Monday 4 July 2022 04:36 PM Superdry designer wins £100,000 after being refused promotion because she was ... trends now
An experienced designer for high street fashion store Superdry has won almost £100,000 in compensation after her bosses refused to promote her - because they thought she was too old to quit.
Knitwear expert Rachel Sunderland was deemed a low 'flight risk' from the company compared to younger members of staff and would stay 'no matter how she was treated', an employment tribunal heard.
As a result, she was repeatedly passed over for promotion in favour of other colleagues with less experience until she felt forced to resign.
Ms Sunderland - thought to be in her early 50s - has now won £96,208.70 in compensation, after winning claims of unfair dismissal and age discrimination.
The tribunal, held in Bristol, heard she was a knitwear design specialist with more than 30 years experience in the fashion industry at brands like Fang Bros and Boden before joining Superdry as a designer in 2015.
In the first season in which she was responsible for designing Superdry's range of men's knitwear, sales - which had been falling - increased by 63 per cent.
Her performances were applauded by her bosses, who rated her overall ability as 'master' in 2017 and 2018.
Knitwear expert Rachel Sunderland was repeatedly passed over for promotion in favour of other colleagues with less experience until she felt forced to resign
But the risk of her leaving Superdry was assessed as 'low', whilst the impact of her leaving was assessed as 'medium'.
This flight risk assessment was neither discussed with Ms Sunderland before it was made nor disclosed to her afterwards.
The tribunal heard that, when Ms Sunderland first started working at the fashion brand everyone had the title of 'designer', but this changed in 2017 when two of her colleagues were promoted to 'senior designer'.
She raised this issue in an appraisal meeting with her manager in March 2017 but he told her she needed to undertake other responsibilities to reach the rank of senior designer.
In August 2018 the design team was restructured with roles of trainee designer, assistant designer, designer, lead designer and design manager.
Florence Humphreys, an HR advisor at Superdry, told the tribunal that in order to be promoted to lead designer, a candidate would need experience of working across multiple categories without needing much support and guidance from senior colleagues.
Ms Sunderland claimed she had all of the experience necessary, as she managed work in the men's and women's knitwear and knitwear
