10/11/2024
It is with a heavy heart and mixed emotions that I announce the closing of Davey Designs.
DD started on social media way back on 7 August 2011 and was designing and creating unique and high quality products well before then.
Sadly the situation with the current economy, coupled with the impossible algorithms of social media and supply chain issues, the fight to stay open and continue creating has become exhausting and deflating. The business also takes up a lot of space in our family home and it’s time for us to have our house back to ourselves.
Many of you also know about my health issues (a very dicky heart) and that ongoing struggle has meant an additional rethink. I have had a long and serious think about closing over recent months. It was not an easy decision to make.
DD is such a big part of me and who I am. I will very much miss most aspects of it.
I think the recent copycat from Egypt, who blatantly stole my intellectual property, designs and photos (and continues to do so), was the last straw. And FB and Insta think that’s all ok, neither removed the pages after multiple reports. Your job should not make you cry! Online sales and social media is not a very nice place to be a lot of the time now. Coupled with the very tough financial times we are all going through in our country at the moment, and a market that is now flooded with cheap knock off subpar products, I think I have finally run out of ‘oomph’ to keep going.
One of my biggest joys has been creating designs (that have a lot of research, love and meaning behind them) for the Early Years Learning sector. Working with child care centres, kindergartens and family day care operators has been so rewarding.
The other great joy was making designs for multiple generations within your families and being able to custom make matching designs when new babies arrived … so that siblings all had a version of the same product throughout your homes.
It may be that I am able to recharge my battery after taking a few months ‘long service leave’ (lol). I will give it some thought early next year as to whether it is viable to continue in some way, a smaller way.
Time will tell . . . . after a long break.
It has been a dream and an absolute pleasure to create for my extremely supportive community of customers, to collaborate with other makers and build some wonderful relationships with my special suppliers. A huge thank you to all of you!
Kindest regards,
Leanne
