It took an innocent question from a little girl getting excited about putting the Christmas tree up to trigger the launch of a business that ended up impressing two of the BBC’s Dragons so much they invested in it.
“Mummy, can fairies be Black?”
gave Natalie Duvall pause for thought when her seven-year-old daughter posed the question as they put their decorations up. The answer seemed obvious, but when Natalie went online to try to find angels, Christmas fairies and Santas that reflected her race and culture, she was left wanting.
For some years, Natalie had worked on a range of diversity and inclusion projects with her friend Alison Burton, who has a daughter of a similar age. The fruitless search led to a range of six products being produced in time for Christmas 2019 – and March Muses was born.
“My first reaction was to tell her of course fairies can be Black, but the truth is that it was impossible to buy Christmas decorations that reflected that,”
said Natalie.
“If I did find any that had brown skin, they were simply brown versions of the white models, rather than having the hair and features of a Black person.”
The 2019 range – a Black Santa, an Afro Angel, two Black baby angels and a boy and girl angel, sold out in no time and Natalie and Alison began seriously considering how they could extend the range in time for Christmas 2020. Downtime during the pandemic gave them an opportunity to work on their collection, which had grown considerably by Christmas 2021, when March Muses had a pop-up shop in the Christmas shop in Selfridges.
Alison said:
“It was around the time that the tragic death of George Floyd in the States had led to the Black Lives Matter movement and there was a great deal of awareness about diversity and inclusion, and I think within the business world that opened people’s minds to working more with Black businesses.
“In our previous jobs, people had asked us how to begin to talk to children about race and we’d always say do it through books and toys, if it’s there and they can see it, it becomes natural. It doesn’t need to be a heavy conversation, but if children, whatever their skin colour, see different races represented in their day-to-day lives it just becomes the norm.”
Having got off to such a strong start, March Muses faced its biggest test when Alison and Natalie got the chance to appear on Dragons’ Den. In the end, they came away with joint investment from Deborah Meaden and Peter Jones, transforming the way they approached their business.
“It was absolutely gruelling,”
said Alison.
“We were in the Den for two hours, being quizzed solidly about our business, and we were just about at the point where we knew it wasn’t meant to be, when Peter Jones suddenly said he was going to make an offer.
“Even if we hadn’t got that investment, the whole experience was valuable to our business because it made us sit down beforehand and go through absolutely everything and make sure we had the right answers. I think we watched pretty much every episode of Dragons’ Den before we went on, and we would listen to what they asked, pause the TV and work out how we would answer that question if we were asked it. We had our business model clear in our heads, our figures, everything, because you are properly grilled and you can’t slip up.”
Investment has meant that March Muses now uses a fulfilment centre to handle orders – and it helped the team acquire a business manager to help drive it forward. This year, March Muses will have products in both Selfridges and Liberty’s Christmas shops as well as a number of smaller retailers.
As well as the decorations, the March Muses range now includes Christmas cards and wrapping paper, birthday cards and wrapping paper featuring Black footballers, dancers and superheroes, and a Love collection that includes Black cupid wrapping paper and a Black couple wedding cake topper.
The success of the company has led to it being named a finalist in the Creative Entrepreneur of the Year category of the London and East of England Great British Entrepreneur Awards. The results will be announced at the awards ceremony at the Grosvenor Hotel on November 21.
Natalie said:
“Santas, fairies and angels are fun parts of childhood but we don’t see them in real life, so who’s to say what they really look like or what colour their skin is? Even as a Black woman, I’d never really stopped to think about why all those characters are automatically shown as being white and now, when we tell people about our business they realise we’re right and it hadn’t occurred to them either – or they immediately get on the internet and try to prove us wrong.
“It’s been so good to see our ideas prove so popular and to have had the support to get through doors that are not always open to you if you’re Black and a woman. We’re still doing the groundwork, we’re working on the range, but we’re excited about what the future holds.”
Find out more about March Muses at www.marchmuses.co.uk