Bridal Reloved is making brides the centre of attention

Britain’s wedding industry is worth around £10bn each year according to hitched, the wedding-planning website. And thanks to the legalisation of same-sex marriage in England, Scotland and Wales in 2014, there have been even more blushing brides on the lookout for their dream gown. But it was more a case of personal experience that prompted Kate Atkinson to start Bridal Reloved, a chain of stores selling pre-owned designer wedding dresses for a fraction of the price. “I was trying – and failing – to sell my own wedding dress,” she recalls. “I couldn’t find any high-street shops to take it and most brides weren’t comfortable buying it from me online.”

Spotting a gap in the market, Atkinson realised she’d stumbled upon the perfect business idea. And given her temping role at a local school had just come to an end, the timing seemed perfect. Within six weeks, she’d ploughed her personal savings into opening a store in Beverley, stocking 30 second-hand dresses to test the waters. “I just figured I had nothing to lose by giving it a shot and, luckily, it proved very popular,” she says.

But it wasn’t just a sprinkling of good fortune that helped the concept take off. It also helped that Atkinson knew her target market inside out: she’d been a bride herself and was also a seasoned bridesmaid, having been wedding dress shopping on more than one occasion with her sister and friends. “I knew what it felt like to try a dress on in a boutique and had seen brides spoken to rudely,” she says. “I wanted to do things differently and make sure that the bride felt like an absolute star.” And so Bridal Reloved was conceived with the bride – not her entourage – in mind. Dresses can be tried on by appointment only so women have the shop to themselves and receive one-to-one attention from the salesperson. “It’s a privilege to be in the room when a woman first sets eyes on her dream dress and we want to make that experience as memorable and special as possible,” says Atkinson.

Once she got the keys to her first store, the entrepreneur threw herself into the task of researching the bridal market, speaking to people from the industry, learning about how to properly clean dresses, getting to know the top designers and reading every bridal fashion tome or online article she could get her hands on. There was also a big marketing push from day one. “For the first three to six months I created awareness and built a community, doing everything from starting a Facebook page and creating a networking group to sending out press releases and attending wedding fairs,” she says. “I just went for it.”

As word of mouth started to grow, business picked up and Atkinson was able to open a second store, this time in Dorchester. But then came a fork in the road when a misstep at a networking breakfast left the entrepreneur out of action. “I walked into the venue swinging my laptop and feeling so confident, thinking ‘I’m a young entrepreneur’,” she recalls. “And then I tripped and fell right at the entrance steps: it was so embarrassing.” A few blushes were the least of it: it turned out Atkinson had a slipped disc, which meant she was only able to keep her stores open a few hours a week and ended up having to undergo spinal surgery. Thankfully, a friend offered to help out and the entire experience made Atkinson realise that it was time to build a core team around her instead of trying to do everything herself. “We had enquiries coming out of our ears and business was snowballing: I couldn’t have handled it all by myself,” she admits.