The Business of Fashion Podcast

The market for digital collectibles is booming, but does it present a real opportunity for brands, or is it just a passing fad?

When a shoe collaboration between design studio RTFKT and digital artist Fewocious netted around $3.1 million earlier this year, the fashion world sat up and paid attention. More than 600 pairs sold out in seven minutes. The shoes were issued as non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, unique digital assets authenticated by a digital ledger known as a blockchain. With appetites for unique virtual assets surging, more fashion companies are looking at how they can tap the market; even Rimowa is launching NFTs. But is this a long-term opportunity or just a passing fad?

In the latest episode of The BoF Podcast, deputy editor Brian Baskin speaks with Benoit Pagotto, co-founder of RTFKT, Karinna Nobbs, co-CEO of NFT marketplace The Dematerialised, Amber Slooten, co-founder and creative director of digital fashion house The Fabricant and editorial associate M.C. Nanda about ways fashion can tap into the NFT gold rush.

• Virtual fashion isn’t just about gaming anymore, and that could open up a whole new marketplace for digital skins and on-trend avatars. “Within this new NFT space, people are starting to see the value of digital items,” said Slooten.”You’re able to sort of create that new, endless way of expressing yourself.”

• The fashion industry has yet to fully tap into the NFT opportunity, and doing so will mean becoming more open to collaborations. “Nobody [is] sharing anything with each other [in fashion] because they’re afraid it’s going to get stolen,” said Slooten.

• Proponents of NFTs say the recent boom is no flash in the pan, but a mark of a paradigm shift. “This is fundamentally going to change digital ownership, creative structures, the creative economy, how we view money even,” said Nobbs. “This is bigger than the Internet.”

Related Articles:

What the NFT Gold Rush Means for Fashion

NFTs for Fashion: Fad or Opportunity?

Gucci Is Selling $12 (Virtual) Sneakers

 

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The inspirational speaker and author speaks with Imran Amed about the opportunity for fashion businesses to reset and refocus after the pandemic is behind us.

The upheavals of the last year laid bare long-standing problems with the way the fashion industry operates, but it’s also created opportunities for change and innovation. Business leaders should reflect, reset and rebuild with a focus on their core values and goals, inspirational speaker and author Simon Sinek tells BoF’s founder and editor-in-chief Imran Amed, on this week’s episode of The BoF Podcast.

• Sinek has written multiple books on the importance of looking beyond “how” and “what” when making business decisions. “Having a sense of why is very grounding; it’s literally a foundation,” said Sinek. “Every single person has their own unique ‘why’… and the rest of our lives offers opportunities to make decisions to stay in balance with that purpose.”

• As businesses look to a post-pandemic future, they have an opportunity to use the challenges of the last year to reassess and refocus on the values they started with, which often fall by the wayside as businesses scale. “You know you can tell when an organisation loses its way because it becomes obsessed with output… and they lose [the] sense of their own values and if you’re an employee or customer you can feel it,” Sinek said.

• Leaders are not the only ones who can drive change. “There is no such thing as unicorns and rainbows everyday [at work,] sometimes it’s hard,” said Sinek. “[But] every single one of us has the capacity to be the leader we wish we had.”

Related Articles:

Coronavirus Concerns Hit Fashion’s Workplaces

How to Create an Inclusive Workplace

Industry Leaders Share Insight on Securing Employment in 2021

 

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Fashion brands are upping marketing rhetoric and imagery to include a wider range of body types, but many companies are still failing to serve the plus-size consumer.

The market for plus-size fashion is worth nearly $30 billion in the US alone. But while brands are upping marketing rhetoric and imagery to include a wider range of body types, many companies are still failing to serve the plus-size consumer.

In the latest episode of The BoF Podcast, chief correspondent Lauren Sherman speaks with Marie Denee, creator and editor-in-chief of The Curvy Fashionista, Alexandra Waldman, co-founder and creative director of Universal Standard and BoF’s senior editorial associate Alexandra Mondalek about the right way to do plus-size fashion.

• Plus-size customers want one thing: choice. But too often they’re left sifting through limited ranges that reflect a narrow view of how they should dress. “Give us the same assortment,” Denee said, adding that brands must unlearn tropes about what the industry can offer plus-size consumers.

