The Business of Fashion

Fashion 2.0 | Fashion156 speaks out

Guy Hipwell, the stylist-cum-entrepreneur behind Fashion156, is carving out a space as one of the UK's pioneers of fashion on the Internet. Yesterday, Guy teamed up with two of his contributors, Susie Bubble (interviewed on the BoF back in November) and Elliot James Sainsbury, to share their fashion Internet experiences at the Apple Store in London. The event coincided with the launch of Fashion156's latest issue, appropriately titled, "The Fashion on the Internet Issue."

My biggest takeaway was that the future for fashion editorial -- both online and offline -- is healthy and promising.  Integral to the fashion industry is the telling of stories, communicating about brands and inspiring debate and discussion. While the Internet has broken down traditional fashion industry walls, there is still a clear demand for traditional fashion content as well.

Cartier and Sergio Rossi | The power of Internet video

Yesterday I met with James Killough, an innovative London-based film maker, who happens to have a film in pre-production that may end up being one of the first real films about the fashion industry -- or so everybody tells me.

More to the point, James also talked to me about the potentially powerful combination of the Internet, video and the luxury industry and cited an innovative video project directed by Olivier Dahan, the renowned French film-maker, who collaborated with Cartier on a series of 12 videos for its Love collection.

I took a gander at the videos today, and was impressed -- not only with Cartier's forward-thinking use of video to create a narrative behind one of its most important iconic lines, but also with the stories themselves, which were engaging and, sometimes even moving.

Fashion 2.0 | Top 10 Online Fashion Magazines

While taking a whirl around the Internet these days you're bound to bump into an online fashion magazine - or ten. Everyone from Richard Mortimer of Boombox fame to Net-a-Porter’s Natalie Massenet is getting in on the action – and looking for ways to monetise it.

For a long time, content developers had a hard time creating a distinction between simple websites and bonafide online magazines. But, in the past year, a plethora of online magazines have emerged with three common threads:

Multimedia:  The new magazines are a veritable multi-media festival. For some content consumers, particularly younger tech-savvy types, a multi-media experience is the only way to capture (and keep) their attention: lots of videos, blogs, and communities.

Integration: The trick here has been to create a truly integrated experience across different channels -- for example,  how do you make an offline page really come alive on the Internet? Creating complementary content that can be consumed separately, and together, satisfies even the most demanding multi-tasker.

Convergence:  Style.com meets Neiman Marcus.com. Content companies are integrating commerce models into their sites while commerce companies are creating their own content, and thereby, becoming content destinations in and of themselves. 

To mark the surge of online magazines, we've compiled a list of ten of the most interesting concepts to watch:

Fashion 2.0 | Still waiting for the future

About a year ago,  I posted an article entitled, Fashion 2.0: What the Future Holds, laying out some thoughts (and questions) on the future of luxury and fashion online.  Since then, Fashion 2.0 has been one of  the most discussed topics on The Business of Fashion, and the ensuing debate has been thought-provoking, largely due to the high level of engagement from the BoF community. The latest example of this is from Annie Chang, who posted this delightful YouTube video response to our first Fashion 2.0 post, demonstrating the convenience of shopping from the comfort of one's living room. Thanks Annie.

Over the past year, I've continued to argue for the potential to sell luxury online, and more controversially, to use the Internet as a tool for communicating and engaging customers. I spoke to JC Report and the South China Morning Post about the growing influence of fashion blogs and wrote an article in the Financial Times on Fashion 2.0, using the example of the wildly successful Mini Cooper online community as a compelling case study for where things may go.

But, has anything really changed in the meantime?

Fashion 2.0 | The compelling simplicity of Store Adore

We have always been big supporters of the Fashion 2.0 revolution that is sweeping across the Internet. But, it must be said that not all of the new sites are adding much value. There are plenty whose value propositions are unclear, whose technology is shoddy and whose business models are overly complex.  To add to this, with the flood of new online communities out there, there is growing consumer fatigue, so getting anyone to pay attention is tougher and tougher.

Meredeth Barnett and Cristina Miller have managed to overcome all of this with their new site, Store Adore, which provides its community with targeted user-generated shopping guides and detailed store reviews. Like the power A&A duo from Gilt Groupe, featured last year on the Business of Fashion, Meredith and Cristina are longtime friends and Harvard MBAs who have complementary skills sets.

Links | Future fashion, Pink slips and Recession buster

A little lightness to end the week here on The Business of Fashion. This 1930's clip from Youtube forecasts cantilever-heeled shoes and transparent net as the fashion must-haves for the Year 2000. The video has had almost 100,000 views. Could Raf Simons, Marc Jacobs and Alexander McQueen been some of them? Have a look at their collections for Spring/Summer 2008.

