36 Blingtastic! Launched in 2011, Crystal Parade caters for the growing need of rhinestones and crystals for crafters, nail artists, designers and stylists. Here, Director Poppy Pennington tells us more... Poppy, the founder of Crystal Parade had five years previous experience within the embellishing world, many years’ experience within sales and customer service roles and at the age of 16 was running a couple of successful enterprises. So, with hardwork, the odd risk here and there, a great team by her side and the love and support of her family and friends she took the leap to start Crystal Parade. Tell us about launching Crystal Parade When I launched Crystal Parade there was only a few companies you could purchase crystal embellishments from, and they were mainly offering the highly priced brand of crystals which weren’t always suitable or affordable for some customers; or the other choice was poor quality rhinestones. I saw a gap in the marketplace for a crystal supplier offering not just one brand of crystal but two. A few years down the line, we offered three great brands with three price points, a myriad of colours, sizes and shapes available in wholesale or retail packs. Today Crystal Parade is a Silver Authorised Preciosa partner and has its own brand of Zodiac crystals. In 2016, we launched a great range of crystal mixes. Our crystal mixes are a big seller with the AB mixes being the number one seller. Our customers love to experiment with the different colour combinations which make the crystal mixes a fabulous and economical solution for getting creative and splashing the colour! What’s life like at Crystal Parade today? We’re in our 13th year and have been so lucky to work with very creative and well known indvidual’s and companies. From the stylists for Sam Ryder, P!NK, Take That, Leona Lewis, Little Mix, Robbie Williams, Spice Girls, The Vivienne, Ant and Dec and Sam Smith to name a few... and then there are all the theatrical productions we have worked with including Shrek, Thrillier, 42nd Street, Kinky Boots, Phantom, Frozen and most recently we’ve supplied Zodiac and Preciosa crystals to the Royal Opera House’s production of Cinderella. I went to see the performance it was amazing but made extra special by seeing the cast sparkling in our crystals. Over the years, we’ve been asked to crystallise many different items from Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers, a life-sized mannequin (we called her Goldie, she was crystallized in thousands of Zodiac Golden Shadow rhinestones), bikinis for F1, champagne bottles, wheelbarrows, cricket balls, a Rolls Royce and other ordinary and not so ordinary items. But it’s not just about the dizzy heights of stage and celebrities that has seen Crystal Parade stay solid and grow from strength to strength, we have thousands of customers who wish to place sparkling orders to add the extra special touch of sparkle to their greeting cards, journals, parchment craft, crochet projects, costumes, jewellery designs, shoes, hat and accessories. The craft and costume marketplace is key to Crystal Parade’s success and we work with wellknown artists to keep our finger on the pulse when it comes to embellishing special craft projects and showstopping costumes.
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