• Lazy marketing that co-opts the language of body positivity without really serving plus-size shoppers is also a problem. “We have to learn to speak to a consumer that has been not just ignored, but belittled… it’s an emotional minefield,” said Waldman. “Body positivity is a personal journey.”

• Companies need to invest in plus-size ranges too, taking the time and spending the cash to perfect fit, style and branding. “You have got to be led by the change and not the money,” explains Waldman.

Related Articles:

What Fashion Can’t Seem to Get Right About the Plus-Size Market

Unravelling the Plus-Size Problem

How to Make Your Brand Size-Inclusive

 

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The designer’s teacher turned close collaborator and friend, reflects on how Elbaz communicated his fashion dreams to the world.

 

Ever since the news of Alber Elbaz’s death broke last weekend, the fashion world has been in a collective state of mourning. Many have eulogised and memorialised the designer’s unique ability to make women feel empowered in the clothes designed. But few knew him better than Shelly Verthime, his close friend and collaborator, who first met him as his teacher at the Shenkar College of Engineering and Design in Israel.

This week on The BoF Podcast, editor-in-chief Imran Amed and editor-at-large Tim Blanks speak with Verthime and reflect on Elbaz’s influence, recounting the highs and lows of his career defining moments.

• From the beginning of his career, Verthime said Elbaz created a clear path for the steps he wished to take with the industry. “I knew that there was just something so special about him, it was so clear to me where he is going,” she said. “At the time I was his teacher but very, very soon he became my teacher, and then he became [the industry’s] teacher and mentor and friend.”

• Throughout his career, Elbaz exercised the power of communication as well as creativity. Elbaz was an “original creator, emotional creator but he was a fantastic communicator,” Verthime said. “He knew what works and what doesn’t work for him.”

• Elbaz was known for his efforts to empower women, dressing them suit to their needs and build their confidence. His close relationship to his mother facilitated his understanding of women as multifaceted. “What he wanted to do was that his clothes would enhance the personality, where you see the face… it was about the woman who would wear it,” said Verthime. “He wanted assertive women [and] he wanted women to love themselves.”

Related Articles:

Lessons for the Fashion Industry From Alber Elbaz’s Talk at VOICES 2018

Alber Elbaz on Making His Return to Fashion

Inside Alber Elbaz’s Return to Fashion

 

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The late designer shared his musings, wisdom and advice for the fashion industry in a talk at BoF VOICES in 2018.

Alber Elbaz, who died aged 59 of Covid-19 over the weekend, was a revered and beloved figure in the fashion industry. The designer, famed for revitalising the fortunes of Lanvin before a dispute with his owner led to his abrupt departure, had just returned to fashion after a five-year hiatus.

He debuted his new venture, AZ Factory, during Paris Couture Week in January. The joint venture with Richemont was designed to reflect a better model for the fashion system, the pressures and strains of which Elbaz knew all too well.

In a heartfelt, funny, thoughtful and poignant address at BoF VOICES in November 2018, Elbaz shared a mix of personal anecdotes, observations and lessons for the fashion industry:

• Fashion needs to pare back its unfettered production cycle to a level that’s manageable for young designers straining under the “speed of the system,” he said. Elbaz compared the industry’s constant demand for newness to an old recipe that uses too much fat: “Maybe [it’s time] to cut the butter out and make it healthier.”

• Creative instinct and improvisation are far more valuable than the tech tools that might be available to designers. “Life is full of codes, formulas, databases and algorithms,” said Elbaz. “Overuse of all of those can kill intuition and intuition is the essence of creation. This is the essence of life itself.”

• There’s more to fashion creation than just empty aspirational content. Long-time muse and client Meryl Streep “said that I never tried to transform her, but I helped her to be a better version of herself,” said Elbaz. “I believe that’s what fashion does best. It’s dreams, but it’s no longer just dreams. It’s also about solutions. It’s also about solving problems with a dream.”

• Above all, celebrate your audience. “For years, I felt I was hugging people with my clothes,” he said. “I thought that every dress I make would be hugging the woman who is wearing it. Years later, I received all these hugs back from you fashion people.”

Related Articles:

Inside Alber Elbaz’s Return to Fashion

Inside the Mind of Alber Elbaz

Alber Elbaz on Making His Return to Fashion

 

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Fashion is a notoriously opaque industry. That’s a big problem when the industry is focusing on reducing its negative environmental and social impact.

