Daily LInks
1. Hermès and LVMH Stocks Are as Trendy as Their Handbags: Fractional shares of designer stocks can be a far cheaper way to get “pride of ownership” than a luxury handbag. (On Stockpile, one can buy a gift card of fractional stock such as Hermès for as little as $5, while the most coveted luxury handbags easily top $10,000.) – Read More on the WSJ
2. Making Ethical, Sustainable Clothing Choices: “One of the things that we are looking at this year is regulatory and legal reform in the fashion industry. For example, we are supporting California’s Garment Worker Protection Act, which will, for the first time in decades hold fashion brands legally and financially accountable for what happens in their garment factories.” – Hear More on NPR
3. Next round of stimulus checks could further lift US e-commerce sales: U.S. e-commerce sales in 2020 hit an estimated $791.7 billion, accounting for 14% of total retail sales that year, according to figures from the U.S. Census Bureau. That is up from 11% of total sales in 2019 and 9.7% in 2018. – Read More on S&P Global
4. Debranding Is the New Branding: As much as brands aspire to be sui generis, branding has fashions that ebb and flow like skirt lengths or collar widths. So, what is the future of debranding (or blanding)? Either the debranding trend proves ever more pervasive and, driven by digital, beds in for the long-haul; or it provokes a backlash of pent-up creativity inspiring flamboyant counter-cultures like Dada, psychedelia and punk. – Read More on Bloomberg
5. RETRO READ: How Can You Protect Branding That Barely Even Exists? Since so much of a company’s value is directly tied to the strength of its intellectual property, how is it that companies have managed to maintain or achieve brand recognition when so many of the branding elements are stripped back? Well, minimal branding does not mean non-distinctive branding. – Read More on TFL
6. Walmart beats data breach lawsuit, in test of California privacy law’s scope: A California federal judge has agreed to dismiss a lawsuit over an alleged data breach affecting Walmart Inc customers, finding California’s privacy law can’t be applied retroactively and the plaintiff doesn’t claim the breach came after the law took effect in January 2020. – Read More on Reuters
1. Can the Death of Skinny Jeans Save Retail? Skinny jeans account for 35% of women’s denim sales in the U.S., but they have lost their place as the gravitational center of women’s wardrobes. They are no longer the default. Wider styles are gaining market share, including one known as the “mom jean.” – Read More on Bloomberg
2. RELATED READ: Fred Segal Turned Jeans into Hot Fashion in the Early 1960s. While working as a sales director for the H.I.S sportswear brand in the early 1960s, Fred Segal had a vision: Blue jeans didn’t have to be just sturdy work pants costing a few dollars; they could be recast as a fashion item and priced at $19.95. – Read More on the WSJ
3. MyTheresa is E-Commerce for Luxury. The Stock Might Be the Cheapest Thing it Sells. The overall luxury market is growing by about 7% annually. The tailwinds put Mytheresa in an enviable position, and the company should get a further boost from its expansion in the U.S. and China, which are currently just 10% of sales each. – Read More on Barron’s
4. So long, sweatpants. Americans show signs they’re ready to get dressed up again: It’s time for retailers to pivot — again. That won’t come easily, though. Businesses continue to face congested U.S. ports and container shortages, backlogging merchandise, which will make stocking shelves with fresh outfits all the more complicated. – Read More on CNBC
5. Yeezy Gap collection is coming in the first half of 2021: Announced in June 2020, Gap Chief Executive Sonia Syngal said on the late Thursday earnings call that the timing of the collection’s arrival is “the number one question” she’s asked. – Read More on MarketWatch
6. RETRO READ: Gap, Telfar and Contract-Making in the Age of COVID-19. “While the basic premise under U.S. law is that contracts must generally be kept and performed, an extraordinary circumstance may make performance so vitally different from what was reasonably expected [that it may] relieve performance.” – Read More on TFL
1. Is the Fashion World Changing? Brands pointed to European anti-discrimination laws to avoid answering question about diversity. In France, a controversial 1978 law regarding “data files, processing and individual liberties” prohibits the collection and processing of personal data that reveals, directly or indirectly, the racial and ethnic origins, or religion, of any persons. – Read More on the NY Times
2. Why Go to Paris When You Can Buy Hermes in Hangzhou? The share of Chinese consumers’ high-end purchases made in mainland China more than doubled from 32% in 2019 to over 70% in 2020. All the big fashion houses will need to adapt. – Read More on Bloomberg
