Staff Reporter – The Zimbabwe Daily
Harare, Zimbabwe – One of the country’s top modeling agencies, Harare Life Models, is now feeling the repercussions of COVID-19.
Due to the country’s state of emergency mode, fashion shows, beauty pageants and face to face training is no longer permitted which in turn has taken a ripple effect on the agency.
“Modeling is generally an in person activity. We are having troubles doing grooming in order to get the model ready for gigs, also because of the lockdown they are relatively no events happening such as fashion shows which means no gigs for models. So it’s really tough times,” said Batanai Santos, Creative Director of Harare Life Models.
However, the Creative Director said the modeling agency was now using online platforms as means of recruitment and conducting trainings.
“We have developed an online platform for models to submit their applications it’s at hlmodels.co.zw and in terms of training we are building courses for online consumption both on the web and also on WhatsApp.
However, we are still consulting our clients on the best ways to work with our models without putting them at risk of exposure to the Coronavirus epidemic,” said Santos.
Santos further highlighted that modeling was still economically viable, “modeling is indeed still viable, however we need to innovate, perhaps incorporate things like influencer marketing and building our models as brands so that they can get paid while endorsing products.
Moreso, with regards to the new normal, we think it’s only necessary to look at the way forward and it’s hard to tell if we will ever go back or we might be facing a new normal, what’s important is adoption and making it work.”
