Job hopping with style

WHEN it comes to job variety, Limerick man William O’Brien has had a broad career which has spanned training race horses to dealing in discarded women’s fashion.

In between, there was Dell.

William, 33, from St Joseph’s Street, got interested in horses at an early age and after starting out working at Knockainey Stud.

He also trained for a while before emigrating to Kentucky where he worked at a stud which turned out yearlings for the Keenland sales costing millions of dollars.

The call of home beckoned with a job opportunity at Dell, where he worked for nine years as a training specialist.

Come May 2009, he left as the computer giant, packed up and headed for Poland. Out of a job, he worked on an idea of trading in women’s fashion and opened his business, Be Fabulous, in Shannon Street.

William said: “I worked for a while in a swap shop in Thurles and felt there was an opportunity to open a clothing and accessories store aimed at women, providing designer clothes and high-street fashion at affordable prices.”

He takes in fashionable items which may or may not have been worn, but which the owner has decided no longer belongs in their wardrobe.

William said: “We agree the price we put the item on sale for, and if and when it is sold we split the revenue 50/50. If the item is not sold within 12 weeks it is returned to the client enabling the movement of designs and items within the store.”

Things are going so well that he has recently taken on a part-time sales assistant and expects to create an extra, full-time position in the near future.

William said: “Some of the clothing I take has been pre-worn, or pre-loved, but the woman who owns it no longer feels attached to it. Some has never been worn.”

At any one time he stocks up to 2,000 items which would also include bags, jewellery and shoes.

“About 60% of the stock is sold and the remainder returned to the owners. I’m opened about 14 months now and can’t complain. It’s hard work, as it’s a six-day-a-week business. But I am getting a lot of repeat custom and that is very encouraging,” he said.

Be Fabulous was set up with the support of the Limerick City Enterprise Board and he also got funding from the European Globalisation Fund.