Teresa timberlake tlke

HOT 100 BRAND CHAMPIONS: Teresa Timberlake, managing director, TLKE

Teresa Timberlake’s business strategy is simple: take the best-loved brands from the US and establish them in the UK market, and her Stateside finds are winning her distribution company TLKE some serious kudos on the British high street.

The star of TLKE’s portfolio is Anne Klein, which is ranked in the US’s top five watch brands. Timberlake first brought the brand over to the UK in 2013 through an exclusive deal with Debenhams but the brand has recently enjoyed huge expansion and now has 250 doors with a range of partners that includes House of Fraser, Fenwicks, Bentalls, F Hinds and H Samuel.

As well as strengthening her own coffers, the expansion of TLKE is helping to improve the financial fortunes of cancer charity Breakthough. “Anne Klein passed away in 1974 from breast cancer and since then so much has been done to understand breast cancer but the fight is still far from over and this is why TLKE commit to donate a percentage of profits to Breakthrough,” explains Timberlake. This dedication to giving back is why she has posed for her Hot 100 shoot at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show in a garden designed by friend Ruth Willmott, who has worked the space into a double helix formation crossed by a ribbon of pink plants in memory of her sister-in-law Angela Willmott who died from breast cancer.

With a fantastic selection of watches under her control – other brands include Nine West, Vince Camuto, Quiksilver and Roxy – and hopefully some good karma on her side, Timberlake, who likes to wind down after work with a spot of hot yoga, says she is feeling confident about the future. “We will continue to build on what has been created in such a short space of time. We are really excited for the immediate and long-term future.”

IMAGE: Kalory.co.uk

James Buttery

Editor of WatchPro, the WatchPro Hot 100 and The Luxury Report.

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