Here at KMI Brands we can't get enough of our new webshop and there are lots of tempting gifts to suit everyone this Christmas time. From coffret sets to bundles, candles to room sprays, diffusers to body creams, there is something for everyone! We are also offering free delivery on all orders up until Christmas time and we now ship internationally!

On behalf of all of us at KMI Brands we would like to wish you all a wonderful Christmas and a very happy and healthy 2012!

Naked for Kids is a four piece range of hair products for children, all at the RSP of £3.05. Designed to keep hair feather soft and tangle free, Naked for Kids is available in fragrances that kids love. The range includes Jam Sandwiches, Bananas & Custard and Toffee Apple 2 in 1 Shampoos, and Orange Lollies Untangle Me Spray.

 
Younger still, Mini Naked is born: the next best thing to using nothing on babies’ delicate skin. All containing gentle aloe vera, the range uses only the bare essential ingredients. The four piece collection contains My First Butter Body Butter, Go Ga-Ga Gentle Body Wash, Cute as a Button Foam Bath, and Knee High De-Tangler Shampoo. RSP from £3.05 to £4.09.

New Mama Naked sits alongside the Mini range and has been introduced for mothers who often struggle to find products as their lifestyle changes. Whether they are expecting the pitter patter of tiny feet or they already have little ones, the three piece collection includes Serenity Stretch Mark Cream, Calming Bath Foam and Positivity Hand Cream, all at the RSP of £4.09.

Naked has come a long way since its launch in 2005. Consumer demand for natural products continues to rise, as does the desire to reduce toxic load. With favourites established in the bath, body, shower and hair categories, the natural step for Naked is to reinforce its unique position with these new additions to offer a wider choice to consumers. All new introductions stay true to the Naked mantra of being 'Goodness in a Bottle': lots of natural active extracts without parabens, petrochemicals, or sulphates.

Herbie Dayal, CEO of KMI Brands kicked off the evening explaining how the relationship between KMI and Dr Linda came about. Dr. Linda then took to the floor with an inspiring speech about the connection with the mind and the skin, and how passionate she is about her new, groundbreaking skin collection.

The range launched in Harrods on June 1st, available from the Pharmacy. Dr. Linda has been offering skin consultations in Harrods, and will next be in store on September 5th. LP Skin Therapy is also available from QVC.

Find out more about LP Skin Therapy by Dr Linda Papadopoulos:
www.lpskintherapy.com
www.facebook.com/DrLindaPapadopoulos
www.twitter.com/lpskintherapy

For more photos, please click here.

Guys take note – introducing the brand new FishFreezer range which includes the two cult Soho favourites with an added cooling menthol hit. Professionally developed by Fish’s Soho Style team the FishFreezer range is the ultimate styling essential to tame your barnet in any heatwave.

Jellyfish Frozen Firm Styling Gel will not only give your hair the crucial extra firm hold, it also has a cool minty blast, just what you need to wake you up first thing. Punk it up or add spikes harder than icicles to make your bonce look fierce. Unlike ice, this gel dries firm so no fear of melting or running. For ultimate hold, apply to damp hair, style and then blast dry to lock ‘n’ load your look. RRP £5.99, 150ml

Fishshape Frozen Firm Texturising Cream is ideal for creating choppy and chunky styles for short to mid length hair with the added fresh minty blast of menthol. Work a pea sized amount into your mitts and work over towel dried hair. RRP £5.99, 100ml.

All Fish products are available from Boots stores nationwide.

Visit us at www.fishsoho.com and follow us at www.facebook.com/FishSoho

Keep your cool with Soho Style!

Kilpatrick PR have been hired to handle press relations for a number of KMI's brands: Naked, Ted Baker Fragrance & Toiletries, Fish and Fish for Girls, and Little Me Organics. Alix Avory, Marketing Manager for KMI said of the appointment: "We were looking for an agency that had great ideas and could handle the diversity we have within our portfolio of brands at KMI. We believe we have found that in Kilpatrick and are pleased to welcome them on board as part of our team."

Wizard Public Relations has been appointed to handle the press and PR for the Orla Kiely fragrance, beauty and home fragrance collections. Wizard have a proven track record at generating great press coverage for KMI, having previously worked with the Naked brand. Victoria Howell, Brand Manager for Orla Kiely commented "It's clear that Wizard have a great passion for the Orla Kiely brand and we look forward to developing our relationship."

NBPR will still handle PR for LP Skin Therapy by Dr Linda Papadopoulos, and Alison Jameson PR will still handle PR for the Phil Smith range.

