A CITY fancy dress firm has smashed its crowdfunding target of £200,000, in an investment scheme as part of its expansion plans.

Fancy Dress Worldwide, based at Shrub Hill Trading Estate, raised £271,000 through investment site Seedrs in just 27 days.

The campaign launched on August 3 with ambitious plans to use the investment to expand the firm’s operations with new warehouse equipment, Amazon Prime integration and an export strategy for the USA.

Since then, 150 investors have bought shares in the company.

Adam Bellamy, current CFO of PureGym, is one of the firm’s new investors and will take up a non-executive director position starting in October 2018, joining founder and managing director, Dom Portman, together with former global banking executive Kayar Raghavan on the board of the firm.

Mr Bellamy will be stepping away from his PureGym CFO role in October 2018, but plans to maintain a position on its board as a non-executive director and investor.

Mr Bellamy said: “I’m delighted to be joining Dom and the team at Fancy Dress Worldwide. I think they’ve done a great job in establishing the business thus far and I’m looking forward to helping them realise their ambitious plans for long term growth.”

Mr Portman said: “The Fancy Dress Worldwide team and I are extremely excited to have smashed the crowdfunding target, well before the closing date. One of the key goals of this funding round was to gain experience within the company as we grow.

"Mid-way through the round, and after some careful thought, Kayar and I felt that appointing an experienced CFO as a non-executive director would be beneficial, and Adam fits the bill perfectly. It’s an extremely exciting time for the company, particularly with Halloween around the corner, and I encourage anyone wanting to invest to do so soon."

Interested investors can visit seedrs.com/fancy-dress-worldwide.