the airport for my return flight and I decided to try one last time. I wasn’t taking ‘No’ for an answer. ‘Please, Jack, don’t make this a wasted trip. All I can say is that I promise you that this will be the best thing that’s ever happened. I will turn this business into something huge in the UK and Europe.’ And then I came down hard. ‘But I’m not doing it unless you give me the distributorship. I’m not wasting my time. I will get them into all the papers and magazines and then people will buy from you as well, so what’s the point in me doing the hard work for you to see the rewards? And I tell you what, I’m going to do them anyway. I’ll just find another manufacturer.’
Jack went very quiet but I could tell I was winning him over. Michael was staring at me like he wasn’t sure if I was his wife. He’d not seen this side to me before. ‘Look, what have you got to lose?’ I smiled. ‘You’re not selling it in Europe at the moment anyway.’ Jack looked me in the eyes. I knew I had him. ‘So give me it and I’ll make it worth your while.’
Michael was staring at me, Jack was staring at me and then Jack drew in a deep breath. ‘Okay, deal,’ he said.
We left for Glasgow with the distributorship and we hadn’t paid a penny for it. The agreement was we would buy them at a certain price with my redundancy money and sell them at a certain price. So Jack would make his margin, I’d make my margin and the stores would make their margin.
I came home feeling incredible. But as with all my victories I didn’t just sit back and enjoy it. For me, it was like, what next? What can we do now? I’m always driving forward. So I hit the ground running. The first thing I did was register my company. Michael suggested it was named after him, his initials – MJM International – in 1996. I then hit the phone.
It was my aim to stock these enhancers in every store. My sales pitch was that I had these revolutionary silicone gel pads that would enhance your boobs by two cup-sizes. I got appointments everywhere – thinking back, I don’t know how I managed to get all those meetings. I came to London with a case containing samples from Jack. The gel pads were very expensive at £150 retail and that meant I had to target high-end lingerie boutiques like Rigby & Peller. I sold the pads everywhere and then I started the PR. I wrote my own press release, sent it to all the newspapers and the publicity just kept coming and coming.
The enhancers were called Monique but they were soon nicknamed ‘chicken fillets’. The local papers wanted to interview me. Who is this woman who has launched these ‘chicken fillets’? And then the Scottish national, the
Daily Record
, wanted to interview me. Seeing my name in the paper I’d read since I was a kid was a really big deal. They now call me the ‘bra tycoon’ but back then I was a ‘businesswoman’. My mum and dad would ring me up and tell me how their neighbours were talking about me, how Gran had read about my success in her tea leaves. Dad said his friends down the pub had read about how I’d started up my own business. Sadly, I also heard a rumour that people were saying, ‘It won’t last’, but I shrugged it off.
I worked from a desk in my bedroom with Declan’s cot by my side. Michael was still in pensions but he would do the books and the legal stuff for me at the weekends and in the evenings. He wasn’t that interested in the creative side of things but he liked the trips. By then I was earning ‘okay’ money, more than at Labatt, but nothing to set the world on fire. I was always thinking, What’s next?
Keep going. Must keep going.
I thought back to my ‘Eureka!’ moment in the toilets at that rugby dinner and dance. My dream from day one had been not just to sell a Monique-style enhancer but to invent a bra with a Monique built into it. The problem with the current product was that they were solid silicone. I’d been wearing them
Jack went very quiet but I could tell I was winning him over. Michael was staring at me like he wasn’t sure if I was his wife. He’d not seen this side to me before. ‘Look, what have you got to lose?’ I smiled. ‘You’re not selling it in Europe at the moment anyway.’ Jack looked me in the eyes. I knew I had him. ‘So give me it and I’ll make it worth your while.’
Michael was staring at me, Jack was staring at me and then Jack drew in a deep breath. ‘Okay, deal,’ he said.
We left for Glasgow with the distributorship and we hadn’t paid a penny for it. The agreement was we would buy them at a certain price with my redundancy money and sell them at a certain price. So Jack would make his margin, I’d make my margin and the stores would make their margin.
I came home feeling incredible. But as with all my victories I didn’t just sit back and enjoy it. For me, it was like, what next? What can we do now? I’m always driving forward. So I hit the ground running. The first thing I did was register my company. Michael suggested it was named after him, his initials – MJM International – in 1996. I then hit the phone.
It was my aim to stock these enhancers in every store. My sales pitch was that I had these revolutionary silicone gel pads that would enhance your boobs by two cup-sizes. I got appointments everywhere – thinking back, I don’t know how I managed to get all those meetings. I came to London with a case containing samples from Jack. The gel pads were very expensive at £150 retail and that meant I had to target high-end lingerie boutiques like Rigby & Peller. I sold the pads everywhere and then I started the PR. I wrote my own press release, sent it to all the newspapers and the publicity just kept coming and coming.
The enhancers were called Monique but they were soon nicknamed ‘chicken fillets’. The local papers wanted to interview me. Who is this woman who has launched these ‘chicken fillets’? And then the Scottish national, the
Daily Record
, wanted to interview me. Seeing my name in the paper I’d read since I was a kid was a really big deal. They now call me the ‘bra tycoon’ but back then I was a ‘businesswoman’. My mum and dad would ring me up and tell me how their neighbours were talking about me, how Gran had read about my success in her tea leaves. Dad said his friends down the pub had read about how I’d started up my own business. Sadly, I also heard a rumour that people were saying, ‘It won’t last’, but I shrugged it off.
I worked from a desk in my bedroom with Declan’s cot by my side. Michael was still in pensions but he would do the books and the legal stuff for me at the weekends and in the evenings. He wasn’t that interested in the creative side of things but he liked the trips. By then I was earning ‘okay’ money, more than at Labatt, but nothing to set the world on fire. I was always thinking, What’s next?
Keep going. Must keep going.
I thought back to my ‘Eureka!’ moment in the toilets at that rugby dinner and dance. My dream from day one had been not just to sell a Monique-style enhancer but to invent a bra with a Monique built into it. The problem with the current product was that they were solid silicone. I’d been wearing them
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