Limkokwing University’s Fashion and Retailing Students on the Global University Campus programme in Limkokwing London attended a lecture by Patricia van den Akker at the University of the Arts London (UAL) on 8 Sept.

Patricia van den Akker is a Director for The Design Trust, an online business school for designers. She is also an adviser, trainer, coach and mentor who specialises in business development, sales & marketing to train and support creative entrepreneurs.

Patricia has worked with numerous organisations and universities to coordinate creative business development workshops. She has worked at the Crafts Council, Design Nation/New Designers in Business, Studio Levien, Cultural Industries Development Agency (CIDA) and Pembridge Partners. Her 15 years’ experience include training over 100 small creative businesses, policy makers as well as social entrepreneurs.

Her workshop focused on the seven aspects of costing and product pricing, entrepreneurial skills, calculating overhead costs and hourly wage, trade price vs retail price as well as marketing and promotion.

Students learnt tactics to help them raise their design profiles and credibility to attract more clients. They also learnt to balance financial cost for sustaining their businesses. 

“These sessions are very useful for designers and design students,” said Fashion and Retail student Lee Lay Chien. “We need to know who our clients are and what relationships we want with them.” 

Limkokwing University regularly conducts workshop sessions with industry professionals in various countries to promote career growth and networking opportunities. These industrial insights allow graduates to lead their own business ventures after completing their studies.

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