Daily LInks
1. Millennials and Gen Z Are Hooked on Klarna, a $46 Billion Shopping App: The “buy now, pay later” craze is troubling financial regulators. “In the past when I didn’t have money I simply just couldn’t shop,” TikTok user Joella Louisa tells Bloomberg News. “Now with Klarna, I can.” – Read More on Bloomberg
2. RELATED READ: Regulations, Consolidation at Hand as Buy Now Pay Later Continues to Gain Steam Among Consumers. At the same time as the number of brands, users, and dollars in the BNPL arena continues to grow, the largely unregulated nature of the BNPL explosion has been garnering the attention of regulators around the world. – Read More on TFL
3. More than 8,700 chain stores have closed in 2021: More than 8,700 British chain stores closed in the first half of 2021 as a combination of the coronavirus pandemic and the shift to online shopping continued to hit demand for bricks-and-mortar retail, new analysis has shown. – Read More on the Guardian
4. Vietnam’s Factory Shutdowns Tug at Apparel Industry’s Seams: Apparel brands rely heavily on Vietnam for manufacturing; the country has taken on more importance for U.S. companies in particular as they have shifted sourcing out of China to avoid rising production costs and tariffs. – Read More on the WSJ
5. How JD.com sold Western luxury brands to China’s Gen Z: A landmark collaboration with French luxury leviathan LVMH sees JD hosting an innovative program to deliver the brand’s exclusive shopping experience to netizens. Meanwhile, JD Luxury Express provides a white-glove delivery service for the high-end watches and jewelry that self-gifting consumers covet to showcase their personality. – Read More on SCMP
1. At Top Magazines, Black Representation Remains a Work in Progress: Diverse covers also do not always reflect a diverse staff. The people creating magazine covers — the models, photographers and hair and makeup artists — are typically freelancers and contractors, hired quickly and employed temporarily. Long-term staffing changes take more time and effort. – Read More on the New York Times
2. Fashion and Retail’s Tech Boom Goes Deeper: Technologies today, particularly artificial intelligence, machine learning and other data-driven models, quantify the pursuit and rip insights that predict what shoppers want. Platforms promising to make this a reality include giants like Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud and many others. – Read More on Yahoo
3. There’s no such thing as sustainable fashion: “We’re hearing very little about what the fashion sector is doing to eliminate fossil fuels from its supply chain. Fossil fuels are the major contributor to climate emissions, and this sector is one of the biggest contributors to climate emissions globally.” – Read More on Fast Co.
4. What’s the formula for e-commerce profitability? Dick’s Sporting Goods, for one, says it achieved significantly higher profitability in the second quarter in its e-commerce channel through fewer and more targeted promotions, better leverage of fixed costs and strong customer adoption of curbside and in-store pickup. – Read More on Retail Wire
5. Designer Virgil Abloh: “The forefront of fashion is not a trend, it’s not a fabric, it’s not a self-serving prophecy, it’s empowerment. It works every time. It works every generation, this idea of enlightenment.” – Read More on the WSJ
6. Day-Trading Army Goes All-In on NFTs as Meme-Stock Mania Ebbs: Thanks to collectibles like Pudgy Penguins and the Bored Ape Yacht Club going viral on social media, sales of non-fungible tokens on the largest marketplace, OpenSea, jumped to $3 billion in August. That’s more than 10 times the tally in the prior month. – Read More on Bloomberg
1. Retailers Turn to Clothing Rental as Consumer Acquisition Tactic: “Rental is a great way to meet a consumer in her digital environment. It provides an access-oriented way, which younger consumers are really habituated to, to experience their apparel in a reasonable and cost-effective way.” Banana Republic, Ann Taylor, Express, Loft and other clothing retailers are trying it. – Read More on PYMNTS
2. UK brands yet to sign accord on Bangladesh garment workers’ safety: Almost 80 companies including Marks & Spencer, John Lewis, Asos, H&M, Zara’s owner Inditex and New Look have backed the legally binding deal, but Primark, Next and JD Sports among those yet to sign legally binding replacement to 2013 deal. – Read More on the Guardian
3. RELATED READ: As Brands Adopt New Bangladesh Accord, a Look at How Disputes Are Handled by the Legally-Binding Pact. In all likelihood, and given the rising importance of ESG, including in the apparel space, the Accord’s Committee very well may see an increasing number and variety of labor and other ESG-related disputes. – Read More on TFL
