The last 10 years of That Shoe Lady has seen many ups and downs, and has been an enormous period of growth for everyone involved - this is a story of resilience. While trying to find quality designer shoes at an affordable price, and having no luck in South Africa, Jessamie discovered Jeffrey Campbell and Dr. Martens whilst browsing social media. She asked a friend that was travelling to the USA to bring back some pairs for her as samples, and as they say, the rest is history.

That Shoe Lady established a warehouse in 2019, hiring a number of support staff to assist with the increased demand and administrative work. The company looked set to begin expansion once again, looking to Gauteng as its next home. Then the COVID-19 pandemic hit. The world changed in a matter of days, and That Shoe Lady was left with a website, Instagram, and a Facebook page, harking back to the early days of the business. This was a horribly difficult situation for the company - most of the team of 30 had to be laid-off until That Shoe Lady could begin trading again, as per the rules for the first few months of lockdown. The website saved the business, along with Jessamie selling off her personal collection of shoes on auction on Instagram in order to cover overheads for those first few months. Pop-Up stores were opened in order to maximise income - one in Canal Walk Mall and one in Cavendish Mall. A new store in Willowbridge shopping mall was also opened in late 2020. Despite the expansion, the company culture at the head office/warehouse was suffering. Morale was at an all-time low - COVID-19 had a huge impact on the company culture and the management structure started to collapse. Throughout 2021 and 2022 desperate measures were taken to improve the morale, but to no avail. Life was getting harder for everyone - costs of living had gone up exponentially, and the repercussions of the prolonged lockdown had a long-lasting effect.

At a peak of 7 stores nationwide (including a pop-up in Rosebank Mall, Johannesburg), That Shoe Lady was the victim of an online hack in September 2022. A large amount of capital was stolen (this was retrieved, fortunately), and That Shoe Lady lost all its social media accounts, which at this stage, had over 100k followers on each account. Social media being its main source of sales/marketing, That Shoe Lady suffered a loss of income of about 66% as soon as the accounts were lost. After consistent, but futile attempts to get the account back, That Shoe Lady had taken out loans in order to pay overheads to keep the business going until we could retrieve the lost accounts which held so much value. Eventually, in April 2023, we were forced to liquidate, and retrench all 30 employees that we had managed to sustain throughout the pandemic.

Liquidation essentially means that all assets owned by the company are seized. This was the biggest loss imaginable, and Jessamie could not picture her life without That Shoe Lady, and everything that had been built over the last 10 years. The plan was to start over, albeit with nothing, and to build the business from the bottom up again, just as Jessamie did in the early days of the business. This would include a NEW Instagram account, a NEW website, and a NEW store. As soon as the company liquidated, Jessamie began preparations for a new company with the same business concept, but learning from mistakes that were made over the years in order to refine the concept into something even better.

Small amounts of stock were bought back from the ‘old’ That Shoe Lady, and sold in order to generate capital to start a new store and a new website. A few months later Jessamie opened a new That Shoe Lady physical store in Gardens, Cape Town. With the help of some of the old TSL team, the store is now flourishing again, with a new website to be launched in early March 2024. Things are looking up for the first time in a long time - by building one brick on top of another, Jessamie hopes to build TSL up to something even better than before.