When Laura Low Ah Kee and Shannon Savage met whereas working at Lululemon in 2005, the Vancouver, Canada-based athletic attire model wasn’t but the worldwide phenomenon it’s in the present day.
Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Left On Friday. Laura Low Ah Kee, left, and Shannon Savage, proper.
“The time period ‘athleisure’ did not exist but,” Savage tells Entrepreneur. “This complete world of ladies’s athletic attire didn’t exist but. So it was a very cool time to be concerned within the firm, and we simply all the time had this love for this energetic life-style and product and trend.”
Low Ah Kee and Savage each took on government roles at Lululemon; Low Ah Kee went on “many journeys” throughout her tenure however primarily targeted on merchandising, and Savage labored on the design facet.
After a sabbatical partially spent in Maui browsing and kiteboarding, Low Ah Kee was catching up with Savage when inspiration struck. She’d worn Lululemon sports activities bras in lieu of typical swimwear for all of her water actions as a result of they carried out the way in which different merchandise available on the market could not. What in the event that they leveraged their experience to create swimwear that merged trend and performance?
The duo continued their careers at Lululemon and labored on their ardour product on the facet, developing with an exhaustive checklist of every little thing they wished in a super bathing go well with. However it wasn’t till they left their jobs on the athleisure large that they acquired severe about beginning a enterprise.
“We wished a reputation that had one half nostalgia and one half pure spontaneity.”
In 2017, amid a “booming” swimwear trade that also wasn’t designing the fashion-forward, high-performing merchandise they wished to see, the co-founders seized the chance to launch their very own premium energetic swimwear model: Left On Friday, headquartered in Victoria, Canada.
“ Laura and I are each the last word weekend warriors,” Savage says, “and we’re all the time off to have an journey someplace. We wished a reputation that had one half nostalgia and one half pure spontaneity, a reputation that individuals instantly determine with, and it captures this concept of the last word weekend going away. You do not know the place you are going. Seize one swimsuit, you are good.”
Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Left On Friday
The co-founders knew that “any nice product begins with nice material,” in order that they got down to discover one that might handle a number of main points they noticed inside the present swimwear market.
The material needed to be compressive when moist and dry and supply “smoothing protection.” “We did actually discover that the majority swim on the market, as soon as it will get moist, you do really feel fairly bare, however not bare in an effective way,” Savage explains. “It exhibits each lump and bump.”
Moreover, the fabric needed to be sturdy sufficient to carry as much as an energetic life-style with out sacrificing the handfeel. The purpose was to design with a material that “as quickly as you contact it, you are like, I have to put this on my physique, I need to expertise this product,” Savage says.
A number of trial and error went into discovering the material that might do all of it. The co-founders ordered numerous materials to experiment with; a good friend’s mom sewed the primary designs in her basement, and Low Ah Kee and Savage examined them out in numerous climates, from the desert to the seaside. Lastly, they landed on their Smoothing Dream Material.
“It began as a bikini facet mission after which turned Left On Friday.”
Then it was a matter of developing with a line of kinds that every served a definite function. The co-founders self-funded their enterprise, investing their very own cash within the material, stock and “making the very best product potential.” “ Shannon and I actually hustled, [but] extra from like workload [hustle] versus hustle, get cash,” Low Ah Kee recollects. “It began as a bikini facet mission after which turned Left On Friday.”
By leveraging their in depth present talent units within the activewear house, Low Ah Kee and Savage launched their enterprise on-line — and it was “instantly worthwhile.” Left On Friday continued self-funded progress through its ecommerce channel for some time, however ultimately, the co-founders wished a board of advisors “with pores and skin within the sport.”
“The purpose of the advisors was to get some recommendation, to maintain us accountable, to drag us out of the day-to-day, which we had been very a lot in,” Low Ah Kee explains. “So we surrounded ourselves with three unimaginable advisors who we knew from our neighborhood, and so they put in a bit bit of cash.”
Picture Credit score: Courtesy of Left On Friday
Associated: Why Each Entrepreneur Wants a Board of Advisors
When the pandemic hit, Left on Friday needed to navigate provide chain challenges, however the model in the end got here out stronger and with extra funds raised on the opposite facet.
“We’re a really cyclical, seasonal enterprise,” Savage says, “so if you get one thing just like the stress cooker of Covid, all the provision chains shift, so after we get an enormous stock drop in October, we will not promote that. That ended up taking place. All of the timelines acquired shuffled, so we wanted cash after we did not have cash.”
Left On Friday hasn’t raised more cash since that time, and Low Ah Kee and Savage stay the model’s majority house owners.
“ The uniforms made such a splash. They had been going viral within the Olympic Village.”
One other thrilling breakthrough got here in 2024, when Left On Friday designed the official nationwide staff uniforms for Canada’s girls’s seaside volleyball staff for the Paris Olympics and World Tour. Savage designed a bit that lived as much as the model’s dedication to trend and performance: the one-shoulder go well with left the gamers’ hitting arms free.
Picture Credit score: Coliena Rentmeester
“It was [a] profession spotlight, life spotlight, model spotlight, every little thing that occurred on this stage within the epicenter of trend on the greatest sporting occasion that ever occurs,” Savage says. “ The uniforms made such a splash. They had been going viral within the Olympic Village, and everyone was speaking about them. From a enterprise standpoint, we acquired international consciousness.”
Left On Friday noticed a 136% enhance in worldwide site visitors throughout the Olympics and a sustained gross sales progress of 67% in its native Canada in early 2025, per the corporate. The model renewed its partnership with the staff for one more 4 years via 2028.
In response to buyer demand, Left On Friday has additionally expanded into different premium activewear, from sweatshirts to tights, playsuits and extra, retaining its dedication to trend and efficiency on the forefront of each design.
Now, Left On Friday is an eight-figure model, and Low Ah Kee and Savage stay up for its continued progress within the premium activewear enviornment — and the possibility to supply merchandise that match into girls’s energetic lives.
“ I like that there is nonetheless a lot untapped potential out there, in attire and simply within the house usually,” Savage says. “ It is a very intimate place. Not everybody all the time feels comfy in that place, so I like that we’re creating this product [that allows] girls to have the flexibility to reside their greatest life, if that is being an Olympian or if that is simply going out and taking part in some informal volleyball on the seaside.”