3. RELATED READ: How a Decline in Chinese Tourists Around the World Has Hit the Luxury Sector. Most of this overseas shopping is done by women between the ages of 19 and 29, according to a 2018 survey of over 750 million Chinese people. It seems clear that as the Chinese economy recovers from coronavirus they will return to spending. Where they are able to travel and spend will have a big impact on economic recoveries from the pandemic. – Read More on TFL
4. Elon Musk Doesn’t Care About Patents. Should You? HBO tolerates theft of its core product. SpaceX forgoes patents. Knowing its software would be pirated, Microsoft followed the same strategy to build its presence in China. – Read More on HBR
5. Gap Inc. CEO Predicts Apparel Rebound as Consumers Emerge From Covid-19 Pandemic. Gap CEO Sonia Syngal has laid out a plan to revive the long-struggling company by closing hundreds of Gap and Banana Republic stores, cutting the number of items it sells and pushing executives to take more creative risks with the flagship brand. – Read More on the WSJ
6. The Absurd Nike Scandal That Has Sneakerheads Losing Their Minds: It’s unclear to what extent Ann Hebert was directly involved in her son’s lucrative endeavors, but it appears to have been enough to end her Nike career. – Read More on Slate
1. The curious appeal of Birkenstocks: These proudly orthopaedic sandals (and a recently-announced buyout by LVMH-affiliated L Catterton, which reportedly put a $4 billion-plus valuation on Birkenstock) have demonstrated that anything — anything — can become chic under the right circumstances. – Read More on the FT
2. How Supreme-Style Merch Drops Took Over Corporate America: Merch isn’t new. What’s changed is the brashness with which companies are evolving their swag game into a merch play, embracing the hype model of limited drops, big-name collabs, and higher price tags, as everyone from giant consumer brands to up-and-coming TikTokers tries to mimic Supreme, the upscale streetwear brand acquired in November by VF Corporation for $2.1 billion. – Read More on Marker
3. Can Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen’s The Row survive the pandemic? The problems started with Barneys going bust in the summer of 2019. At the time, The Row was Barneys’ single-largest vendor creditor, to the tune of $3.7 million, a sum eclipsed only by some of its landlords. In the wake of that debacle, The Row’s then president, David Schulte, left the company that fall. (He is now suing the company, its parent company, and the Olsens, in their personal capacities.) – Read More on The Cut
4. Off-Price Retail Is Fully Priced: The long-term picture for off-price retailers undoubtedly looks good; they have a track record of performing well during and after economic downturns. And TJX and Ross Stores have been steadily gaining market share from department stores. – Read More on the WSJ
5. Can fashion be sustainable? Yes, says Gabriela Hearst at Chloé: Hearst’s arrival at Chloé, where she will work in partnership with sustainably minded new CEO, Riccardo Bellini, points to a radical shift in strategy among mainstream luxury brands who believe that values, rather than aesthetics, are the key to an aspirational image which, in turn, will drive customer loyalty. – Read More on the Guardian
6. RETRO READ: Can the Fashion Industry Ever Really Be Sustainable? An alternative, radical approach may be to recognize that humans have always used fashion to satisfy emotional, egoistical desires. So, the challenge should be shifted from trying to control these primeval, irrational behaviors to finding a systemic and ethical approach to embrace them. – Read More on TFL
1. Women-Led Startups Received Just 2.3 percent of VC Funding in 2020: This wasn’t just part of an overall decrease in VC funding. In 2019, 2.8 percent of funding went to women-led startups; in 2020, that fell to 2.3 percent, Crunchbase figures show. This comes after years of increases. The 2.8 percent figure, while paltry, was an all-time high. – Read More on HBR
2. Target thinks the future of e-commerce is its stores: Target, whose sales grew by more than $15 billion for the fiscal year ending January 30, has focused on making stores the cornerstone of its digital sales, using them as the fulfillment centers for shipping items, or where customers could pick up their online orders if they chose. – Read More on Qz
3. These Are the Retail Trends in Ecommerce for This Year: “Omnichannel as a number one point, having to attend to all channels and have a very clear strategy for marketplaces of physical stores, department stores, ecommerce for different brands and for this we have to work a lot.” – Read More on Entrepreneur
4. Can Buy Now, Pay Later Save Physical Retail? The payment form factor is rapidly on the rise, as some 48 percent of consumers now report they would not shop with a merchant that did not offer credit or some form of BNPL at the point of sale. – Read More on PYMNTS
