Celebrating a Milestone – Kate Stokes of Coco Flip

Celebrating ten years since their inception, Coco Flip has grown their community and strengthened their founding ideals of promoting local production and making, through their continued spread. Co-founder Kate Stokes speaks to the milestone, their sustained evolution as a brand and their new showroom.

Located out of their Northcote showroom in Melbourne’s eclectic north, Coco Flip share the space with fellow local Australian maker of fine furniture, Plyroom. Their positioning in the heart of a thriving community of creative thinkers and makers was key and has been one of the founding stones to the growth of their community. Their recent move was to further reinforce this. Describing themselves as one small part of a bigger whole, co-founder Kate Stokes speaks to the important ten-year milestone and their new showroom space.

Reflecting on the time since Coco Flip began, Kate laments on it having been over a quarter of her life thus far. More positively though, she adds, “Things certainly look quite different to what they did ten years ago, but our ethos and intent are still same. We’re still proud to be a small family-run business working with talented local manufacturers to create lasting products. We’ve grown really organically over the years so it’s nice to stop and reflect on how far we’ve come.” The year started out for many with much more prosperity and optimism, including this milestone as a benchmark. Kate says, “We had planned to have a big ten-year anniversary celebration in our showroom but alas, 2020 had other ideas.” Instead the focus has been on celebrating in other ways.

Looking back to where it all began, and launching that first product into the unknown, she says, “Felt like a daunting task, as there were so many unknowns – it was a steep learning curve. Now however, we have a much firmer grasp on the industry, the local manufacturing scene and business in general, so the ship runs quite smoothly these days.” Having previously been located in Collingwood, the new move further north advances their immersion into the vicinity and adjacency of other similar-minded makers. The alignment with Plyroom was serendipitous, who were also looking for a space at the same time. Kate adds, “Our brand values align, and our products sit together really naturally. The showroom is a sun-filled warehouse on Heidelberg Road in Northcote. The ground level is our warehouse where we package, and store products and upstairs are the showroom and office space.”

Celebrating ten years since their inception, Coco Flip has grown their community and strengthened their founding ideals of promoting local production and making, through their continued spread.

Primed and dynamic in dealing with the current situation, Coco Flip are also adapting the way that the showroom is experienced, with online and virtual interactions available as well. In terms of what is on the horizon, Kate says, “We’ll be launching some new products such as a pendant light for Australian brand NAU, an anniversary limited edition Coco Pendant to celebrate 10 years and some more secret projects.” We’ll be watching.

“We’ll be launching some new products such as a pendant light for Australian brand NAU, an anniversary limited edition Coco Pendant to celebrate 10 years and some more secret projects.”

“The showroom is a sun-filled warehouse on Heidelberg Road in Northcote. The ground level is our warehouse where we package, and store products and upstairs are the showroom and office space.”

Primed and dynamic in dealing with the current situation, Coco Flip are also adapting the way that the showroom is experienced, with online and virtual interactions available as well.