Hi first of all have you seen our section Career Advice on the site (under learning)? There is a cross section of jobs iwthin fashion profiled and answes some of your points here.

As you are not a full member to the site we can not go into depth with the answers you require. If you want to join as a member we are more than happy to meet you and go thorugh your points one by one in London. For further details on membershiop informatoin contact emiily@fashion-enter.com.

one really good way forward here would be to undertake work experience. Why not come to us for a few weeks and try out the different roles of jobs?

Is there industry going down - there will always be winnes and loses in any industry so a lot here depends on your take of what's up and whats down. If you spoke to asos.com who we supply they would definitely disagree with you but then you read about the doom and gloom of the industry with sales down at M&S et al and it makes you wonder. The industry is different otday than a few years ago - more competition from overseas manufacturing, new "cheaper" retailers such as Primemark, 7000 fashino students are allegedly leaving education each year so yes its competitive but so are most industries.

A lot here depends on you and your personality - are you a doer - do you make "things" happen - do you have that can do attitude because more than anyting this is needed in fashion.

Re changing jobs - when you are in a company its easier to transfer over to other sections e.g. I was at M&S as a selector and for a while I thoughjt I wanted to go into merchandising...after sitting with a merchandiser for a few days I realised that this was not for my skill set however! Its the getting in thats the most important.

There is no easy black and white answer here and ideally we would talk this through togehter but hope this helps a little

Good luck and kind regards

I am currently studying my a levels and will soon be appling for university. I would like some advice on whether a career in the fashion industry will be any good.

I want to study fashion design but i would like to know if i have other fields within the industry i can go into if fashion designing fails. I dont want to be left in a dead end when all fails and completely start a new topic. For example; if i fail in becoming a fashion designer can i still stay in the industry and do something else without doing courses to learn another field? or Can i go into graphic or interior designing?
I know getting experience is very important as well and i hav had experience in graphic designing. I have also tried many fashion companies but not one of them have replied back to me. I have also been told that working for a magazine is very good too.

On many occasions i have been told that the industry is going down because there is lots of competition and it's very hard to find jobs. If i do have a situation where i cannot find a job working as a designer then can i go into another field within the fashion industry?

I need some good advice because i am getting slightly confused. All advice given will be much appreciated.