Cay outlines bold new future for her Cooma online fashion store

And what a thriving business she now runs.

Her birdsnest online fashion shop  has found a large niche among women, especially women in regional and rural areas, wanting to buy, without necessarily the need to try, but if they do and it doesn’t fit they can change a garment. It’s been a perfect fit between birdsnest and its customers and Jane’s business dream is becoming an ever bigger reality.

Birdsnest now offers its own apparel line and is actively seeking opportunities in China. She is about to bring a US-based but Australian-born head of operations from Washington to Cooma,  bringing with him a wealth of knowledge and contacts within his family.

Birdsnest now employs 140 people in Cooma and was recently voted the fourth best place to work in Australia. Employees can take leave to see their children, they have their own meditation and meeting rooms, and they can fit in work hours around school hours.

And birdsnest located in southern Cooma is growing. Part of the famous old Hains building, birdsnest will soon consume the whole building, with a redesign offering tourists a fabulous experience if they’re visiting.

For Jane Cay, seeing the growth in running a small outfitters shop to running an online sensation has been amazing. 

But she is adamant she couldn’t have done it without help from friends, wise business partners and seeking help when needed.

Staying ahead of the digital game has also been very important. She sees that as a key to growing businesses in regional areas.

“We need to get people educated about digital opportunities so that they can apply that to their business what that they already have and with this knowledge do amazing things, to understand, to know to even ask the questions, to know that these digital opportunities apply to them,” she told the Next Crop forum.

There has been a push to create business digital hubs, supported by the CWA, in regional areas, but she is not sure this is the answer.

“Any sort of concierge service for small and medium businesses and then via industry into the state or federal governments is definitely helpful, but i have to say i found very little answers from government,” she said.

“The elementals I found was going to industry based conferences, travelling. Our store manager has just come back from New York, our new iteration of this story is going to be something out of this world. She went to an industry forum in New York with 39,000 retailers who went to this. But  what she found invaluable was the conversation there and getting on the street, streetwalking, to see what is happening to experiential retail.

“One of the great places you learn is looking outside your industry, so at the moment, we are thinking how do we redesign the new store. We’ve bought  a new building in Cooma and we are not just looking at the retail industry, we are looking at the best hotels in the world, looking at completely different ideas. Harris Farm in Sydney you can pour your own milk from a different farm, put their own cap on, the consumer in Sydney is loving to connect with who that farm, they are supporting a farmer - I thought how good is that ! That’s story telling and the customer is engaged. I thought for us we can tell the story behind a dress, who designed it, where it came from, a totally different application, but we can all learn from each other.”

Online shopping offers so many opportunities to regional businesses without effecting their existing street retail shop. “I’m not the only one in town, Cooma menswear went online two years ago and they went from 3 to 8 employees, doubled their revenue through utilising digital, just realising you can be part of it. A teacher in Cooma Sue Burke who started Interactive Lessons  whiteboards. She saw a problem, all those interactive whiteboards in schools with no content, now she worked out a way to providing content for these boards, that is a completely digital based business and she is selling to all over Australia, that is just in this town.

“I think it is about encouraging people, and if you put your hand up, people will help.”

Birdnest maintains its software through an agent who comes for a week every second week to make sure the online shopping system is running to plan.

Cay says starting a business was important, but making her employees feel satisfied and happy in work was just as important. “It just so happens we are doing this in a dress business, I would want to do this in any business. My key role is to be a champion of the culture at birdsnest. You have to believe in them (employees). We are all together, we just happen to sell dresses for the love of it. 

“And Cooma is the most beautiful place in the world to live.”

Jane lives on a family farm with her farmer husband Oliver and their children. Her dinner is sometimes just a Mentos from a speaker’s table she has such a busy schedule.