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AccelerateHERStories: Olivia Parkes – Redefining the Art of Personalisation

There’s a composure about Olivia Parkes that doesn’t ask for attention; it earns it. When she speaks, she’s clear, assured, and entirely unhurried, the sound of someone who knows where she’s going, and why.

Persi began with a simple realisation: for all the talk of “personalisation” in retail, the experience had become anything but personal. “We’re collecting all this data,” she said, “and still the experience feels completely detached from the human on the other side.”

She began with curiosity and a touch of audacity, assembling her first prototype from a patchwork of no-code tools. “I sent a text out on Monday morning that said: send me a picture of three items in your wardrobe and I’ll style completed looks including your items, with links to purchase. Within ten minutes I was oversubscribed.”

Her first “AI” was herself.

“I used a quiz on Tally, PowerPoint for the flat lays, and Notion to publish them as websites. Then I’d send each customer a personal link … ‘Hi Laura, here are your recommendations.’ That was my MVP.”

It was functional, not flawless, but it worked. More importantly, it gave her evidence that the demand was real. Every interaction, every order confirmed that shoppers wanted guidance that felt personal, not predictive. “Ninety-six percent said they’d use Persi again,” she noted. “That was the moment I knew I wasn’t imagining it, the appetite was already there.”

The Founder, Olivia Parkes

Olivia’s story isn’t just about tech. It’s about identity, the interplay between ambition, motherhood, and the impossible standards women hold themselves to. “Before I had kids, I always had a fear, can I achieve what I want to achieve and still be a good mum, whatever that even means?”

There were moments of reckoning. “Was I being selfish? Irresponsible? Because I was sacrificing what could be a nicer life, earning a better salary, for something that might never work. And I was losing time with my kids. That’s the hardest bit.”

But she’s learned that progress often hides in discomfort. “Every time I got there, something happened. Some little spark would pull me forward again.”

To Olivia, confidence isn’t a posture, it’s persistence.

“You need to be tenacious. Determined. Resilient. You need all of that in buckets. And you’ve got to ask for help, keep pushing, and make sure you’ve got people around you who’ll lift you when you can’t lift yourself.”

The Work and the Raise

When Persi secured its £660,000 pre-seed round, Olivia made a decision that signalled exactly what kind of leader she intends to be. “I asked the syndicate to come in £50k less and ring-fenced the final £50k for female angels,” she said. “I told them, ‘I’ll go out on LinkedIn — if I get nothing, I’ll be back for £50k. But I’m leaving that door ajar. I really want women on my cap table.’”

The response was immediate. Within a day, she had ten calls booked and £176,000 pledged for that £50k space. “I was running downstairs between calls saying, ‘We’ve got forty, we’ve got seventy, we’ve got a hundred!’ It was wild.”

She closed the round with eight female investors, several of them first-time angels. “One was the Chief Customer Officer at Reiss. These women were incredible.”

The decision came from design, not decorum,

“It was about visibility; giving women the opportunity to own part of something they believe in. If you want representation at the table, you start by giving women a stake in the room.”

The Collective

What anchors Olivia isn’t just ambition but belonging.

“AccelerateHER and Barclays have been huge,” she said. “You meet women who just get it. We share the highs, doubts, the juggle. You don’t have to explain the chaos, they already know.”

That sense of shared understanding, of women meeting each other as peers, not competitors, is something she returns to often. “There’s something powerful about sitting in a room where everyone’s building, failing, and rebuilding. It makes you feel less alone in it all.”

The Reflection

There’s no hint of sentimentality when she talks about the future. Just focus. “You’ll never be ready,” she said. “You just start. And then you keep going.”

Olivia Parkes isn’t chasing scale for its own sake. She’s building a company with conscience, a technology that remembers its users are people, not profiles. And in doing so, she’s redefining what it means to lead: with conviction, clarity, and an unwavering belief that progress should feel personal.

AccelerateHER Programmes: Helping You Scale

Olivia Parkes is part of the Barclays Eagle Labs Female Founder Accelerator 2025 Cohort, powered by AccelerateHER.

Did Olivia’s story inspire you? Perhaps we can support your business to scale.

Our accelerator programmes and peer accelerators are designed to help female founders move from the idea stage to successful scaling. Programmes like the Barclays Eagle Labs Female Founder Accelerator and the Women to Women (W2W) Programme connect you with industry experts, investors, and key resources to build and scale your business.