4. Why algorithms are struggling to disrupt the world of fashion: The fear that Amazon might overwhelm the business model meant a volatile start in stock prices. But to the benefit of Stitch Fix, Amazon has consistently struggled to sell fashion. Think about the AI-powered camera, the Echo Look. This was supposed to provide style recommendations, but was repeatedly criticized for being misdressed. – Read More on the FT
5. Swiss watchmaker Oris says sales still below 2019 levels: Swiss watch brand Oris said sales were still slightly below the level seen in 2019, the year before the pandemic, due to a patchy recovery in Asia. Meanwhile, the United States and some European markets were doing better than expected. – Read More on Reuters
1. Can a tiny clothing company force the shipping industry to clean up its act? Each year, tens of thousands of merchant vessels carrying everything from iron ore to iPhones burn enough heavy fuel oil to release more than a billion metric tons of carbon dioxide. This represents nearly 3 percent of global emission. – Read More on Grist
2. Marta Ortega Pérez Is the Secret to Zara’s Success: As someone who embodies the extremes of the fashion industry, the 37-year-old daughter of Inditex founder Amancio Ortega is helping Zara batter down the traditionally unquestioned divide between luxury fashion and mass apparel. – Read More on the WSJ
3. Boards Need Real Diversity, Not Tokenism: The U.S. stock exchange has won approval for a new rule that requires corporate boards to become more diverse. Now companies must implement that – and go beyond the numerical requirements and box-checking to create a thoughtful, purposeful solution. – Read More on HBR
4. Beyond Appearing ‘Green’ – New Sustainability Efforts in Fashion Start with Internal Change: Confirming this fuzziness, a recent ICPEN report found that “40 percent of green claims made online could be misleading consumers.” In this way, many brands are able to create the appearance of eco-consciousness without delivering meaningful results. – Read More on Nasdaq
5. RELATED READ: Nearly 50% of Companies’ Sustainability Claims Are “Exaggerated, False, or Deceptive,” According to New Probe. The European Commission announced that the sweeping probe into hundreds of websites and a subsequent closer examination of 344 “seemingly dubious claims” resulted in a finding that “in more than half of the cases,” the claim-making company did not provide “sufficient information for consumers to judge the claim’s accuracy.” – Read More on TFL
6. Can the ‘high heel index’ predict economic growth? “The index worked by analyzing social media and other online sources for influencer and consumer references to shoes and boots where there was either a specific height of heel mentioned, like ‘four inches’ or a phrase that could be equated easily to a height.” – Read more on the Guardian
1. China’s consumer spending is weak. Electric vehicles and luxury goods are bright spots. “The pandemic has increased income disparities between lower and higher income earners, and the trend is visible in the consumer goods market with demand growth for high-end goods, e.g. luxury items, being stronger.” – Read More on Barron’s
2. Luxury Goods Market of South Korea Growing Rapidly: South Korea’s luxury goods market is continuing to grow regardless of COVID-19 and this growth is being led by those in their 20s and 30s. The combined sales of Hermes Korea, Louis Vuitton Korea and Chanel Korea amounted to 2.5 trillion won last year. – Read More on Business Korea
3. Flip bags $28 million to turn beauty, wellness social commerce on its head. Founder Noor Agha believes the future of e-commerce will be driven by shoppers and the experiences they have with social media, so Flip is pulling all of those experiences into one app, mixing in user-generated reviews and live shopping shows for beauty, wellness and health brands. It then adds same-day shipping and back-end logistics. – Read More on TechCrunch
4. Small tech deals keep swimming amid FTC ‘tidal wave’ of merger reviews: The FTC is on track to review about 3,000 deals this fiscal year, which ends in September, far exceeding the annual totals of the past decade. This led the agency to warn recently that companies should expect more merger reviews to exceed the standard 30 days amid the “tidal wave” of filings. – Read More on S&P Global
5. Ikea To Pilot Furniture Buyback, Secondhand Sales: Loyalty customers will be able to sell gently used Ikea furniture in exchange for store credit, with these items then available for resale in Ikea’s “as-is” section at discounted prices. Any customer can join the loyalty program for free. – Read More on PYMNTS
