This is a FUNDRAISER to raise funds for new developments and production. There's a long story and a short story. The short story follows this sentence; the longer one is below. If you want the super long one, find me in person after I've had half a glass of wine.

We need to raise a little money for mega-exciting new stuff, and painfully boring stuff too. Usually, a brand would borrow, sell part of their business, or their founders would be wealthy enough to put in some more cash. We don't want to do the first if we can avoid it, the second isn't us, and the third is laughable.

We're asking you, our lovely customers, if you have any intention of purchasing from us in the future, to buy a gift card now and we’ll top it up with a little extra as a thank you. 

It works like this:

You know you're going to buy something at some point in the future. Tomorrow, next month, next year, whenever. Instead of waiting, you buy a gift card now and we'll top it up as follows. For example, if you buy a gift card for £50 now, we'll give you an extra £12.50, so you'll have £62.50 to spend when the time comes. This offer will run for about a week but there's no time limit to spend your gift card!

Spend £24 now, get £5 extra = £30

Spend £50 now, get £12.50 extra = £62.50

Spend £100 now, get £25 extra = £125

Spend £250 now, get £62.50 extra = £312.50

Spend £500 now, get £125 extra = £625

Discount will be applied automatically at checkout.

Free gifts are not included with the purchase of gift cards.

I'll also make a list of everyone that joins this fundraiser and, although I'm not sure how yet, give you something, or an opportunity to get something or do something special, as a further thank you in the future. Story mfg was literally built on this kind of thing. In our first two years we asked you to buy stuff we hadn't made yet, you did, and here we are.

Thank you, thank you in advance! This will run for a week, or end sooner if we hit an internal goal we have.

The longer story:

This industry is nuts, the world is upside down, and as a small business we are the squeezed middle. We're the first to pay suppliers and the last to get paid, and no amount of careful planning can help that. The more successful we are, the bigger the bills we have to pay, and the later we are paid (for lots of maddening reasons). It's tedious, boring, upsetting, and we have been at it for years. We have built entire systems around us so we don't have to rely on the fashion industry, and we are almost entirely free of it all.

It's important to say, we are okay as a company. We are nowhere near bankruptcy or any of those scary things. This isn't a "save us!" situation. We are SO careful with money. Like many companies, the last few years have been disaster after disaster: tariffs, rising costs, wars, and most of the fashion industry imploding, with stores vanishing and leaving us out of pocket.

As they say, it's hard to live, laugh, love in these conditions. We have always been a company that develops things from scratch and does things others won't, but these things take money, and currently every penny and more is evaporating. I'm tired of delaying things because someone decided not to pay us on time. Us not paying those we work with isn't an option, obviously, so we have to find solutions. We do what we can, but it's impossible to get level at the moment.

This is very us. Very old Story mfg. We started the brand on Reddit and fashion forums, asking people to pre-pay for jeans we were dreaming up because we couldn't afford to fund it ourselves. Twelve years later a lot has changed, but these things still make sense.

So, if you ever planned to buy from us, please consider putting some money towards that purchase and buying a gift card.

I saw another company in another industry do this and thought, "why haven't we done this before?" It makes so much sense.

Once again, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.

Katy, Saeed and team Story mfg.