One of the biggest challenges facing the fashion industry in its efforts to become more responsible and sustainable is bad data. While companies are under increased pressure to provide more information about working conditions and greenhouse gas emissions, the data they share is limited and often of dubious quality. At the BoF Professional Summit: Closing Fashion’s Sustainability Gap, Linda E. Greer, a global fellow at the Institute of Public and Environmental Affairs and a member of BoF’s Sustainability Council, joined BoF London editor Sarah Kent for a discussion on how fashion’s bad data is affecting its sustainability efforts.

• Companies often lack oversight into their own supply chains, preventing labour conditions and environmental impact from being properly recorded or addressed. Full supply chain transparency is critical for companies to trace and collect data.

• This opacity also allows companies to avoid accountability for working conditions and the environmental footprint of their sprawling global supply chains. “There is a level at which the lack of transparency is working for these companies, because it allows them to perpetuate the status quo,” said Greer.

• Stricter regulation would force companies to do more, but in its absence Greer recommends companies start by looking at emissions from their manufacturing base. “If you’re not doing that, you’re just not in the game,” said Greer.

 

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Measuring Fashion’s Sustainability Gap

Scaling Up or Selling Out: How Can Sustainable Labels Credibly Collaborate with Big Brands?

Devising a New Social Contract for Fashion’s Garment Workers

 

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Fashion has routinely failed the millions of people who make its clothes. What should the industry do to create systemic change?

 

Over the past year, the pandemic has laid bare — and worsened — the stark inequality, financial insecurity and poor working conditions endemic to the global garment industry. This has been driven by years of voluntary self-regulation, outsourced labour, and the pursuit of maximum profits by brands and retailers.

At the BoF Professional Summit: Closing Fashion’s Sustainability Gap, BoF London editor Sarah Kent was joined by Ayesha Barenblat, founder and chief executive of Remake; Ritu Sethi, founder-trustee, Craft Revival Trust and editor, Global InCH; and Anannya Bhattacharjee, international coordinator, Asia Floor Wage Alliance, to discuss how the global fashion industry is failing its garment makers, and what needs to change.

• Many of the challenges facing the garment industry today are systemic. “The business model, whether luxury or mass market, is set to exploit people,” said Barenblat, also noting that it is mostly women of colour “who make our clothes and bring our fashion to life.”

• Bhattacharjee said brands need to redress the “extreme imbalance of power” with their suppliers by paying the actual cost of production, producing goods in an environmentally sustainable way, and moving away from the industry’s reliance on overproduction and overconsumption. It is also crucial that brands make good on their commitments to support freedom of association in factories, she added.

• While the global fashion industry benefits from widespread deregulation, mounting consumer engagement is proving a powerful force for increased accountability. “Consumerism is changing, and I think for the first time we actually have the right period where we can change the discourse from the consumer’s point of view,” said Sethi. Indeed, said Bhattacharjee, “this is a time of opportunity and radical change.”

 

Related Articles:

Fashion’s Humanitarian Crisis

Racism and Inequality Are Stitched Into the Garments We Wear

Brands Say They Want to Keep Workers Safe. Not All Are Willing to Pay for It.

 

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The pioneering designer spoke to BoF’s Imran Amed about continuing to push the envelope for sustainable luxury at the BoF Professional Summit: Closing Fashion’s Sustainability Gap.

British designer Stella McCartney has been an advocate and pioneer for sustainability long before it became an industry buzzword. But she is still developing new ways to work. More recently that’s included experiments with leather-like material made with mycelium — or mushroom root structures — and efforts to use cotton and wool sourced from regenerative farms, which restore the health and biodiversity of the land instead of purely extracting from it.

”It’s very simple but today it seems very radical, and really it could be the future of fashion,” she told BoF editor in chief Imran Amed in a keynote address at the BoF Professional Summit: Closing Fashion’s Sustainability Gap. McCartney also shared the compromises she has to make as a designer to work within the parameters of sustainable materials and low-waste production methods and what it will take for the wider industry to wake up to its imperative to change:

• Consumer pressure and better regulation will be key for the fashion industry to make changes that are urgently needed. “I don’t think we can rely on our industry to commit to this, as much as we can rely on tomorrow’s customers insisting that this is the only thing they’re going to invest in,” she said. “The only way truly to have significant change in the timeline that we have is for policies to be set into place, for there to be legislation.”

