Celebrating 10 Years Of Kollab

A Trip Down Memory Lane

AUGUST 1, 2024

This year we celebrate 10 years as a business! To mark this milestone, we sat down with Hayley to take a trip down memory lane...

Let’s start at the beginning

Kollab started with a mission: to make every day essential items more fashionable while keeping them functional and of course reusable. Jess and I whipped up our business plan in a week and presented it to our husbands. The very next week, we were full steam ahead, planning to launch at Life In Style 2014.

2014: The Big Launch

We kicked off Kollab with a bang, launching with seven reusable bags. Life In Style 2014 in Melbourne was an unforgettable experience. My husband and I had a sales agency for 25 years before this, so I recognised the power of tradeshows early on and knew it was pretty pivotal in launching Kollab here.

The OG Kollab customers will remember some of the products we started off with, like napkins, tablecloths, placemats, and aprons! We tested these over a few seasons, and our customers told us what to continue with and what to drop. It’s always fun to look back and see how far we've come with our product development!

2015: The Stars Align

In 2015, the practical (and fashionable) stars aligned, and demand for our range of everyday essentials took off! We loved our bags, but we didn’t realise how much others would love our colourful prints and designs too. By the end of the year, Kollab was popping up in stores all over Australia.

2016 & 2017: Growing Pains & Gains

We continued to grow through trial and error of prints and products... Enter flasks and coffee cups that made a small appearance for a couple of years and introduced our washable paper range. 

2018 & 2019: Big Launches & Exciting Ventures

2018 and 2019 were huge! We launched the Market Bag and our first collaboration with Billabong was a dream come true, as well as creative collaborations with Sharpie and Society of Wanderers. And let's not forget the Picnic Mat launch – the start of something very exciting! As the range grew, we started gaining serious traction. We were on a roll!

2020: Picnic Mat Mania

Ah, 2020. The year everyone moved to outdoor dining and socialising. Our Picnic Mat became the best-selling product, and we could barely keep up with demand. We also added a smaller 1.2m x 1.2m Mini Mat, new colourways in our paper range, and collaborated for the third time with Billabong, plus incredible artists like Karina Jambrak and Tiny Garden.

2021: Sunny Days Ahead

2021 was another incredible year of growth. We teamed up with Gro To, Kip & Co, artist Maggie Stephens, and Billabong once again. Our new Holiday Collection, inspired by our favourite destinations, included an extra-large Picnic Bag, Umbrellas, and more Picnic Mat designs. It was a complete alfresco dream!

2022: Showing Love

In 2022, we introduced our mighty Mini Cooler Bag, perfect for work, play, and everything in between. We also launched one of our favourite collaborations with Canteen, raising money for young people in Australia impacted by cancer through our Share The Love campaign.

2023: Big Year, Big Moves

Wow, probably one of our biggest years to date. We launched four brand new shapes – the Wine Cooler Bag, Travel Bag, Wet Bag, and Outdoor Tablecloth. We continued to partner with incredible brands like Sage x Clare, Kikki.K, and Halcyon Nights.

2024: Pinch-Me Moments

This year, we've worked with some dream brands like We Might Be Tiny, Mustard Made, Merry People, We Are Feel Good Inc, and of course, our biggest highlight... the Matildas. "When Football Australia contacted us saying that the Matildas wanted to work with us, it was a real pinch-me moment." But we never rest and have a few more surprises up our sleeve before the year ends.

Throughout this journey, my three girls and husband Mick have played a big part in supporting, loving, and working hard behind the scenes. Their involvement has been crucial to Kollab’s success. 