clothing would be number one priority for a lot of these people, but after some research, it’s clear that festival summer fashion is extremely important as well. Consequently, we decided to combine the two and come up with an indie collection of comfortable festival fashion.

The second aspect of our target market is aimed towards the environmentally friendly. The reason for this is that most festivals are held outdoors and we feel it fits in perfectly with our theme. Everyone going to these outdoor festivals will certainly feel comfortable with the earth and nature and we feel the added element of our clothes being made with these materials, would attract more people to our collection. Although there have been other environmentally friendly clothing collections made, we feel ours is a bit different and more attractive than those already made.

Conversely, while we don’t have an age range for our target market, the clothes themselves are designed based on clothes that have been shown to appeal to people under 35 years old. While this isn’t a set target, we believe the majority of our buyers would come within the 18-35 age range. In addition to this, the majority of festival goers are certainly within this age range and are more likely to buy clothes from retailers that sell our type of designs.

In conclusion, our target market was the inspiration behind the whole idea. We developed the clothes after we had decided on our target and while we were deciding on one, we immediately felt we had to cater to the huge market of people that go to festivals as it really was an opportunity not to be missed.

The original Music Meadow range is a capsule collection, consisting of sixteen items – both male, female and gender neutral items. Every piece in our range we feel can be worn with another item, something we feel distinguishes our collection from others – there are no clashing colours, prints or textures here. The collection centres around an image we find particularly appealing– with the image itself providing a print/pattern basis for many of our clothes, as well as providing the colour scheme for our items.

Item #1
The first item in our collection is a multi layered top, consisting of a bra-like undergarment and a fitted lacy over top. This top is ideal for the warmer summer weather of festivals, is interesting enough to stand out by itself, yet also can act as a layer in a wider outfit. Available in black, white, muted orange and grey-purple.
RRP - £20

Item #2
The second item from Music Meadow is a classic summer dress. The summer dress is a fashion fix that never goes out of style, and remains a pivotal part of any festival wardrobe. Our dresses are available in two main variants
a) A tank-dress, with a relatively loose, slouchy silhouette, which finishes above the knee.
b) A subtle mullet-style dress that hits just below the knee on the front, and extends further on the back.
The dresses are available in black, muted orange and grey-purple, as well as in patterned form.
RRP – a) – £34; b) £36

Item #3
The third item in our collection is a daring, hooded, stylish poncho. This item is more suitable as a cover up during the evenings and cooler days of a festival, and provides the perfect alternative to a hoody or cardigan, and is made from a lightweight yet warm cotton blend fabric. The ponchos are available in black, muted orange and grey-purple.
RRP - £32

Item #4
The fourth item from our collection is another vintage inspired item currently on trend - high-waisted denim shorts. Comfortable and fashionable, these shorts go with vitually anything. The denim used is light but durable, whilst the hems of the shorts have a roll up inspired effect. The shorts are available in three different washes – indigo, black & acid wash.
RRP - £28

Item #5
The fifth item from our collection is the classic skinny jean. Versatile, comfortable and wearable in any weather type, the skinny jean is flattering to any silhouette. Our jeans are close fitted, without being uncomfortably tight or super-skinny, and made from lightweight but durable denim, which can easily be worn with wellies.
RRP - £40

Item #6
The next item in our collection is the headband. Again, made from organic cotton and extremely useful for getting your hair out of your face for those long days at the festival, and still looking fashionable. This headband comes in grey-purple, muted orange, and black.
RRP - £5

Item #7
The seventh item in our collection is a simple tank top. A versatile classic, the tank can be worn in almost any way, with our variation having a loose, slouchy, 80s inspired fit. Available in grey-purple, muted orange, black and also in our signature print.
RRP - £16

Item #8
The eight item from the Music Meadow collection are wellies, which are available in a multitude of sizes, and are gender-neutral. Wellies are essential wear for festivals, and with our range, you can look the party whilst sluding through the famous festival mud, whilst keeping your feet comfortable. Our boots are made from fair-trade rubber, are super comfortable and soft, yet durable, and come in a number of plain colours, with the rubber sole in a contrasting colour, adding an extra twist of style.
RRP - £60

