Adelle Renaud, Founder of Peau De Loup and Noble Motives Collective
We are proud to kick off Pride Month with one of our favorite badass LGBTQ+ women entrepreneurs . Not only does Adelle own Peau De Loup, Caposhie, and Noble Motives Collective but she is constantly working to use her businesses and platform to create a more equal world where we hold space for inclusiveness, helping and working with others to create change.
Extremely fortunate to grow up in a very encouraging environment, I was taught to dream big, work hard and make big things happen.
Relationships are the currency of my work that has got me where I am today and it will be what continues to grow with me. As Peter Northouse shares in Leadership: Theory and Practice (2015), leadership is a learned process. I hope to be an example of someone who activated my dream and put in the work to develop myself into a successful leader.
I began right out of college working for a local Vancouver manufacturing company focusing on sustainability, learning about “eco” fabrics, processes and our footprint.
As life does it threw me a curve ball at 22 years old my Memere was diagnosed with a fatal cancer. She was my rock and the one person who saw me for who I was. Losing her made me rethink my path and I found myself starting to take on projects as contract menswear designer that fit more of my true aesthetic. This led me to a roll working in Bangladesh with an organization that was trying to make changes happen in a country that so desperately needed it.
Growing up as a tomboy I always very aware that the retail clothing experience wasn’t built for me. One day while reflecting on my career I had a realization that would change my life forever. This realization ignited an idea and the research began. I found blog after blog with tons of women all searching for the same thing I wanted.
We were tired of hunting down the least girly item in the women’s section or buying men’s pieces that had the look but not quite the fit. I knew I had a viable idea Tomboys were more than a fringe trend, it was a movement. But how would I take this concept to creation? From my years of experience working in manufacturing I had seen the good the bad and the ugly and knew that there had to be a way I could create one item and make it the best it could be. I started reaching out to every mill, factory locally and offshore to see if they had any off-cuts that they would sell.
This is how PEAU DE LOUP and the button down came about. I built a network of “scrap” fabrics and then negotiated my in with one of the top factories who was used to producing for the big companies - they agreed to manufacture my first round of shirts 1000 units using 35 different fabrics. I knew that if I could make the best shirt my customer didn’t want to buy 1 shirt they wanted to 10 new shirts. I launched our first shirts in January of 2012 pre-selling enough shirts to pay for my production. Before the end of the year was done I had made a partnership with three ex Nike marketing guru’s who left their high paying job to start a tomboy brand! Wildfang! Over the next 3 years We launched multiple seasonal collections that were worn and adorned by many. This was an eye opening experience and an honour to work with some of the top talent in the US from the finance people down to the creative teams.
The time came to eventually make some decisions... would I move to the US and leave behind Peau De Loup to join the WILDFANG team full time. At the time Erin McLeod, my business partner in PDL, had been in the heat of training for the FIFA Women’s World Cup and she approached me with the idea to work with Canada Soccer and be the first National Women’s Soccer team to put the women on the pitch in suits like the men.
After many sleepless nights I finally made the decision to fight for my little business and give it all I had. Erin and I won the bid to make history and the put the women’s National team on the pitch in suits. To do this we had to get financing which led me to try my hand on dragons den. We came out successful with a deal along with opening the door for other investors and opportunities.
Today my current roll as the Creative Entrepreneur leading charge at Noble Motives Collective, an organization based in Vancouver, Canada housing both Peau De Loup and a new brand called Caposhie has given me the opportunity to pair my educational background in Fashion and Digital Graphic Design with my passion for entrepreneurship. In all my roles I made it my mission to prove myself relevant as a self-learned leader who designs and leads with passion, purpose and respect for all. -Adelle
What are book(s) that inspire you/your company:
Right now I am reading a book from the series Is Gender Fluid? (The Big Idea). As an fashion/ graphic designer turned entrepreneur with no formal business training my library of business/ self help books is vast! One of our customers wrote a book called The Ethical Sellout, it is a field guide for addressing the inevitable crises of ethics in industries like design, advertising and marketing.
What has been the biggest highlight running your own company?
The people! The community of people I get to work with around the world building products, to the teams I work alongside launching the products to the amazing customers I get to interact with. It’s what keeps me going.
What are your Favorite business tools that your company uses? (Slack, PicMonkey, Asana, Liveplan, Adobe etc.)?
Adobe Creative, Google everything(sheets, docs, calendar), Asana, Agendrix, Shopify, Skedsocial, Mailchimp.
Is there any content, music, anything that is inspiring you right now?
Music is a huge part of my life and is always playing at all times of the day.
How do you hope that your company can create a better world?
I hope that we have or can play some role in creating a more equal world where we hold space for inclusiveness, help and work with others to create change. For us it has started with creating a button up that make people feel the same on the outside as they do on the inside and I hope we are able to continue to grow with our community and evolve as they need us to.
What are your top three goals for your company this year? AND! How can the LWL Community support you in accomplishing them? (donating, supporting new product launch, etc.)
This was going to be a big year for PDL we had plans of launching into the US this summer with Pop up stores, A new zero waste Initiative and many more New product launches. Things have shifted and there are a lot of new challenges facing many businesses this year that we have never had to address or overcome.
The ripple effects from Covid will be felt through almost all aspects of the business from supply chain issues down to generating enough revenue to keep the lights on.
Right now my goals have shifted and my focus is on making it through the other side of this with integrity, compassion and hopefully stronger than we were to begin. Now is a time to work together and build each other up.
What is one action you want every woman entrepreneur reading this to take this week?
Fight for your space.
Click through to shop the Founder’s Suit from Peau De Loup