6. RELATED READ: Buyback Programs: The Future of the Luxury Market? Second-hand luxury can actually be seen as “a new growth driver and another high-quality, entry-level offer, such as perfumes, bags and shoes,” according to fashion consultancy Heuritech. (And those are precisely the types of high-margin offerings that enable most luxury brands – which, with their high turnover, volume-based models, are not actually based on exclusivity at all – to generate billions in revenue.) – Read More on TFL
1. India’s Future files new case against Amazon in top court over $3.4 bln retail deal: India’s Future Retail on Saturday filed a new case against Amazon.com at the Supreme Court in its latest effort to seek clearance for its $3.4 billion retail assets sale, which the U.S. firm has challenged. – Read More on Reuters
2. ‘Nationalist consumption’ boosts Chinese fashion industry: A nationwide shopping spree has turned the Chinese sportswear maker Erke from an also-ran to one of the hottest brands in the country, highlighting how the trend for “nationalist consumption” has changed China’s retail landscape and put pressure on Western companies. – Read More on Nikkei
3. Debunking the Hemline Index: The theory was developed in the 1920s and posits that the length of dresses can be an indicator of where the economy is headed, with shorter cuts pointing to good times and longer ones signaling a downturn. – Read More on Bloomberg
4. Retailer-fashion brand matchups thrill Wall Street but often fail: Target’s shares rose about 50 precent between the beginning of March and the middle of July, compared with an increase of 18 percent in the S&P Retail Industry Index for the same period. But the odds are good that Target and Levi’s linkup will come and go without leaving any appreciable impact on the company’s long-term performance. – Read More on Forbes
5. Chanel buys up more jasmine fields to safeguard famous No. 5: The luxury group said it had bought up an extra 100,000 square meters of land, adding to the 20 hectares it already exploits in partnership with a local family near the town of Grasse, known for its surrounding flower fields. – Read More on Reuters
6. RETRO READ: The Battle for the World’s Most Famous Fragrance: Chanel No. 5. The war over the rights to Chanel No. 5 dates back to 1924 when Ms. Chanel, herself, joined with French businessmen Pierre and Paul Wertheimer to expand the distribution of her fragrance business, which, at the time, was only available to clients who visited her Parisian atelier. – Read More on TFL
1. Re-engineering the fashion retail experience: The pandemic has accelerated changes in how we shop — and localization and unique offerings figure to be part of the plan to save the bricks-and-mortar trip. – Read More on the FT
2. Interest in designer collabs grows as Gen-Zers view luxury goods as assets: “[Designer collabs are] desirable partially because they’re scarce limited editions. It’s not like next year there’ll be a very close version of that product coming to market, which can be the case with other releases. That creates hype,” says StockX CMO Deena Bahri. – Read More on Morning Brew
3. Resale stays hot as platform powering Lululemon valued over $200 million: Trove Recommerce, a maker of online platforms for brands such as Lululemon and Patagonia to sell used goods, raised $77.5 million from investors trying to get in on the hottest part of the apparel market. The Series D round, led by G2 Venture Partners, brings the company’s total funding to $122.5 million. – Read More on Bloomberg
4. RELATED READ: Are Buyback Programs the Future of the Luxury Market? To date, “Most brands have [failed] to capitalize on the booming resale market,” according to Luxe Digital. While there are certainly some exceptions, such as Gucci and Stella McCartney, for instance, both of which have teamed up with San Francisco-based resale giant The RealReal, luxury brands “have been hesitant to encourage resale by fear of cannibalizing sales of new products and diluting the exclusivity of their brands.” – Read More on TFL
5. Coty bets on fragrance rebound for return to sales growth, shares soar: The company said it has a “robust launch” scheduled for the first half of the current financial year, adding it would also roll out touchless fragrance testers across the globe. – Read More on Reuters
1. Shein’s low prices are setting fast fashion on fire: Shein may be one of the most successful clothing brands that you’ve never heard of. The fast-fashion giant is where Gen Z shoppers go to find cheap, trendy clothing. Over the course of the pandemic, the brand managed to bring in nearly $10 billion in sales. – Read More on Globe & Mail
2. Ulta Beauty raises 2021 outlook on ‘recovery’ for beauty products retail: The company’s performance reflects “the recovery of the beauty category,” Chief Executive Dave Kimbell said in a statement. “Our value proposition is strong, and we are evolving and innovating to lead in the new beauty landscape, capture additional market share, and drive profitable growth.” – Read More on MarketWatch
