Cheng was in a New York lingerie store when she realised she had been wearing the wrong bra size. As she stood in the fitting room wearing the correct one, she realised for the first time what a bra should feel like.

This was when it hit Cheng that finding a bra that fits in all the right places is a common struggle for most women. “I think a lot of us feel that there is something that’s not comfortable, but we can’t quite identify what,” she explains. “So we just go with the flow and say it’s good enough; it’s not falling off, at least.”

But what really pushed Cheng to open her own boutique was the lack of places with fitting expertise, size inclusivity and varied styles in Hong Kong.

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Cheng had a successful career in marketing and product development for beauty giants in New York and Europe. But she fantasised about becoming an entrepreneur. She says her thinking became clearer when she needed a strapless bra for a party but didn’t know where to look.

“I’ve never lived in Hong Kong before, so I asked my friends, ‘where do you guys buy lingerie in Hong Kong?’” she recalls. “And their answer was so surprising. It was nowhere.”

Cheng immediately got to researching, going from department stores to premium lingerie boutiques, but was left completely uninspired. One store’s attitude was particularly depressing. Unable to tell the difference between two black bras Cheng asked about, its employees simply said, “They’re both French, but this one is a bit more expensive.”

Determined to change the lingerie scene in Hong Kong, Cheng began going to trade shows in Paris and New York, talking to suppliers about a store that didn’t yet exist.

This made things difficult in the beginning, Cheng remembers, as it was a struggle to convince suppliers to stock with her. “I was faced with a lot of pushback. I was a nobody in the industry,” she reveals. “I had no retail experience beforehand. I was a little Asian girl coming in from Hong Kong. I didn’t have a lot of credibility.”

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Twelve years after founding Sheer, Cheng can look back with fondness about how Chantelle has been with the boutique since day one as her first ever supplier. Now, the brand sits on a curated list of over 40 international designer brands – Coco de Mer and Agent Provocateur included – some of which are only available from Sheer in Hong Kong.

So why the name Sheer? “We wanted something that’s easy to pronounce, easy to remember. I toyed with a lot of French names. But that’s just too hard, I think. And my friend said, ‘Well, what about Sheer? Because a lot of stuff that you sell is beautiful and sheer … sheer evokes a sense of delicacy, a delicate soft feeling.’”

At Sheer, not only are there a variety of bra sizes and styles to choose from, but in-house lingerie experts provide a range of services too, which stays true to Cheng’s original vision for the brand. Sheer’s professional fitting service “Fit Clinic” helps customers find their perfect bra fit. “Lingerie is a lot about fitting and trying stuff on and understanding what works for you,” shares Cheng. “There’s a lot of education involved in training our team as well.”

In times of struggle, what drives Cheng’s passion is seeing how much her customers loved the products her boutique offered. “To me, it’s not about selling. It’s not about the financial part of the business,” she says. “To me, it’s really the emotional part where I can see that our customers walk out of here happier and more confident than they walked in. I love that feeling that we somehow made a difference in someone’s life.”

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Advice and future goals

Cheng’s advice for aspiring entrepreneurs? Just be prepared for the worst.

“Overestimate the amount of planning, work, dedication and commitment that you will need to put into your business,” she says. “Before I started, I read a book and it said, plan for the worst, hope for the best. We thought about every single thing so that when that problem does arise, [we aren’t] completely flustered.”

Cheng says the company was able to grow even through the pandemic. “We’ve experienced such significant growth in the three years of Covid. It really is shocking. And it’s all from the support of our customers, our fans, my team who, in the midst of Covid craziness, pivoted right and left to get the business to where it is.”

Before leaving to prepare for the soft opening of Sheer’s new Harbour City branch, Cheng admits that it’s a new experience for her: “We’ve never opened a store on the Kowloon side, let alone in a giant like a Harbour City.

“It’ll be a huge learning curve for myself and the team, but we’re super excited about the new store. We just want to keep bringing amazing, beautiful lingerie to women in Hong Kong.”

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The annual charity bra drive

Inspired by the bras in her wardrobe that she realised could find new purpose, Cheng uncovered an overlooked need for intimate apparel among impoverished communities – where essentials like bras are often considered luxuries – and started an annual bra drive just two years after founding Sheer.

Through direct distribution to charities in Asia, Sheer has since donated over 10,000 bras to women who are refugees, experience poverty, or have been victims of sex trafficking or crisis pregnancies.

When Cheng asked if charities really had the need for bras, the response was unanimous: “Every charity said yes please, because [they] always get donations for clothing, for sanitary pads, but no one thinks about a bra,” Cheng shares. “A lot of these girls and women don’t have a good fitting one and it actually affects their safety and stability; a bra is the least donated clothing item but the most needed.”

For Sheer’s 2023 bra drive, Cheng is focusing on Hong Kong, partnering with local organisations including Hong Kong Dignity Institute, Mother’s Choice, Pathfinders, Christian Action and Run Hong Kong after a three-year hiatus. She is inviting women in the city to donate clean, gently used bras – whether regular, maternity, wireless, sports or any other type of speciality bra.

The collection period will last from September 15 to October 15, and both Sheer locations at The Landmark and the newly opened Harbour City branch are open for collection, with prizes up for grabs and a lucky draw for a HK$5,000 Sheer gift card.