• When LVMH took a minority stake in her brand in 2019, McCartney took on a role advising the luxury conglomerate’s CEO Bernard Arnault on sustainability. “The reality with Monsieur Arnault is that he would never have invested in a brand like mine if he didn’t think that this was the future,” she said. “I think it gives off a huge message of positivity for the industry.”

• For the crop of young designers looking to work sustainably, McCartney has some sage advice: value collaboration and mutual learning over competition; “be a fighter” when it comes to securing better incentives for sustainable practices; and always look for new information on how to be better. “You never stop learning when you work sustainably,” she said.

 

Related Articles:

Why LVMH Struck a Deal with Stella McCartney

Stella McCartney Announces UN Charter for Sustainable Fashion

The BoF Podcast: Stella McCartney: ‘Everything Is at Stake’

 

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A new generation of direct-to-consumer brands like Topicals and Parade are finding success with a powerful community-based approach to marketing.

In a fashion and beauty market packed with look-alike labels, a new generation of digitally native direct-to-consumer brands are adopting a new playbook, pushing bolder messages and aesthetics starting with their key differentiator: community. Skincare brand Topicals and lingerie label Parade have turned celebrating their customers’ skin issues and body shapes that don’t conform to traditional ideals of beauty into a powerful and authentic marketing centrepiece.

In this episode of the BoF Podcast, Topicals’ co-founders Olamide Olowe and Claudia Teng and Parade’s co-founder and chief executive Cami Téllez speak with BoF senior editorial associate Alexandra Mondalek on the power of community and the new direct-to-consumer model.

• The new generation of community-focused DTC brands are abandoning the increasingly standardised marketing playbook that has resulted in a proliferation of identical-looking “blands.” Instead, they’re finding new ways to identify with their customer base.  “We now know that branding is about creatively finding where [the customer] is and centring around reintroducing the customer to self-expression,” Téllez explains.

• Consumers particularly respond to products that speak to their issues in a way that’s relatable and fun. Digitally native brands have often made the consumer experience “quite sterile and bland and their product experience was lacklustre,” says Topicals’ Olowe. Instead Topicals is  “celebrating the fun of flare ups.”

• Authenticity is key to building community with the new generation of DTC brands utilising their founders’ stories to speak about their products as customers too. Topicals brings “a different perspective to the way that people experience the beauty community… [and] speaking authentically with our community in a different kind of way,” Teng says.

 

Related Articles:

The New 4 Ps of DTC Marketing

How Not to Be a Boring Direct-to-Consumer Brand

The New Rules of Going DTC

 

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As retail stores begin to re-open this summer after a year of lockdown, Doug Stephens shares strategies for post-pandemic success from his new book, Resurrecting Retail.

 

Retail’s Darwinian shakeout over the last year has consolidated market power in the hands of dominant e-commerce players. But a brand, even if small, can still be mighty. The key is focus and finding a relevant niche, Doug Stephens said at VOICES 2020, previewing his new book, Resurrecting Retail, out on April 13.”

In the post-pandemic retail era, purpose will be the new positioning,” Stephens said. “What will be your brand’s reason for existing?” he asked.Stephens outlines 10 reasons why retail should exist in 2021 and beyond, from product education to activism.

• “I see Covid-19 not as a mere accelerator, I see it as a threshold,” said Stephens. “As a unique wormhole in time where society as a whole is being pulled out of the industrial era and across the threshold of the digital age.” Though 2020 was challenging for a lot of retail companies, it has made the big ones like Amazon, Alibaba, JD.com and Walmart even stronger and better prepared to capture more of the global retail economy.

• Brands must think about purpose: what is the question your brand answers? Companies that succeed in the marketplace do this well. “When we buy Nike products, we’re buying a cultural point of view, and Nike answers a very specific consumer question. The question, of course, is ‘Who inspires me?’” Stephens said.

• In the post-pandemic world, the media will no longer be just the message. “Every form of media now, that the consumer has exposure to, is no longer simply a call out to go to the store,” Stephens said. “Every form of media must be the store.”

 

Related Articles:

Take a Look Inside The Post-Pandemic Store

The New Rules of Brick-and-Mortar Retail

Tapping Into the Future of Physical Retail

 

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