Bibhu Mohapatra Reflects On 10 Years In Business

by Eddie Roche

Bibhu Mohapatra celebrated ten years in business with a special show at Spring Studios this week. The Daily spoke with the designer backstage before the show to reflect on the past decade and what he’s looking forward to ahead. 

Congratulations on 10 years!
It’s all about the people who have been with me on this journey. All the women and men and my friends and family. It’s a good feeling to look back and identify the things I’ve learned from and the mistakes I’ve made.  We have new partners in India and our sales team is now based out of Paris. The next decade will be about aggressively growing the brand. The last few years have been difficult as we were restructuring. This business is very difficult. In ten years, the formula has changed.

What’s the plan now?
Now it’s about staying connected with our consumer and telling an authentic story about the product.

Bibhu Mohapatra (Courtesy)

You announced your bankruptcy in 2017 but were able to come back, which is a rarity. How did you do it?
We started at a time when the world was falling apart. In order to survive and keep the brand growing, we had to take on those debts. Now we have new partners and it’s a brand new day. It’s super exciting. I have a great team. We’re moving to a bigger space.  You have to do it with honest or else it doesn’t work. I took last season off to finalize my reorganization.

What are you most proud of in the ten years?
The people who have been there for me.  I learned a lot in the ten years and now I’m ready for the next ten to twenty years with the right partners behind me. I feel like I can focus on the product and how to grow the brand. A lot of the Fall collection features some of the Bibhu classics that have done really well and then some new pieces mixed in.

Peruse the Fall 2019 collection below! 

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