She and Andy woke in the middle of the night to the sound of a fax machine processing orders. "Let's not quit."Įarly on, the Spades' Tribeca loft was crammed with boxes that she hauled up and down five floors and shipped at the post office. "Katie, you've got two of the best stores in America," he told her. She thought about shutting down the business even though she'd just incorporated.īut Andy helped her see the potential: Barneys and Fred Segal department stores spotted her bags at the event and agreed to start selling them in select stores. "We hadn't even sold enough to cover the cost of the booth," Spade said. In 1993, the Spades spent more than $4,000 on materials and admission to a New York City trade show with her bags.
![what stores sell kate spade what stores sell kate spade](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/df/de/f4/dfdef4acea31770e36a489c871c8052c.png)
There, Kate became a de facto apprentice - clipping big sheets of paper and fabric samples until the new skills became habit. She had no experience in design, so she found a pattern maker who worked out of an apartment. Spurred by a sense that the situation was pressing, Spade searched Yellow Pages and used her fashion magazine network to find supplies for her handbags. "When you don't have an income coming in," Spade told Guy Raz on the podcast How I Built This in 2017, "you're doing whatever you can to make it happen." At one point, they even liquidated their 401(k)s. For the next few years, they relied mostly on Andy's income and mutual savings. She had decided over dinner with Andy to pursue a new direction: Making her own handbags.
![what stores sell kate spade what stores sell kate spade](https://www.couturetraders.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/0680b00000Cda3H_leopardprint1.png)
![what stores sell kate spade what stores sell kate spade](https://i.pinimg.com/originals/b0/08/cb/b008cb5b5e7753f5bd767114cdfdf39d.jpg)
The next year, she moved to New York and landed a job in the accessories department at Mademoiselle magazine.īy 1992, Spade saw no future for herself at the publication and quit. In 1985, Spade graduated with a journalism degree from Arizona State University and then backpacked around Europe. No doubt, much of the entrepreneur's legacy will be defined by her business, which started with hard work, sacrifice and hustle.