This idea has the potential to put fashion flash sale sites to shame. And updates the business model.
More benefits to the customer. More benefits to the designer.
And still has the whole “buy now” urgency appeal.
Really differentiated in the fashion space.
It’s a win-win-win if you ask me.
via Moda Operandi
When you consider the global economy, certain obvious players come to mind – but what about the increasingly significant economy that exists off the books?
As Rob Neuwirth outlined in his Pop!Tech talk: Free Markets vs. Flea Markets, this Informal Economy or Shadow Economy or System D economy comprises $10T in annual global GDP and employs 1.8B people worldwide – about half the workforce on the planet. In aggregate, this quasi-legal system represents the 2nd largest economy in the world (behind the United States), and with current growth levels, is expected to eclipse the #1 spot in less than 10 years. By 2020 it has been forecasted that 2/3 of the global workforce will be doing business in this domain.
Farm-to-Table
It’s a funny concept when you really think about it.
Isn’t all food from a farm?
Isn’t all food consumed at a table?
Well no, not really… and no, not always.
In fact, a whole lot of the food we eat these days is created in a lab and consumed in a car – if we’re being really honest, a lot of it is designed in a lab specifically to be consumed in a car. Fast food is as American as… well, fast food. The concept itself was born in America, it was raised and continues to thrive in America and has now become one of our most powerful and influential global exports. Fast food has fundamentally shaped the landscape of the United States and the world – quite literally and figuratively (pun intended).
2 BRANDS BETTER THAN 1?
As an avid shopper - both online and in real life (yes, I’ll admit it - it’s not as if it was a secret), I’ve quickly gotten on the whole online sample sale bandwagon.
gilt.com
hautelook.com
ruelala.com
ideeli.com
salemail.com
thetopbutton.com
onekingslane.com
the list goes on…
Online discount “invitation only” retailing has taken off with a bang (and a chunk of my monthly paycheck!)
So recently when one of the original sites - Gilt Groupe - launched a new sister site, Gilt Fuse, I obviously took notice.
The two sites are quite similar - same business model, relatively similar merchandise selection (ha, obviously I would know this). The difference is that Gilt Fuse is geared towards a younger, slightly more fashion-forward, exclusively female audience, whereas Gilt Groupe is slightly more mature, more expensive, male and female friendly.
While the success of the Gilt model is undeniable (“the company has quintupled its membership in the past year, with 1.3 million registered members in the US and more than 200,000 on its five-month-old Japanese site. Company revenue for calendar year 2009 is expected to be in excess of $150 million.” - MSN Money), I wonder about the strategy behind this recent brand extension.
In the early stages of building a brand, I’m not convinced it’s a smart move to immediately take that equity and split it in two.
Objectively speaking, it takes double the resources to build double the brands. Subjectively speaking, as a loyal Gilt Groupe member, I think it was a strategic misstep - asking customers to go to two different sites to accomplish the same task is confusing and defeats the whole purpose of an online sample sale - efficiency, ease, speed.
Well, I’m curious to see how it all pans out… and no, it hasn’t stopped me from signing in every day at noon (and spending way too much on clothes I don’t need), but that’s an entirely different issue!
(Marissa Vosper)
friday is my day for yoga.
while i walk to the gym nearly every morning (up west 4th street, across west 11th), today i noticed the following:
- dog poo (customary)
- 3 used condoms (not as customary)
- stomped-on cockroach
- vomit
- sleeping homeless man
- various pieces of food/litter disgarded on the sidewalk
- overflowing trashcans
as i sat in my yoga class i contemplated why it is that i love and live in
new york city.
there’s something about being a new yorker that presupposes a
skewed sense of reality.
one that accepts all the bad
in order to soak up all the good.
it’s all about perspective, which is what makes brands so interesting to me.
“new york city,” the brand, is something i full-heartedly buy into, cockroaches, condoms, vomit and all.
but at what point (if ever) does a new yorker become a former new yorker?
at what point do people stop buying the brand in favor of something sunnier, cleaner, prettier, easier?
at what point does that skewed reality come into focus?
if it ever happens to me, i think i’ll blame it on advertising.
om.
(marissa)
Check out Living Proof on Sephora’s homepage
(Marissa Vosper)