To contact Kilpatrick PR on Naked, Ted Baker, Fish and Little Me Organics, please call 020 7381 6226

To contact Wizard Public Relations on Orla Kiely, please call 020 7725 9290

To contact NBPR on LP Skin Therapy, please call 020 7833 9160

To contact Alison Jameson PR on Phil Smith, please call 0131 621 7210

Interesting Facts on Tanzania
Tanzania is a fairly stable country in terms of government. The current ruling party is supported but opposition is building. Although Tanzania remains out of the headlines in terms of famine and poverty, there is still a real problem within the remote and rural areas. The population of Tanzania has doubled in the last 20 years, only 12% have access to a bank account but half own a mobile phone!

Oxfam have created a National Change Strategy for Tanzania – the ten year programme started in 2007 and is broken down into the following initiatives:

• Economic Justice – a person’s right to earn a living, strengthening land rights, encouraging use of value chains (getting more out of the products you produce) .
• Gender Justice – equal opportunities, developing women’s leadership and economic strength, reducing domestic violence.
• Social Justice – making government accountable, public spending tracking, building capacity of local citizenship.

Projects are actually based around working within an area for a set period of time to improve facilities and attitudes and allow the local community to continue the work once Oxfam leave.

Oxfam GB work directly with NGO’s (non-governmental organisations) at the community level, it will be NGO’s who build the rainwater tanks, working with local builders and contractors. Oxfam steers the strategy.

At a local level the initiatives cover a variety of activities – for example livestock & agricultural partnerships, water and sanitation in primary schools and education partnerships.

• 36% of the population still lives on below $1.00 per day
• Only 40% of rural community have three meals per day
• Agriculture employs 80% of the Tanzanian workforce but only 10% of the landscape is arable

Rural communities often have plots of land and the days are spent farming. The pastoralists make their livelihood from cattle, rather than crops. They have a house and are not nomadic in their living habits but walk and wander with their cattle allowing them to graze, there are no defined boundaries like a farmstead.

Women in rural areas are not well respected and the Oxfam programmes are focusing on equality and better conditions. In many rural communities like the Masai, women are not supposed to own cattle or livestock, so Oxfam are working on the ground through local NGO’s to modernise local opinions. Rights to Ownership programmes are now allowing women to have small livestock such as goats and sheep, these can support a new start. By taking the livestock to market they are able to breed and grow their flock, as well as selling meat and milk, this is an example of a value chain.

It’s hard to imagine but the rural communities live and conduct themselves very much in their own way, most have their own dialect, beliefs and laws.

Shinyanga – Oxfam GB
Our key hosts were Wilfred Mwita – Programme Manager for Education and William Chipeta – Programme Officer for Education

Education and Sanitation programmes go hand in hand. Oxfam’s educational focus is on teacher training and maximising their skills and the facilities available to them. Due to the rapid increase in population many teachers at primary level with diplomas were moved up to teach secondary education. This left a shortage of well educated primary teachers reducing the quality of primary education. Through the use of mentors and the teacher resource centres, Oxfam are introducing improved teaching techniques to engage the students and encourage participation. This is not easy with average class sizes ranging from 60-100 pupils in rural areas and shortages of classrooms and basic equipment. Although teacher numbers are slowly recovering, there is still a real lack of applicants. Parents have to pay for uniforms, any commuting costs and the cost of time not spent tending to the land or cattle.

There are now five new teacher training centres in Shinyanga plus seven renovated centres.

• 180 schools
• Pupils per school can range from 100 to 1000 plus.
• Approx 2000 teachers
• 300 trained to date as part of the mentor programme
• 170 mentors who “pool” to train others in the field

Oxfam’s partnerships with Water & Sanitation in Shinyanga has generated:

• 40 rainwater tanks
• 38 Shallow Wells
• 30 Drop Hose pipes
• 40 Latrines

Our Oxfam Team are based in an area called Mikocheni in Dar es Salaam. Here Rachel and Charlotte met with:
Monica Gorman – Country Director based in Tanzania since 2009
Jane Lonsdale – Governance Director based in Tanzania since 2009
Silas Liakasi – Senior Programme Manager
Rose Kibe – Fundraising & Communications Organiser
Mary Sogo – Educations Programme Manager

To see more of KMI's photos of the visit please visit KMI @ Flickr.

To see video footage please visit: www.youtube.com/kmiclub

If you would like to donate towards the Shinyanga project please click here

Diary of a Trip of a Lifetime:
Day 1: “Landed in Dar es Salaam. Dar es Salaam is on the East Coast of Tanzania and translated means “Good Port”. Very well grounded and strong team, covering everything from education, to water and sanitation. Fascinating plans and economic strategy that Oxfam are trying to build with government at local and national level.