The Latest in Fashion: Pink Slips (New York Times)
Eric Wilson chronicles the revolving designer doors at fashion houses from New York to Milan to Paris in recent years. Of course, the latest door revolved this week in Milan, where Lars Nilsson was quickly replaced by Tommaso Aquilano and Roberto Rimondi of 6267 as head designers for Gianfranco Ferre.

Luxe brands Follow the Money - to the Internet (WWD)
Several readers have written to alert us to today's WWD article about the role the Internet can play in helping luxe brands ride out the recession, which US Fed Chairman, Ben Bernanke, all but confirmed yesterday. In what some are touting as the greatest recession buster for luxury companies, the Internet may (finally) be the next battleground in their quest for the luxury consumer's dollars, euro and yen.

Fashion 2.0 | Luxury Interactive reveals online luxe race

Just digest these figures for a moment:

• Coach's online business now has revenues of over $100m per year -- the same as what Gucci's new flagship on 5th Avenue is expected to sell.  Neiman Marcus has broken the $500m in sales barrier online.
  
• In the last year alone, wealthy consumers' use of social networks such as Facebook and MySpace has rocketed from 27% to 60%, a growth rate of more than 120%.
• And, people are snapping up uber-luxe products online -- DeBeers regularly sells single diamonds worth more than $25,000 on its ecommerce site and 20ltd.com has sold items worth twice this much.

These were amongst the most interesting tidbits revealed at this week's Luxury Interactive conference held in London. The eCommerce opportunity has now become abundantly clear. Some quick math would suggest eCommerce is a very profitable channel indeed, especially when compared to a flagship store. The rent alone on the Gucci flagship in New York is estimated to be $23m, when an Internet retail site can still charge a full retail price, but with much lower fixed costs to cover. (However, returns and discounts are higher in the Internet channel.)

As for Web 2.0, finally, we're beginning to see a shift from a discussion of "if" luxury brands can seize real opportunities for relationship building with their best customers on the Internet, to an exchange on "how" this can be done. Arguably, a brand's Internet site is now the most important contact point for customers -- especially for the customers of the future. One step brands may now take is to set up their own online communities, as we wrote about in a Financial Times article in February.

Fashion 2.0 | The Ford channel

In what may be one of the most innovative manifestations of Fashion 2.0 we've seen, Ford Models has brought fashion modeling to the YouTube generation -- quite literally.  Under the careful watch of Katie Ford, daughter of founder Eileen Ford, and new CEO John Caplan, the once-embattled American modeling agency has creatively melded the rarefied world of Fashion with the openness of Web 2.0. And, in doing so, they have successfully reinvigorated the Ford brand and created brand new revenue streams that will see the company into fashion's future.

Web 2.0, of course, has already turned the music industry upside down and created a platform for influential web voices including everyone from political commentators like Arianna Huffington, to entrepreneurial gurus like Guy Kawasaki and Seth Godin, and even the celebrity-obsessed Perez Hilton. But these online influencers have all been built by being open and open to criticism -- something the fashion industry isn't known for. And, they are individuals, not a monolithic company.

So, how does a modeling agency, built on the secretive glamour and exclusive allure of fashion, operate within the openness of Web 2.0 culture? By taking down the fashion barriers and letting everyone inside to get to know its people.

Fashion 2.0 | StyleHop's fantasy fashion

Watch out buyers, editors and merchants.  StyleHop, one of a new breed of Internet start-ups, is attempting to disintermediate you.  Or, at least, StyleHop is trying to make your job easier.

According to President David Reinke, a business school classmate of ours, women are craving an honest, accurate, democratic rating system in fashion that can help them cut through the clutter and show them highly-filtered lists based on individual preferences.

Customers, he says, know that the editorial pages of fashion magazines are biased by a need to please advertisers and other external influences. So, they would prefer to turn to the wisdom of crowds (i.e. masses of other people just like them) to help them pick out the best styles.

Fashion 2.0 | Published in the Financial Times

Today, the Financial Times published its regular Business of Fashion supplement, chock full of industry updates and in-depth articles on the issues that are shaping the industry. It really is a must-read for everyone in the fashion business, whether you are a creative or a corporate, or somewhere in between.

This time, we contributed an article, How to reach second base online, encouraging established luxury and fashion companies to start thinking about Internet as a communication tool, not just a tool for selling and advertising.  In fact, if done cleverly, this can be used to re-establish the communication and relationships that Luxury Goods companies were once known for.

We would love to hear what you are thinking on Fashion 2.0 these days, and about any brands that you think are leading the way. The full PDF of the article is available here.