Camilla is already looking to extend its lease with its Dallas landlord, Northpark Centre, as its new boutique delivers strong sales, CEO Jane McNally has revealed to Ragtrader.
The store, which was opened remotely by the brand in August, was leased to Camilla on a 12-month 'pop-up' basis, however the business wants to partner with the centre on a long-term basis.
"The store has actually, not only exceeded initial expectations, it's actually almost doubling them," McNally said.
"We've also seen a spike in digital performance in the Dallas area because the store is acting as the hub to increase local awareness.
"It's been supported by a lot of great local press call outs, so that's really helped us raise our general awareness in the area.
"We're now looking at how we can partner with Northpark into a longer term," she said.
McNally said the brand's digital sales account for about 50% of Camilla's total, with digital sales from the US making up 20%.
And given the strong performance of the Dallas store, as well as the brand's digital sales in the US, Camilla will look to open a further seven or eight boutiques in the US over the next three to four years.
Camilla Dallas
But the Dallas store's performance isn't just down to the vibrant clothing and surrounds – although that undoubtedly helps – the Dallas area was chosen specifically by Camilla, as the customer demographic 'ticked all the boxes.'
The business will take this same approach when opening its other US boutiques too.
"We map out all of our territories by sales pattern, and that's – for the US – against both online and wholesale demand," McNally said.
"We also look at potential demographic match.
"So we did that, and Dallas came up glowing green against all our metrics.
"Having established that Dallas was definitely a city that we wanted to operate in physically, as well as online - and we knew that we had that strong customer appetite - we needed to find the right centre and the right location.
"Northpark met all the right demographic criteria. The centre is regarded locally as being the home of art, as well as shopping.
"So they offered us a short term lease, which is just opposite Apple and beside Nordstrom on their luxury wing.
"That's enabling us to test our boutique concept in Dallas as our third US standalone site," McNally explained.