The 43-year-old entrepreneur founded brands4friends two years ago and it has since become Germany's largest online shopping club.

Heitmeyer has pencilled in sales of 85 million euros ($124.3 million) for this year -- more than three times as much as last year.  Finding investors seems to be the least of his problems.

Private equity companies were calling him rather than the other way around, he said. "There's not one week where there isn't another one calling up," Heitmeyer said.

"There aren't that many healthy companies around and there is a certain pressure to invest. We are benefitting from that."

Brands4friends has so far gotten most of its financial support from venture capital firms like Partech International, Mangrove Capital Partners and Holtzbrinck Ventures.

For the next financing round early next year, Chief Executive Heitmeyer wants to get private equity on board, aiming to raise a clear double-digit million euro sum.

Heitmeyer's idea of selling clothes, accessories, and other lifestyle products by fashionable brands in Germany to an exclusive online audience for a steep discount (similar to France's vente-privee.com) came at the right time.

The number of bargain hunters swelled as the global economy fell into recession and companies were grateful to hive off ballooning inventories to distributors like bransds4friends.  A growing online community began bidding for selected products from brands like Nike, Puma, Reebok, Oakley, or Eastpak for discounts of up to 70 percent.

Today brands4friends has more than two million members in Germany -- up to 120,000 new members sign up per month, also hepled by its link-up to the German social networking site StudiVZ, which is owned by Holtzbrinck.

Heitmeyer aims to launch its first expansion abroad later this year and is in talks for a possible joint venture with another e-commerce company to enter the U.S. market, potentially in the next three years.

Over the mid to long term, however, brands4friends may have draw funds for its expansion elsewhere.  Heitmeyer is already toying with the idea of tapping the stock market.  So, far no date has been set, he said.

    ($1=.6839 Euro)

(Reuters photo)

 The doctor of microbiology will also head the shareholders'
committee which represents the Henkel family members who hold
about 52 percent in the creator of Persil detergent.

But the 40 year old great-great-granddaughter of the Henkel
founder is not the pioneer many would like to see in her.

"She basically helps to manage her own fortune. It's a
family job," said Hagen Lindstaedt, head of the Institute of
Management at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology.

"Male supervisory board members are typically made by the
company. With women, it's different. Female supervisory board
members are often representatives of families or owners," he
said and referred to Susanne Klatten as an example.

Klatten's family owns almost half of German premium carmaker BMW
and about 92 percent in specialty chemicals maker Altana. She
sits on both companies' boards.

Lindstaedt just published a research paper which found that
the number of women on German management boards has been on the
decline since 2005 and stood at 2.4 percent last year.

About 4 percent of shareholder representative on German
supervisory boards are women, the research also showed.

"Nothing has really changed over the past ten years,"
Lindstaedt said. "I would love to see more women joining the
board on a management ticket," he said.

Which is why instead of a quota he suggested listed companies should publish
the top three management levels to raise transparency. Women
might find it more attractive to take a job at a company with a
particularly high proportion of women.

Lindstaedt is counting on women to vote with their feet and shatter the glass ceiling.

When I walked into the dome of Berlin’s Bode Museum in July for Escada’s Pink Party at the Berlin fashion week, it seemed no one was quite sure whether we were celebrating the resurrection of Escada or whether this was a bombastic way of saying good-bye.

Today, we know it was the latter. Escada failed to get the support it needed from its bondholders to restructure its debt, which was a precondition for further capital injections from shareholders, like the Herz brothers -- owners of coffee franchise Tchibo.  

Escada admitted defeat late on Tuesday and said it would file for insolvency this week. Is this the end of an era, the end of Germany’s sole glamorous answer to Armani, Chanel and Versace? 

Escada’s Pink party clearly made an impression. The broad staircases to the left and right of the museum’s entrance were draped with mannequins wearing outfits from all stages of the company’s 33-year history.

Brightly-coloured duvet jackets, diamond-studded jeans, fur coats, lavishly embroidered evening gowns and eighties-style leather jackets dazzled fashionistas and enraged anti-fur protestors outside the swanky soiree, which drew guest such as actress Diane Kruger, super model Nadja Auermann and designer Wolfgang Joop.

Escada has left its mark in the global fashion industry and continues to inspire today’s designers from Paris to Tokyo. Even if Escada fails to crawl back from insolvency, the spirit will live on.

Berlin

For the fifth time, up-and-coming fashion designers are meeting in the German capital to present selections from their latest collections at the Berlin Fashion Week, which is attracting increasing interest from the international fashion scene.

Maia Guarnaccia, vice president at IMG Fashion Europe, which organises the fashion week in Berlin as well as similar events in New York, Miami and Amsterdam, said last year marked a turning point for Berlin.

“Since July (last year) people are now calling us to be here,” he said, adding that it used to be the other way around.

“Berlin still is an oasis,” Guarnaccia said. “Because it is more accessible” than other fashion capitals like Paris, London or Milan, where the cost of living as well as production and rents are a lot higher, he said. This, he said, attracts young designers especially in a time of global economic recession.

“People get more creative in times of a crisis,” he said, having also worked for British fashion designer Vivienne Westwood in the past.

One of the fast-rising stars is designer Pablo Ramirez. Born in Buenos Aires in 1971, Berlin marks one of his first international shows.

“Berlin is another important door to Europe,” Ramirez said after the show. He was invited to come to Berlin after winning top fashion awards in Argentina. “I’m very nervous and excited,” he said.

His summer 2010 collection featured mainly elegant black dresses and suits and was accompanied by almost melancholy sounding strings.

It was followed by a bright, colourful and upbeat show by South African designers Jacques van der Watt and Danica Lepen with their Black Coffee label -- which featured red, blue and red silky smooth wrap-around dresses adorned with golden laces.

A few minutes walk away from the main venue, another show launched in a big white tent set up at the heart of the city, next to the opera house. The German natural clothing brand Hessnatur show is the latest collection with other ecological designers in several rooms of Berlin's famous Adlon Hotel. 

Hessnatur was founded more than 30 years ago by environmentalist Heinz Hess and won over designer Miquel Adrover as creative director in 2007. Hessnatur decided to show in Berlin after his gig at last year's the New York Fashion Week triggered a wave of media interest. “Requests have risen brutally,” said Chief Executive Wolf Luedge.

Why so busy? Well, actress Julia Roberts recently ordered some clothes for her next movie and Vogue just did a photo shooting with Cameron Diaz wearing Hessnatur’s frocks.

While the future looks bright for the company, there is still a great deal of uncertainty. Hessnatur is part of German retail and tourism group Arcandor which filed for insolvency last month.

Luedge could not say what would happen to his company now, but said: “Hessnatur will come out of this one unharmed. I am not worried. Not at all.”

IMG’s Guarnaccia added more optimism. Berlin would make its way, he said: "The success will be a blend of German brands, established designers and newcomers.”