Tomorrow 4am start heading back to the airport. Flying to Mwanza, west of Serengetti, then three hour drive to Shinyanga. There we will meet the local project teams and see where the direct support goes. Over and out from Africa.”

Day 2: Left Dar es Salaam at 4.30am and took flight to Mwanza. Flight is two hours and Mwanza is based on the shores of Lake Victoria. Flew past the top of Kilimanjaro above the clouds… wow! It can be seen for miles. Very impressive!

Arrived at Mwanza at 8am and experienced best baggage reclaim – a man handing you the bags through a hole in the wall. Much quicker than any UK baggage reclaim! Travelling by road is the best way to see the country. Lake Victoria is very impressive and amazing landscape, quite rugged and glacial in appearance. Shinyanga is 160km from Mwanza. Our journey took about three hours. We noticed the landscape and poverty changes quite dramatically as you move away from the bigger towns.

Arrived at Oxfam Shinyanga and went straight out to see a school with the water tanks and currently latrines being built with the Oxfam money. The children were adorable and stayed past home time to meet us. Teachers we met were super and their gratitude overwhelming, proud to show where they can have proper washing facilities, plant trees for shade and use water for cleaning. As a result of the Oxfam money and the building project, a focus is now on this region and at this school today – the government have committed to building another eight toilets. The head teacher went to South Bank University and so was keen to share his London know how. Four classrooms, 160 children, not enough desks and equipment but the kids look happy and healthier than we had expected.

Everything is so dry and dusty the earth is heavy with red clay. Any available plot of land is used to farm whatever they can. As part of the water availability in schools, Oxfam support Shallow wells in the community near by, so the school can use the water without risk of the whole community using it whilst the community uses the shallow well. It was five minutes away and quite amazing in terms of how many people it helps. A small boy was collecting water when we arrived. Dipping a bucket in to fill large containers of which he had four and a bike with one piece of rope. Water is just so scarce and turning a tap on is such a glorious thing we take for granted. Also visited a teaching centre and met various mentors who work with these schools. It’s about 6pm and just got back to our hotel. Will eat and have an early night! Over and out from Shinyanga.”

Day 3: “Karabu! (Welcome) Today we met the local council at their monthly meeting. Meeting today was about the annual budgets and how the spend for education will be split. About 13 members in total with a woman as District Councillor Amina Masenza. The respect and the way they conduct themselves is very different to UK, raising hands, bowing of heads. We then visited two schools today and one was really rural. No roads and nothing for miles. It was very emotional. The kids were happy and smiley but this was poverty on a bigger scale: four classrooms, 700 kids, one rain water tank and four toilets.

Most of the children bring water with them to school, some walk 8km. You can tell this is poorer by the clothing – shoes with wire as the laces have worn out or been lost. Most school shirts are ripped, dirty, and most children walk barefooted. This was very different to the schools we saw yesterday closer to the town. The village elder and parents had a meeting with us. Most families are dispersed and so don't communicate with each other. School is secondary in priority as they need food and water.

One tank is clearly not enough but they don't know how to group together and lobby local councils for more. Quite a sombre day. Annually these people will earn £50. A bag of fertilizer to help their crop is £30, a school uniform is £3. It’s clear that the costs to live outway what the rural population can live on.

Our Oxfam guy Wilfred, spent 30 minutes talking with the villagers and teachers on how they can get more communication and also look to share equipment, food and water resources. A room of blank faces looked back and I wonder whether the immediate daily issue of getting food and water is too consuming to even have the energy to lobby local government. Teachers anda new generation of educated kids should help. Just got back, food and bed again! Three schools to visit tomorrow.”

Day 4: “I believe that Oxfam may try to slowly get you acclimatised so they leave the powerful and hard hitting visits until last. Our visits today took us to one school in the town, one rural and one special needs. I am just going to focus on the special needs school as this needs talking about.

In Tanzania, and I am sure in other African nations, the majority of rural communities have issues when there is a birth of an albino child. We were told today that in the last two years, Tanzania has seen an increase in killings of albino babies. They are either killed quietly, and village leaders say their body parts are used for fishing, medicine and witchcraft. Remote areas are not educated in these matters and so abnormality is hidden away or not dealt with. So a campaign was launched to bring your child to this centre to live in the town of Shinyanga for their protection. They have approx 40 children who are albino. Also another 40 children, either deaf, dumb or blind aged 3 to 15. This place is a sanctuary to them. The children are safe, but limited funds mean this school is also the children's home, quite an eye opener.