Item #9
The ninth item from our collection is a simple, black fedora hat, another gender-neutral item. The fedora is an hat with a rich heritage, and numerous links to popular culture and music, in particular the rude boy and ska subcultures of the 60s and 80s, respectively. The fedora has been enjoying a renaissance in recent years thanks to the likes of Jameela Jamil and Olly Murs, and is the ultimate expression of confidence, as well as a practical sun-blocking device. A must for any festival.
RRP - £25

Item #10
The tenth is a simple, plain, fitted deep-v neck T-shirt, available in white, grey and muted orange. This is an incredible simple and versatile item, wearable by itself, or under another garment. The lightweight nature of the fabric means it’s easily transported and perfect for warmer weather, and a classic festival statement. Available in muted orage, white, black and grey-purple.
RRP - £18

Item #11
The eleventh item from Music Meadow is an oversized vest top. Vests are ever popular festival wear, thanks to their lightweight nature, perfect for hot weather, and ability to act as a layer amidst a larger outfit. Our vest is made from extra-soft cotton, and is an excellent statement.
RRP - £16

Item #12
The twelfth item is a fitted, crew necked t-shirt. The t-shirt has a relatively slim fit, as is made from fair trade, extra soft cotton, perfect to wear by itself, or as a layer. Available in muted orange, black, white, grey-purple and our signature print.
RRP - £18

Item #13
The thirteenth item from our collection is denim shorts, available in three different washes – an indgo wash, black, and acid. Denim shorts are a popular and versatile choice for both festivals and everyday life, with our shorts being relatively fitted, and finishing above the knee. The shorts are designed to be worn relatively low waisted on the hips, featuring multiple layers of pockets, including some with zips.
RRP - £28

Item #14
The fourteenth item from our collection are classic skinny jeans. An every day staple that every man should own, our jeans are fitted without being super-skinny, and thus are flattering on consumers of any size, with the added benefit of being a constant style fixture, evoking the mod fashions of the 1960s, and enjoying a resurgence in recent years. The jeans are low waisted, with the pockets being lined with our signature pattern.
RRP - £40

Item #15
The fifteenth item from our collection is a denim shirt, available in three different washes – indigo, black and pale. The denim shirt is again, immensely popular at the moment and incredibly versatile – it can be worn alone, buttoned in numerous different ways, or as an overgarment.
RRP - £30

Item #16
The final item from our collection is a black leather weave belt. A perfect addition to any outfit, this belt is practical and stylish, remaining a constant style staple within recent years, with the soft leather weave adding an interesting texture.
RRP - £16

We have handpicked two items from our collection, which we feel exemplifies everything Music Meadow stands for. We feel our collection on the whole consists of simple style fixtures that are easily visualised, so we have selected two of the more interesting items we feel will help you understand our line better.

Unfortunately, neither of us on Team Reflections are graphic artists, so our drawings are a bit basic, and for that we apologize, but we do promise these garments would be much better in the flesh, and we hope you can see our collection more clearly through them.

The first item is the mullet dress, featured here in orange! The fit of the dress is designed to be similar to this.

http://i45.tinypic.com/33bq1bm.jpg

It retails at £36.

Secondly, we have the men’s oversized vest, which is featured here in our signature print, and is intended to have a similar fit to this.

http://oi45.tinypic.com/2v2wrw7.jpg

It retails at £16.

Investment in Music Meadow would be absolutely pivotal to our brand. Our line has numerous plans for expansion, all of which would be aided by your investment.

Firstly, our first collection was just sixteen items, something we’d like to expand upon in future collections. Money invested within Music Meadow would go towards the costs of materials and production, as well as to sourcing the cleanest, most environmentally friendly and socially conscious fabrics out there in the world. We really would appreciate investment to help us towards a better future for the line, which would include company expansion in different areas, such as more clothes and better production of these clothes.

