Wearing a sage-coloured gown and clutching a bouquet of white roses and eucalyptus, Sophie Hinchliffe gazed adoringly at the bride as she got ready to walk down the aisle.
One of the eight lucky girls and women chosen by Stacey Solomon to be bridesmaids, Sophie helped fan out the veil and fix her makeup before Stacey tied the knot with Joe Swash during an intimate at-home ceremony in 2022.
There was never a surer sign to those who followed the lifestyle influencers that the two had grown close. Their brands, Instagram accounts and even families had become entwined.
They had been friendly for only three years when Stacey asked Sophie – known to her 4.8million followers as the original ‘cleanfluencer’, with the title Mrs Hinch – to be part of the wedding party.
The invitation was a public statement that the two women supported each other not only professionally, but personally – and that their relationship was cemented in friendship rather than mere Instagram ‘likes’.
But today, with the memory of that whimsical ceremony at Pickle Cottage – Solomon’s Tudor-style home in Essex – fast receding, Stacey and Sophie have all but disappeared from each other’s lives.
First Stacey, 36, appeared to cut Sophie, 35, out of the wedding photos she’d posted online. Then a message of congratulations from Stacey, written beneath the announcement of Sophie’s third pregnancy, was mysteriously deleted.
It left fans in little doubt that things had turned sour.
Stacey Solomon and Sophie Hinchliffe were close friends until their relationship turned sour
They would often share big life events together, such as the birth of their children. Sophie was even one of the bridesmaids when Stacey wed Joe Swash in an at-home ceremony in 2022
Why? The answer, in time-honoured fashion, might well have its roots in money.
Brand deals are everything in the world of influencers. And sources tell me it was competition for advertising and sponsorship revenue that eventually came between them.
‘Stacey is known as a very business-savvy woman,’ an insider tells me. ‘She’s a hard worker, but she goes for what she wants and she gets it.’
The two women have much in common, personally and commercially.
Sophie became one of the UK’s most popular online figures thanks to her widely copied cleaning hacks. Wielding a £3 bottle of Zoflora disinfectant, she first shot to fame in 2018.
The cleaning guru had soon accumulated a staggering two million followers – now known as ‘Hinchers’.
Thanks to her ‘cleaning as therapy’ approach, Mrs Hinch appealed to a wide fanbase, resonating in particular with those stuck at home during lockdown. Today, she is one of the most sought-after influencers in the country.
Meanwhile, Stacey – already a celebrity following her X Factor performances in 2009 and appearances on Loose Women – had also created a lifestyle brand.
Perhaps it was only natural that the singer-turned-influencer would reach out to Sophie on Instagram to offer her support in navigating all this new-found fame. That was in 2019.
They found the similarities went beyond their work. The two women were the same age, both were born and brought up in Essex and both are mums to six-year-old boys: Stacey’s Rex and Sophie’s Ronnie.
Playdates followed. Their friendship went ‘Instagram official’ in 2020, when Sophie posted a photo of them together with the caption: ‘When women support other women amazing things happen…’
As she told the ‘Hinchers’: ‘One day I received a message from this amazing woman, simply asking me if I’m OK.
‘It’s like [Stacey] just knew I wasn’t, even though I hadn’t made this apparent to anyone. I found myself pouring my heart out to her by message, asking how she handles [life in] the public eye with a newborn.
‘And what she said to me was, “Right I’m coming round for a cuppa!” A cuppa? I couldn’t believe it! Stacey Solomon in my house?’
Rarely a day would go by without appearing on each other’s social media.
They have a prolific publishing output in common, too.
Sophie released her popular first book, Hinch Yourself Happy, in 2019 and another four between during the following three years – all helping readers to ‘simplify their life’. Then last year came children’s book Welcome to Hinch Farm and the forthcoming Christmas on Hinch Farm.
Stacey, meanwhile, released Tap to Tidy in 2021. The follow-up, Tap to Tidy at Pickle Cottage, became a Sunday Times bestseller.
The women live just 20 miles away from each other, with Sophie moving into her £1.1million Essex farmhouse in 2022 a year after Stacey moved into £1.3million Pickle Cottage in Brentwood.
Each property sits on several acres of land with room for swimming pools, large gardens, chickens and cocker spaniels.
But today their double act has come to an abrupt end.
Sophie’s September 2023 appearance on Stacey’s BBC show, Sort Your Life Out, was the last time they were seen together on screen.
Anyone hoping to find a reason could, perhaps, look at their respective commercial deals.
In the last few years, both have worked with Asda, Amazon, Tesco, Home Bargains and Karcher.
Instagram posts selling their products have seen them rake in hundreds of thousands of pounds.
Sophie Hinchliffe offered cleaning tips on This Morning in 2018
Sophie began working with Tesco in 2021 and released a collection which included luxury bedlinen, loungewear, heart-shaped bowls and candles.
She cut ties with them two years later, saying she wanted to concentrate on designing cleaning-product scents for brands such as Lenor and Bold.
She also amped up her partnership with Joy of Clean last year, the parent company to Bold, Lenor, Flash and Fairy, aiming to produce signature laundry scents.
A collection of Febreze Air Mist, Fairy-Max Power, Flash All Purpose Cleaner and Fairy dishwasher tablets came next. And she became an ambassador for the Home Bargains chain.
Speaking about her achievement on Instagram at the time, the influencer said: ‘If you’ve followed my crazy journey from the start, you’ll know just how much this means to me. My mind is blown.’
But in the summer of 2024, Stacey swooped in, launching a new business idea called ‘Stacey Loves’. This is a curation of her favourite lines – including fragrances and cleaning products – stocked in Tesco and Home Bargains. She also has a big presence at Asda.
Was this all a little too close for comfort? Some observers think so.
‘For Hinch, I think the friendship was real,’ said one. ‘Stacey turned them into frenemies.
‘She likes to come across as this goofy, sweet woman when in fact she’s a very shrewd business woman.’
Another source said: ‘I’m 100 per cent confident it was a manufactured friendship for brands and a potential TV show.
‘Hinch thought it was a real friendship. Once Stacey got deals that Hinch wanted, it was heartbreak.’
So far at least, this new froideur seems to have has done little to dent their commercial prospects.
By last year, Sophie had business assets of £4.3million and Stacey – thanks to her businesses and property portfolio – boasted assets of £7.3million.
If Mrs Hinch seems unstoppable, the Stacey juggernaut, too, seems to carry all before it.
Her current interests include a production firm named after her sons and a beauty company named after her daughters. She invested in haircare brand Rehab in October 2023.
Stacey’s BBC home-decluttering series, Sort Your Life Out, has run to five series and won a National Television Award last year.
She’s also been the face of Crafty Christmas, and was commissioned by ITV for a series of her Renovation Rescue in 2024.
Just three short years from that touching show of public support for each other, it seems the countryside is no longer big enough for two Essex girls made very good indeed.