Poor, dirty conditions, dormitories which smell of urine, flies everywhere, no medical supplies. Only five special needs teachers, of which we met three and they were fabulous. Here they have water and food, tank funded by Oxfam, and cope well with their daily issues. Their immediate struggle is space, clothing, sun cream and protective hats, sleeping areas and teachers, so much help is needed.

The deaf and blind kids have a strong future and will all either go on to work or go back to their communities. The albino kids future is unknown and quite heartbreaking. Their skin is blistered and sore, flies are all around them and their sight is also not great. Very hard, depressing and emotional, particularly as they want to follow you around, touch your hair, hug you, hold your hand. Charlotte, Kim and I will never forget the images we saw. On a lighter note, these children were shown our books, footballs and skipping ropes. The head teacher showed them and signed to some of the deaf children, they were so excited. Quite a day! Tonight we have a dinner with local councillors and Oxfam before we start our two day journey home, first driving back to Mwanza, fly back to Dar then back to UK. All in all an incredible experience in which we will never forget.”

To see more of KMI's photos of the visit please visit KMI @ Flickr.

To see video footage please visit: www.youtube.com/kmiclub

If you would like to donate towards the Shinyanga project please click here.

Customers flocked to the stand to discover this new skincare range from renowned psychologist Dr. Linda Papadopoulos. Dr. Linda – who made her way to the show on Friday following her appearance on the news that morning talking about ‘happiness’ – made a presentation to selected QVC guests and spoke to customers at the stand about her scientific background and how the range came about. QVC customers asked questions about her range as well as any particular skin concerns they had.

The stand looked amazing and the products received positive feedback from customers very keen to find out more about the brand. They loved the packaging, colours, smells and texture of the products and were very excited for its launch!

LP Skin Therapy includes skincare essentials as well as treatment based must haves, the range includes – system balance face wash, uplifting facial water, multi-task day cream, overnight replenish cream, untired eye cream, re-affirm eye serum, refining lip exfoliator and lip rescue gel. The range was developed based on Dr. Linda’s research in the field of Psychodermatology – research shows that stress can have negative effects on the skin and can prematurely age us. Dr. Linda uses pioneering ingredients in her skincare products including ingredients containing Nootropics known to have a positive effect on the mind (mood enhancers) combined with high performance actives, peptides and vitamins. This science based range uses ingredients which deliver results helping make you feel and look better inside and out, it will change the way you think about your skin.

The innovative and luxurious new brand launches with a fabulous starter kit which customers can buy on QVC from February 13th. Dr. Linda will appear on three 10 minutes slots during QVC Beauty Day at 9am, 2pm and 5pm. The products in the kit are great try-me sizes, perfect for popping in your handbag or weekends away so customers can try before purchasing the full sized products available from April 2011. On Beauty Day the Starter kit is priced at £19.98 but is worth over £42 – extremely good value and one not to miss!

More information on the brand here.

The website is due to launched very soon, so watch this space: www.lpskintherapy.com

“I am absolutely thrilled to be recognised in this way – very unexpected.”  Orla

Orla is presently The Visiting Professor to the department of Textiles at her alma mater The Royal College of Art.

She is involved in Graduate Fashion Week and has helped many students as a trustee to a graduate bursary fund at the Royal College. Her environmental bags for life at Tesco raise 25p per bag for the fund.

She has been external examiner at Master’s level to The National College of Art and Design in Dublin where she began her career.

Known for her unique design language applied to ready-to-wear, lifestyle and homeware, which is shown in her flagship store in Covent Garden. Her new fashion store on the Kings Road has been described as the most beautiful boutique on the road. New concessions are opening in Selfridges and Harrods. Her line is also being prepared for major store group role out.

Her book Pattern recently published by Conran-Octopus is an insight to the creative process and how design can enrich our lives.

Her company Kiely Rowan Plc has a policy of assisting charities through the sale of special product, which has generated funds for The Terrance Higgins Trust, and Fashion Targets Brest Cancer in Ireland and Maggie’s Cancer Caring Centres.

Orla has won four UK Fashion Export awards and her label sells to a worldwide audience. Her business is enjoying double-digit growth. 

Her design studio is involved in producing four fashion collections a year, her talent has also led to many successful collaborations including Apple, Heals, The Tate and Citroen. 

Her presentations for London Fashion Week have always pushed the creative envelope and are eagerly anticipated. Last season she showed a movie she made with Gia Coppola to showcase her collection, to critical acclaim. Her next presentation at Somerset House is on the 18 February 2011.

Further info: www.orlakiely.com