The owner of Blackburn-based men’s clothing brand CAPO ‘couldn’t believe’ his eyes when he received a message from a Liverpool FC player last weekend.
Dan Wilkins, 29, was at a family meal on Sunday when Brazilian international striker Roberto Firmino messaged his clothing account on Instagram saying: "How do I go about ordering from you, I love your brand."
Dan, who launched the fashion brand with his business partner Adam Morning around five years ago, sent off the player’s order the next day and has since received thank you messages and another compliment from Firmino.
Describing the ‘pinch me’ moment, Dan said: “When I first got the message, I thought ‘oh this must be a fake account’ but then I opened it and saw it was verified and realised it was real.
“We’re not massive, we’re a small brand making slow progress, so we don’t pay for people to post on Instagram.
“These people get paid fortunes to post, so when they actually choose to order from us and post because they just genuinely like our stuff, it’s really validating.”
The clothing brand has also received three orders from this year’s runner-up of Love Island, Luca Bish, who is in a relationship with equestrian Gemma Owen, daughter of footballer Michael Owen.
CAPO has also provided the matchday kit for Clitheroe FC, and is set to hit a milestone of £1 million in sales by the end of October.
The business took off when Dan’s dad Lenny Wilkins gave his son £250 towards starting the brand in 2017, which helped the pair pay for the first order of hats.
Dan sadly lost his dad to cancer in 2018, so he is passionate to keep growing the business to prove his dad right and make him proud.
Speaking on whether he ever imagined his business to achieve so much, Dan said: “You always have it where you say ‘oh I want to build a million-pound company, but it’s always so far off in the distance.
“We started with hats, then brought a few tracksuits out and then we just snowballed.
“It was only last year where we thought ‘we’re onto something now’ because the first couple of years are a little bit demoralising but this last year, I’ve realised how much we’re onto something.”
Dan is a father as well as a full-time commercial officer for Blackburn with Darwen Council, but with the help of his business partner Adam, who looks after the brand full time, as well as support from both their families, the pair have worked tirelessly to make the business thrive.
They managed to see their sales increase from £40,000 in 2020 to half a million in 2021 and are now expected to hit the £1m pound mark by the end of next month.
CAPO started off selling hats but now does a variety of athleisure clothing for men and is "focused on providing high quality garments for an affordable price to make it as accessible as possible".
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