5. RELATED READ: As Buy Now, Pay Later Services Gain Steam, Regulators Are Paying Attention. Technically speaking, Afterpay (and other similar companies) “skirt the definition of a loan under some U.S. laws,” meaning that it is not subject to the same regulation. However, regardless of how it defines its operations, “the more successful Afterpay becomes, the more likely it will attract regulatory scrutiny.” – Read More on TFL
1. Is Radical Transparency the Future of the Fashion Industry? While the fashion industry has been historically secretive, a crop of brands are pulling back the curtain to reveal more about how their clothes are created. Often, these revelations only go so far, raising the question of whether a truly open-book approach is a good business strategy? – Read More on the WSJ
2. E-Commerce Giant Rakuten Now Lets Users Shop with Cryptocurrency: Rakuten’s ecommerce service – often referred to as “the Amazon of Japan” – has over 95 million registered users according to a JPMorgan insight report. – Read More on Coindesk
3. Can the EU Regulate Platforms Without Stifling Innovation? Europe looks like the test case for what the regulatory response to platforms’ power. The EU’s GDPR and the recently announced Digital Markets Act are setting the standard for countries around the world — and in some cases offering a cautionary tale. – Read More on HBR
4. “Supreme is selling very standard products; there is nothing new,” Stehle said. “I’m a little afraid that the fans of this brand will want to kill me for saying that right now, but it’s true. How they did that is by partnering with other brands to create even cooler versions of their products that nobody else was capable of providing such that it became exclusive content. And that is now worth $2 billion a year — selling Supreme versions of older products.” – Read More on PYMNTS
5. Luxury is a New Game. These Are the New Rules: The new game requires digital leadership, not just the digital transformations all companies must suffer. Brands also need to know how consumer sentiments are shifting because they will underestimate the competitive activities aimed at their customer base. – Read More on Jing
1. “It’s a basic human right.” The fight for adaptive fashion. Nike, for one, recently released its first hands-free trainer. Three years in the making, the Nike Go FlyEase aims to revolutionize footwear for people who can’t put on shoes independently. – Read More on the Guardian
2. Saplings fly off the shelves as consumer brands turn green: But researchers warn that not all planting schemes are equal, and that eye-catching projects can be a corporate distraction. Planting to offset emissions is not a simple case of one tree equals one credit; schemes have to undergo lengthy checking processes. – Read More on the FT
3. RELATED READ: Companies Are Clamoring for Carbon Credits, But the System is Rife with Issues. More than 1,000 firms across the world – from Louis Vuitton, Gucci’s parent company Kering, sustainability-centric brand Stella McCartney, Swiss group Richemont, Chanel, and Hermès to more mass-market names like adidas, American Eagle, Nike, and Supreme-owner VF Corp – have made pledges to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. – Read More on TFL
4. Young people have a popular pandemic pastime: Filling, then abandoning, e-commerce shopping carts. Abandoned shopping carts are nothing new, but the pastime appears to have picked up in the last year as a replacement for real-life window-shopping. – Read More on CNBC
5. What Does ESG Really Mean? Take Your Pick: These days, it’s hard to find a manufacturing company that isn’t thinking about how to boost its appeal to socially and environmentally conscious investors, but with little collective agreement on what ESG actually means, there’s also a risk that investors can miss important signs of progress in the pursuit of perfection. – Read More on Bloomberg
6. How Jeff Bezos influenced African e-commerce: Compared to other regions, Amazon’s physical presence in Africa is limited. And yet at the same time, Amazon is everywhere. – Read More on Qz
1. Eviction, Bankruptcy and Fashion Grift: In fashion, an industry where salaries are notoriously low and the pressure to represent the brand is notoriously high, gifting has long been considered part of the sector’s basic economy and an approved relationship-building tool. And to supplement their low incomes, editors sell such items as a way to make extra money, a practice fueled in recent years by the booming online resale market. – Read More on the NY Times
2. RETRO READ: The IRS Has a Name for Those Bags, Clothes & Shoes that Fashion Calls Gifts, “Income”. These otherwise seemingly innocuous – albeit, at times rather expensive – gifts present legal issues, including when they are resold, since the value of the goods, themselves, and the profits made if/when they are sold must be taken into account come April 15 (or this year, July 15), when Americans file their individual income tax returns. – Read More on TFL