As our company expands, keeping our product at its core values is of paramount importance to us, and the ethical, environmental nature of our company would remain intact. We want to make Music Meadow a well-known fashion label for all the right reasons and we would thoroughly enjoy coming up with new and innovative ways to make the company bigger and better.

The ultimate goal of our company is to follow a similar trajectory to House of Holland – to expand from a simple collection of clothing privately distributed, to an online presence, to a concession within another store, with the ultimate goal of having our own Music Meadow retail outlet, to house our extended ranges. If you invest in us, this will all be made possible and Music Meadows will become the great fashion label we believe it can be.

Thank you for reading our pitch, we hope you're as passionate about our clothes as we are, and would be happy to answer any of your questions!

Great presentation, everyone! I had a question regarding material costs, etc. I know now that you weren't asked to take production costs of clothing into account, but I do have a question regarding your target audience and the materials you use. A lot of people who are in the target demographic (believe me, a lot of my friends are) who care about sustainability of their clothes also care about fair trade and equitable/not oppressive production of clothing. I was wondering if you have any steps in place to cater to those people - I feel that that would help you sell more. And if you haven't, not a criticism, just something to think about.

Also, a lot of music festivals (Coachella, Lollapalooza, etc.) happen in the hotter months of the year during the summer. A lot of people wear tank tops and the like out of comfort. I was wondering if your line of clothing might be too fashion-forward or conscious for a lot of the people at music festivals who wear clothes at these events more for comfort than a statement?

Thank you for the questions!

In answer to your first question, that is definitely something we considered/would like to include in our product! Our aim is to create an entirely socially responsible clothing range - I think an idea me and Louise dicussed was a range that was kind to the people who produce the materials as well as the planet as a whole! I thought we expressed that idea, but reading back we did only hint at it, but yeah, socially responsible as a whole package was the idea we were going for.

Secondly, the idea behind our clothes is for them to be super comfortable as well as stylish - we don't think you particularly need to sacrifice one for the other! Some of our clothing items are real statement pieces - the printed clothes especially, but if they're too out there for a buyer, we also offer clothes in simpler, plainer forms as well! Our collection here, we think, is especially designed for the summer months, especially taking into account British summer time, where the weather is a lot of the time very changeable - we really do feel our pieces are perfect for festival season, and hope you agree!

Also, we considered production/material costs throughout the task, if you wanted to ask a question on that we'll do our best to answer it!

I hope that's helped!

Excellent presentation, guys; it was very detailed indeed and your line is very impressive.

However, i wondered if you think this is sustainable all year round? I saw you acknowledged that the range could be worn away from festivals but it is still very summer focused; what would your business be doing for the rest of the year?

Hi Pete, thanks for the compliment and the question!

And the answer is absolutely! Yes, we're aiming it right now at festival goers, mainly due to the time of year, but we really believe our line of clothes is very stylish and very "in" and they could be work at anytime during the summer no matter what you're doing. The way we went about designing them was viewing current fashion and seeing what was on trend, as well as obviously festival fashion.

As for what we would be doing, we'd be working on developing new clothing to fit it in with our next season of merchandise. All companies have different clothing for different seasons and the festival clothing is simply "this season". There would always be something new and just as stylish coming out of our brand no matter what the time of year.

Thanks for the question!

My question is on the durability of your clothing line.

I know many peeps who go to these concerts and they usually pack just any old rags and certainly not pricey clothing which IMO is what you are offering to this market.

I can see huge potential in your summer wear though.

What can you do to ease my concerns about this?

Hi Mr_XcX!

At first, we thought that festival wear was all "old rags" too but from some research we discovered that, in fact, a lot of people really care what they wear to these festivals. Obviously people go to festivals for the music but they also go to socialise and make friends and confidence is a big part of this. What we offer people is the clothes that provide this confidence. Our clothes line is comfortable and fashionable and we really believe that Music Meadow would be a big success in this area.

Thanks for the question!

Okay, I can see potential.

I will be thinking about if I should invest or not