Goodbye... But Never Forgotten

In 2014 I founded Hugo & Otto with a simple ambition: to create a beautiful lifestyle brand especially for dogs. At a time when the luxury dog market in Britain was still in its infancy, I opened a boutique on the high street in the picturesque Cheshire village of Tarporley. The location wasn't chosen by chance, it allowed me to be close enough for the school coach that served my son at Ellesmere College in Shropshire, divorce and single mum juggling .

Our little boutique was unlike anything else in the North West.

We became the first retailer in the region to stock Cloud7 and MiaCara from Germany, alongside handcrafted collars, leads, knitwear and coats sourced from Switzerland, California and New York. Long before premium pet retail became fashionable, Hugo & Otto was bringing together beautifully designed products from across Europe and America.

I also recognised another gap in the market: nutrition. As raw feeding was beginning to emerge in the UK, Hugo & Otto became one of the first retailers locally to stock premium raw food alongside dog ice cream. Customers regularly visited for free samples and advice. Many admitted they would never pay those prices for their dogs, but I believed that educating owners was just as important as making sales.

Running an independent high street business, however, came with relentless challenges.

Commercial rents, business rates and utilities were extraordinarily high. Employing staff simply wasn't financially possible, so I worked six days a week in the shop while simultaneously teaching myself what was then this new thing called social media. I also had to learn ecommerce after investing heavily in a website that proved completely unusable, forcing me to start again and build my own online presence.

Then came Brexit.

Much of Hugo & Otto's collection was imported from Europe. Overnight, increasing shipping costs, customs administration and fluctuating exchange rates transformed the economics of the business. Customers who had once appreciated carefully curated collections increasingly compared prices online, sometimes asking me to reduce a £145 dog bed by just a few pounds. It wasn't about the amount, it reflected how loyalty on the high street was rapidly disappearing.

Eventually, I made the heartbreaking decision to close my beautiful Tarporley boutique and continue the business from home.

I built a new website, then another two years later, determined to keep Hugo & Otto moving forward. But it became increasingly clear that Brexit, new taxation requirements and customs regulations had effectively halted the European business I had worked hard to establish, including growing markets in Austria and Italy.

One year after Brexit I faced a defining decision.

Either close the company altogether or invest everything into British manufacturing.

I chose Britain.

It was a significant financial commitment, but I believed that designing and manufacturing luxury dog beds in the UK would secure the future of Hugo & Otto while supporting skilled craftspeople.

Our beds were handcrafted in the West Midlands on a made-to-order basis using carefully selected furnishing fabrics from Warwick, Romo and Ian Manking, an extension of my own background in interior design. Every collection was designed with both beauty and practicality in mind: removable covers, technical upholstery fabrics, carefully chosen colour palettes and a choice of premium mattress fillings.

The first British-made collections launched at the WellChild Christmas Fair at Daylesford Organic Farm. From there Hugo & Otto became a familiar face at DogFest, Dogstival, Spirit Fairs, charity Christmas events and countless pop-up shops.

The constant companions on those journeys were my wonderful dogs, Finnbar MacBrigadoon and Hunter, who travelled everywhere with me and became much-loved ambassadors for the brand, further along came Ottilie Lettuce and we were a little gang. Neighbours and their dogs modelled for me in brand imagery, we plodded along nicely.

Then the world changed again.

Covid accelerated a shift that had already begun. Online marketplaces dominated consumer behaviour, with inexpensive imported dog beds available for next-day delivery at prices that independent British manufacturers simply could not compete with. The culture of buying well and buying once was increasingly replaced by buying cheaply and replacing often.

Despite everything, Hugo & Otto continued.

One of the proudest moments came when The Times Business section contacted me. A journalist travelled from London to meet me, and together we visited my manufacturing partner in the West Midlands. The following day he was flying to Germany to visit the Mercedes factory, and he remarked on the striking contrast between global manufacturing and a small British workshop quietly producing exceptional craftsmanship.

The resulting feature celebrated Hugo & Otto and the importance of preserving British manufacturing skills.

Not every chapter was positive.

As with many independent designers, I experienced the disappointment of seeing ideas and products in the marketplace that closely resembled my own collections, 1 individual slavishly copied all my designs and even approached my makers, they wanted him to enter into a NDA and drop all his existing private clients. Another approached my makers and because she paid him upfront and ordered in bulk he let her copy my designs including colours and fabrics. Sadly, I also found myself involved in an intellectual property dispute over the use of wash care symbols. The court ruled against me, and although I accepted the judgment, the experience was personally and professionally upsetting, this brand also slavishly copied my bolster bed and tried to claim she had designed the donut bed, she did not and my makers produced invoices and letters from stockists 2 years before she had a brand and launched and so it became clear and a difficult lessons that other brands will go to kick you out of business.

Like so many small business owners, I learned that entrepreneurship demands resilience far beyond designing products or making sales.

And now another chapter comes to an end.

My long-standing manufacturing partner has entered liquidation after decades in business. With only a few days' notice, their doors closed, bringing an end not only to our partnership but also to the livelihoods of people who had devoted over twenty years of their lives to the company.

Along with them went fabrics, collections, unfinished products and years of shared craftsmanship.

It is difficult to put into words what that loss represents.

For thirteen years Hugo & Otto has weathered almost every challenge imaginable: the decline of the high street, Brexit, changing consumer habits, Covid, increasing competition from mass-produced imports, legal battles and the disappearance of British manufacturing.

Yet throughout every setback, the purpose remained the same, to create beautiful products with integrity, support skilled British makers and prove that dogs deserve thoughtful design every bit as much as the homes they live in.

Businesses may change. Workshops may close. Collections may come and go.

But the memories, the friendships, the craftsmanship and the journey remain.

Goodbye to one remarkable chapter.

Never forgotten.

To Finnbar MacBrigadoon, Hunter and Otto my lovely companions up there on your rainbow wait for us.

Ottilie Lettuce and her daughter Beatrix are still by my side enjoying snoozing in the sun in the Cotswolds and resting their paws.