Ashley Evelyn Palmer

Originally from Vancouver, Canada, I am a creative and professional individual with a background in Visual Merchandising, Fashion Buying and Styling. I am now based in the beautiful Okanagan and have a variety of different interests in the fashion industry. This includes; Visual Merchandising, Styling, Buying, Management, Entrepreneurship and many more.

I started my career in the fashion industry in 2015 while getting a part time job at Sirens, a well-known retailer part of YM Company. I started as a sales associate and quickly worked my way up to became a part of their management as Shift Leader. It was there I learned the fundamentals of merchandising and developed a strong passion that directed me to advance my career.

I decided to further my education and enroll into the Merchandising and Marketing for Fashion program at Visual College of Art and Design. The program has taught me more about the industry then I could imagine and I find myself confident in my future with many thanks to my amazing instructors.

During my first term of my program I started working for Abito Menswear, a company which specializes in high end casual wear and formal suiting for men. I enjoyed all the aspects of the company and wanted to take on a more advanced role. Within a few weeks I was given the task of looking over the stores visual presentation, including some of the following; window displays, mannequin styling, display structures, inventory levels, customer traffic paths and monitoring the correlation between sales and our visual displays. Along with my merchandising duties I was also given responsibility in communication between our vendors, such as scheduling meetings, arranging promotions, and following up on how products sold instore. Lastly, I assisted with forecasting and buying the new merchandise each season with brands such as Dish & Duer, Fidelity Denim, Alberto, John Varvatos and Robert Graham.

With my previous experience I have developed an understanding around the various atmospheres within a retail environment and the ability to contribute to the organizational revenue through visual presentation. As a recent graduate I look to continue building my career in this field and challenging myself though various projects I take on.