3. Post-Rana Plaza: Why is the fast fashion industry still growing? In the last 20 years, there has been a 400% upsurge in clothing consumption. With low-cost garments and online shopping beginning to take off, the fashion industry proves itself to be a key contributor to climate change and a global threat. – Read More on OAG
4. Dick’s Sporting Goods, other retailers crack code of driving up profits: The company’s CEO echoed a theme of many retailers this quarter: Widening margins, as consumers go on a spending spree and companies learn how to operate a more efficient e-commerce business. – Read More on CNBC
5. ‘They fear the factory can’t last’: Pandemic takes local fashion from boom to bust in Sydney. “If you send manufacturing overseas it adds micro-complexities within the supply chain,” and this can lead to issues like quality control and lags in delivery times. – Read More on the Guardian
1. Michael Kors parent Capri’s stock jumps after Jimmy Choo vet named CEO: “We believe Capri is undergoing key transformations across each of its brands and Mr. Schulman is a timely addition to accelerate brand momentum and refresh at Michael Kors,” analysts said. – Read More on MarketWatch
2. Luxury’s Gray Market Is Emerging from the Shadows: “Traditionally, plenty of luxury brands either turned a blind eye to or even indulged in sales from the gray market as it meant quick cash and a chance to beautify their reported numbers from wholesale retail partners, especially on non-moving or excess stock. But in recent years that attitude has had to change as the market morphs into something that has become more and more difficult to control.” – Read More on the New York Times
3. RELATED READ: As Prices Continue to Grow and the Government Hints at a Wealth Crackdown, Parallel Imports in China Warrant Attention. “Banning parallel imports may have detrimental effects on a manufacturer’s profitability,” whereas “allowing parallel imports constitutes a simple mechanism by which the retail price does not fall dramatically when the state of demand turns out to be low,” while also “providing incentives to retailers to place larger orders than they otherwise would.” – Read More on TFL
4. Signals of change: After a year in which the fashion industry as a whole posted record-low economic profits, business leaders are now seeking to drive a perceived consumer desire to retire at-home wear and renew retail habits for looking good and feeling good in clothes that mark a sense of occasion. – Read More on the Drum
5. Virtual dressing room startup Revery.ai applying computer vision to the fashion industry: Unlike its competitors that use 3D modeling or take an image and manually clean it up to superimpose on a model, Revery is using deep learning and computer vision so that the clothing drapes better and users can also customize their clothing model to look more like them using skin tone, hair styles and poses. – Read More on TechCrunch
1. What’s bothering US consumers? Even absent highly restrictive new measures related to the spread of the virus, delayed return-to-office plans, mask mandates in schools, and potentially altered travel plans all serve as reminders that the virus remains with us. – Read More on Yahoo
2. Amazon Vs. Walmart: The Epic Battle of the Retail Kings Gets Hot. Each company has its own set of advantages. Walmart, the behemoth of brick-and-mortar discount stores, has the most outlets of any retailer. About 90% of Americans live within 10 miles of a Walmart. On the other hand, Amazon, the giant of online shopping, owns about 40% of the e-commerce market. – Read More on Investors
3. Shenzhen tells local ‘made in China, sold on Amazon’ vendors it will stay neutral in their disputes with the US e-commerce giant: While questionable practices like paying for positive reviews often go unchecked on Chinese e-commerce platforms, Amazon kicked off in May an extensive clean-up campaign targeting such activities. The crackdown has affected thousands of merchants. – Read More on SCMP
4. RETRO READ: In an Already-Crowded Trademark Landscape, Amazon Sellers Are Changing Game. In 2014, Amazon enabled China-based entities to sell directly to its members in the West, and in the process, grew its sales by a whopping 20 percent in a single year, prompting its total revenues to blaze past the $100 billion mark for the first time. – Read More on TFL
5. What role will our clothes play in adapting to a warming planet? The apparel and footwear sectors produce more than 8% of total global greenhouse gas emissions, according to a 2018 Quantis report, with emissions projected to increase by more than 60% by 2030. – Read More on Fashionista