Sisters see sales roll in for their designer-inspired sunglasses after Sophie Monk wears them

Sisters see HUNDREDS of sales roll in for their designer-inspired sunglasses after Sophie Monk is spotted wearing a pair: ‘It was a pinch me moment’

  • Two Australian sisters started a sunglasses brand called Skye + Lach
  • It wasn’t until Sophie Monk organically shared the brand that they skyrocketed
  • The result was hundreds of orders a day in the iconic Havana style

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Sisters with no business experience who started to produce oversized designer-inspired sunglasses were shocked when an Australian celebrity wore them and catapulted the brand into the spotlight.

Tammy Schmidt and Kylie Thomasz are the makers of Skye + Lach, born out of their love for dramatic eyewear.

The siblings had no actual business experience other than working in previous corporate jobs and the thought of starting an e-commerce business was both daunting and exciting.

Tammy Schmidt and Kylie Thomasz are the makers of Skye + Lach , born out of their love for dramatic eyewear

‘We were really going against the grain of small glasses being on-trend at the time, but we knew fashion comes and goes and also there is always people who genuinely love the oversized look,’ they said.

Juggling motherhood with a new business and having to learn everything about social media and running a website from scratch was a huge learning experience for the sisters. 

‘We wanted to produce high quality, designer inspired sunglasses at a really affordable price. We had often purchased expensive designer glasses for well over $700 so we needed to make sure ours were under $100 including the protective cases.

‘Giving customers the confidence to purchase a fairly personal product online is also very challenging. We wanted to make sure customers were not hesitant to purchase online so we offer free and easy returns on all sunnies. 

‘Customers don’t even need to pay for the return shipping as we cover those costs should the glasses not suit.’

Skye + Lach built a steady revenue steam in its first three years but the sisters were still waiting for their 'pinch me moment' (Sophie Monk pictured)

Skye + Lach built a steady revenue steam in its first three years but the sisters were still waiting for their ‘pinch me moment’ (Sophie Monk pictured)

The pair quickly discovered that influencer marketing was a fantastic way of building brand awareness, and so focused a lot of the marketing budget on influencers.

‘We would easily spend $3,000 dollars on various influencers some of which were successful and others were absolute flops,’ they said.

‘We quickly discovered that the number of followers a person may have doesn’t equal ROI.

‘We created spreadsheets of all the influencers we worked with and tried to identify who we could continue having genuine working relationships with.

‘It became apparent that the micro influencer was where we needed to focus our attentions to and since have built some amazing relationships with the mum-influencers who genuinely love our sunglasses and are happy to share to their audiences.’

Skye + Lach built a steady revenue steam in its first three years but the sisters were still waiting for their ‘pinch me moment’.

It wasn't until one day in 2020 they noticed Sophie Monk started following the brand on Instagram and liked some of their posts

It wasn’t until one day in 2020 they noticed Sophie Monk started following the brand on Instagram and liked some of their posts

It wasn’t until one day in 2020 they noticed Sophie Monk started following the brand on Instagram and liked some of their posts. 

‘From this we contacted her and asked if we could send her some of our sunglasses,’ they said.

‘A few weeks later she wore our glasses and tagged the brand and of course this was a super exciting day for our small business. 

‘She particularly liked the Havana style and this has since become a best seller for us. We have sold over 5000 pairs of Havana Tort alone.’

The brand immediately saw a spike in sales after Sophie’s endorsement, with purchases starting to come in ‘every 10 seconds on the website’. 

‘It was an insane day for us! When you go from making on average 10 sales per day to over 100 in an hour – you really do pinch yourself and we were so grateful to Sophie for that moment,’ they said.

‘And the best part about this story is that we never had to pay her. She shared because she genuinely loved the brand and that we were just two Aussie sisters, doing what we love.’

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