Midlands entrepreneur Eabha Greville is building a fashion accessories brand aimed at Gen Z consumers seeking individuality without the hefty luxury price tags.
In an era where consumers are increasingly looking for ways to increase their personality through the products they own, Irish entrepreneur Eabha Greville believes there is an opportunity in the growing market for customisable fashion accessories.
The founder of Gravel&Stones has launched a brand that is focused on miniature accessories and charms designed to personalise handbags, phones, keys and other everyday items.
“At its core, Gravel&Stones is about making accessorising fun again”
Gravel&Stones targets younger consumers who want design-led products that feel distinctive and aspirational while remaining affordable.
“Gravel&Stones came from a gap I noticed in the accessories market. There are beautiful luxury accessories and bag charms at one end, but they are often at a price point that is completely inaccessible to younger consumers. At the other end, there are very cheap, mass-produced accessories that can lack the design, personality and branding people actually want to show off.”
Self-expression
Greville describes Gravel&Stones as a business built around the growing consumer appetite for personalisation.
The products are designed to allow customers to transform items they already own. For example, rather than purchasing an entirely new handbag, consumers can update its look through charms, miniature bags and other accessories.
“I wanted Gravel&Stones to sit somewhere in the middle: playful, design-led accessories that feel special and distinctive without carrying a luxury price tag. The wider trend towards personalisation has made that gap particularly interesting. People increasingly want their bags, phones and everyday belongings to feel individual rather than identical to everyone else’s.”
For Greville, the opportunity lies in creating a recognisable brand centred on personalisation, collectability and creative self-expression.
“At the moment, the product sits within the global fashion accessories market, but I see the real opportunity as the growing personalisation and bag-accessories category within that. I don’t think Gravel&Stones needs to capture an enormous percentage of that market to become a substantial business. Even building a strong position among Gen Z and young millennial consumers in Ireland and the UK initially gives us a very sizeable customer base, with international expansion being a natural next step.”
“At its core, Gravel&Stones is about making accessorising fun again.
“Our products are miniature accessories and charms designed to personalise things you already own. Rather than buying an entirely new handbag because you want something different, you can change its personality using a mini bag, sandal or charm.
“The whole brand is based around this idea that anything can be charmed. A handbag is the obvious starting point, but the products can be attached to keys, belt loops, phone cases and other accessories. I want someone to be able to build up their own collection over time, mix colours and styles and constantly change how they wear them.
“The product is deliberately simple, but the opportunity around it is much bigger. I see Gravel&Stones becoming a recognisable accessories brand built around personalisation, collectability and that slightly more-is-more approach to fashion.”
A product of her environment
Although Gravel&Stones is a solo-funded venture, Greville credits mentors, peers and fellow entrepreneurs with helping shape her entrepreneurial journey.
One of the earliest influences on her was Aaron Keane, founder of Leaving Cert Plus, who gave her maths grinds while building his own business.
“Aaron used to give me maths grinds when I was younger, and I always found the fact that he was building a business at the same time really fascinating. Later, I became involved with Leaving Cert Plus myself and got to see much more closely what it takes to turn an idea into an actual product.
“I think that exposure made entrepreneurship feel much more attainable to me. It stopped being this abstract thing that people in Silicon Valley did and became something that somebody I actually knew was doing.
“Since then, I’ve become almost addicted to building things. Gravel&Stones has allowed me to experience the entire process myself: identifying a gap, sourcing products, building a Shopify store, creating the brand, marketing it, fulfilling orders, dealing with customers and deciding what comes next.
“This summer reinforced that further through Hatch105, where I worked in a three-person team building an e-commerce SaaS product and was surrounded by founders and operators every day. I think I’ve realised that I feel most energised when I’m around people who are building something.”
Gaining momentum
Greville believes Ireland’s entrepreneurial landscape is evolving rapidly, particularly among younger founders like herself.
