Disability-inclusive clothing marketplace secures Paralympian partner — just two months after launch

Adaptive clothing brand EveryHuman has secured wheelchair basketball bronze medalist Kathleen O’Kelly-Kennedy and sprinter and long-jumper Vanessa Low as brand ambassadors, less than two months after launching.

EveryHuman is an online marketplace that sells inclusive fashion, designed to allow people with disabilities to dress with independence and style.

Clothing features buttons with magnetic closures, higher backs on pants to cater to a long-term seated position, and shoes that support ankle and foot braces.

Founder and managing director Matthew Skerritt credits his early successes to the “tight-knit” disability community, a gap in the market, and everything he learnt working for his family’s business.

“Adaptive clothing is clothing with subtle adjustments to assist people throughout the dressing process,” Skerritt tells SmartCompany.

Skerritt identified the gap in the market during his time managing aged-care facilities — the family business — where seniors often require adaptive clothing.

“Most of the clothing available on the market is medical and not fashionable whatsoever.”

In this regard, Skerritt found “the US market more forward than the Australian market”.

“We wanted to launch quickly because I do believe there will be a wave of people coming in the adaptive clothing space,” he adds.

Skerritt says it was this sense of haste that pushed him to launch an e-commerce site first, selling imported brands and products, rather than launching his own line of adaptive clothing.

The site went live on the International Day of People with Disability (December 3) last year, just six months after his first proof of concept, and was entirely family-backed.

During the pre-launch phase, Skerritt scoured social media for ambassadors “to represent what we’re about as a company”.

With his large focus on inclusivity, Skerritt sought diversity and those “embedded in the disability community”, because “we’re really offering more than a product”.

Thanks to the close-knit nature of the community, the word spread, and caught the attention of Kathleen O’Kelly-Kennedy, Vanessa Low and others.

Buoyed by the community’s welcome just weeks into EveryHuman’s launch, Skerritt is now focused on an “aggressive growth goal” of 20% month-on-month.

NOW READ: How Melbourne designer Cassie Byrnes scored the job of dressing tennis stars Serena Williams and Grigor Dimitrov at the Australian Open

NOW READ: Startup warrior: Basketball star Andrew Bogut’s top tips for scoring an investor