3. Sneakerheads Have Turned Jordans and Yeezys Into a Bona Fide Asset Class: Flipping sneakers has been a viable business proposition for decades. The demand side emerged as far back as 1985, when Nike dropped the Air Jordan 1, a culture-shifting sneaker that sold faster than the company could manufacture it. The supply side followed soon after, when some retailers began selling the few pairs they could get for more than Nike’s $64.95 suggested retail price. – Read More on Bloomberg
4. How Macy’s plans to hit its $10 billion e-commerce goal: Already a top 10 digital retailer, Macy’s now says it can get to $10 billion in digital sales within three years, up from about $7.6 billion in 2020. (It lags behind only Amazon in online U.S. shoe and clothing sales.) – Read More on Fortune
5. U.S. retail sales to rise 6.5% to 8.2% in 2021, as Covid vaccine triggers fastest economic growth in over two decades, NRF says: Retail sales are expected to grow this year between 6.5% and 8.2%, amounting to more than $4.33 trillion in sales, the National Retail Federation said in its annual forecast. – Read More on CNBC
1. The RealReal is still battling fakes: The company’s business is only sustainable if consumers believe what they’re buying is authentic. It would make sense for it to spare no expense in authenticating every product, but the vast range of product knowledge required for successful authentication of millions of products is challenging to maintain all in one place. – Read More on Forbes
2. Ashley Graham on How the Fashion Industry Fails Normal-Sized Women: “There is a lot of change that’s happened, [but] it’s just still not enough, the fact that we’re still praising designers for that one curvy girl for that one season…. Designers want to say, ‘This is our sample size and this is what it is.; But they’re the ones who actually get to structure how they run their business.” – Read More on the WSJ
3. RETRO READ: How Have ‘Model Health’ Laws Actually Impacted the Fashion Industry? The French law has not necessarily mastered this balance, but it is “a useful French regulatory development in principle,” particularly given that it has been supplemented by voluntary charters adopted by certain private groups, namely, the September 2017 charter put forth by LVMH and Kering, which “go beyond the applicable legislation to frame concrete situations and unify practices.” – Read More on TFL
4. Crocs became a pandemic staple, but CEO Andrew Rees optimistic its new fans will stick around: Crocs have been called the “it” shoe of the pandemic, and its latest results showed huge sales gains. Still, the company’s stock is down more than 3 percent on Tuesday, amid concerns its pandemic boost could fade. – Read More on CNBC
5. LVMH-Backed L Catterton Said to Near Deal to Buy Birkenstock: L Catterton, the private equity firm backed by luxury French fashion house LVMH, is nearing an agreement to acquire iconic German sandal maker Birkenstock, people with knowledge of the matter said. – Read More on Bloomberg
1. This Skin Care Startup Founded with $3,300 Now Heads to 505 Target Stores: The expansion into essential retailers like Target and Whole Foods is key for a new brand like Three Ships, particularly as consumers are less able to experience beauty products in real life at specialty and department stores, as the pandemic has heavily curtailed in-store product testing. – Read More on CO
2. Finesse Says ‘FashionTech’ Will Disrupt Apparel Industry the Way FinTech Roiled Banks: “When you look at most fashion brands right now, they produce as much as they can and hope that something will stick and end up selling. That’s an incredibly inefficient business model, because most things actually do not end up selling.” – Read More on PYMNTS
3. Pressure mounts on President Biden to appoint a fashion czar: More than 80 brands, experts, and organizations have signed on to a letter asking President Biden to help make the fashion industry more sustainable and humane. – Read More on Fast Co.
4. Exports can’t save the fashion sector: In 2020, Spanish exports in clothing, footwear, accessories, cosmetics and jewelry saw a drop of 18.5%, the largest decline to date. – Read More on Business Insider
5. ESG hits the mainstream for European private equity sponsors: Looking at January’s loans that were backed by private equity sponsors, several carried pricing features linked to environmental, social and governance criteria as sustainable borrowing looks like becoming a mainstream practice for many private equity firms. – Read More on S&P Global
6. The Patagonia Paradox & How Luxury Can Learn About Purpose: Ten years ago, Patagonia ran a counterintuitive ad to tell consumers to buy their product less and be reasonable — benefitting its business greatly. The company’s success serves as a textbook example of how brands can win when product and purpose go hand in hand. – Read More on Jing