“Growing up in the Midlands, I don’t think entrepreneurship was presented as an especially obvious career path. You might do a Mini Company in Transition Year, but after that there isn’t necessarily a clear continuation where young people are shown, “You can actually build a company.”
“I think that is changing very quickly in Ireland. This summer has probably changed my perception of the Irish start-up ecosystem more than anything else. Through Hatch105 and other programmes, I’ve met a huge number of young founders, developers and operators. I’ve also got to know people like Liam Fuller from Source and I constantly see people my age on LinkedIn launching businesses, building software, sharing their progress publicly and helping each other.
“There is a really interesting energy emerging around young Irish founders at the moment. Ireland obviously isn’t San Francisco, where entrepreneurship and technology can feel woven into the culture, but I actually think that creates an opportunity. There is a huge appetite here for more spaces where ambitious young people can find each other.
“What I’d love to see is a stronger bridge between school, university and the start-up ecosystem. There are incredibly entrepreneurial young people in Ireland who may simply never encounter the person or programme that makes them realise building a company is an option.”
A measured view on funding
While many start-ups prioritise fundraising early in their journey, Greville initially wants to build her business organically while keeping an open mind about funding.
“There are Irish founders I really admire who have demonstrated what can be achieved without immediately relying on external capital. Aimee Connolly built Sculpted by Aimee from her own savings and grew the company for years without outside funding. Gary Lavin is another incredible recent example. He built VitHit independently and the company has just been acquired by Nichols, the owner of Vimto, in a deal valued at €75 million.
“Those stories make bootstrapping really appealing to me because you retain an enormous amount of control and learn to make the business work with the resources you actually have.
“At the same time, I would never rule funding out. Gravel&Stones doesn’t need funding simply to continue operating, which I think puts me in a nice position. But I am very curious about what could happen if I combined the ideas I have for the brand with significantly more capital, expertise and support.
“Funding could allow my imagination to run considerably further: original product development, larger manufacturing runs, international expansion, physical retail, bigger creative campaigns and building a proper team around the brand. So I wouldn’t raise money simply for the sake of saying I had raised money. I’d want to know exactly what the capital was going to unlock.”
Lessons from the front line
Among the valuable lessons that Greville has learned as a first-time founder is how to balance external advice with personal convictions.
“One of my biggest lessons has been learning when to listen and when to trust myself. When you’re young and building your first business, people can be very quick to give you advice. Some of it is incredibly valuable, and I’ve learned an enormous amount from people with much more experience than me. But I’ve also learned that experience doesn’t automatically mean somebody understands your particular customer, product or brand better than you do.
“Nobody spends as much time thinking about Gravel&Stones as I do. Nobody sees every customer message, order, piece of content, conversion, supplier conversation and tiny decision that goes into it.
“I’ve therefore learned to keep my cards relatively close to my chest and become much more comfortable politely listening to advice without feeling obliged to implement all of it.
“Particularly when you’re young, there can be a temptation to assume the older or louder person in the conversation must be right. Sometimes they’re not. You can listen, take what is useful and quietly continue building.
Her advice to fellow founders? “Just start,” she says. “I think people can spend an enormous amount of time trying to make an idea perfect before anybody has even had the chance to reject it. Your first website won’t be perfect. Your first product won’t be perfect. Your first piece of content probably won’t be either. None of that matters nearly as much as getting something into the world and seeing how people react.
“I’m also a big believer in telling the right people what you’re doing if it helps hold you accountable. Once you’ve said, “I’m launching this,” suddenly you have a deadline that exists outside your own head.
“At the same time, I don’t think you should feel like you have to endlessly defend an idea to everyone around you before you’ve even had the opportunity to test it. Sometimes the best response to scepticism is simply building it,” she concludes.
“Let the customer decide whether it’s a good idea. And eventually, let the results speak for you.”
Image at top: Eabha Greville, founder of Gravel & Stones, pictured with fashion accessories and handbag charms as the Irish start-up targets the growing personalisation and bag accessories market
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