The Glossy Podcast

On the Glossy Week in Review podcast, senior fashion reporter Danny Parisi and editor-in-chief Jill Manoff discuss some of the biggest fashion news stories of the week.

This week, Adidas advertised its new sports bra campaign with a series of nude photos, Prada partnered with French video game publisher Ubisoft on an in-game event, and the fashion publication InStyle had its print magazine shut down.

In late 2019, when Anna Harman and Lisa Bubbers launched ear piercing and pierced earring company Studs, providing IRL services was at the center of their business model. But then the pandemic hit. Today, e-commerce is every bit as important.

"In 2022, we're focused on both [channels]," said Harman, on the latest Glossy Podcast. "We want to really continue to invest in and grow the retail footprint, as well as grow the e-commerce business. We'd like them to be highly complementary to one another. The business will be more successful over time if both are key channels for us."

The company has raised more than $30 million to fuel that cross-channel growth. 

As for expanding its store footprint, Studs has a good start: Harman and Bubbers opened six new stores in 2021, and they plan to own more than 20 stores by the end of 2022.

"You have so many small college towns across the U.S. that have a really captive, large audience of a portion of our core demographic," said Harman. "And so we can have a really large store footprint through time. The opportunity for Studs is unbounded."

Outside of sales channels, Harman and Bubbers are focusing their efforts on expanding their in-house team and overall brand awareness. And, at every step, they plan to write their own playbook.

"Innovation and outside-the-box thinking and creation are what get us out of bed in the morning," Harman said. 

On the Glossy Week in Review podcast, senior fashion reporter Danny Parisi and editor-in-chief Jill Manoff discuss some of the biggest fashion news from the week.

In this week's episode, they take a look at fashion brands' attempts to get in on Lunar New Year and capitalize on big sporting events, including the Olympics and the Super Bowl. They also provide an update on Capri Holdings and Zegna, based on the companies' latest earnings reports.

Amanda Parkes never thought she'd wind up in fashion. Then again, 2-year-old Pangaia, where she serves as chief innovation officer, isn't your typical fashion company. 

"We are a materials science company," Parkes said on the latest Glossy Podcast. "We're all about the future of materials, and we really think that's an approach that can change the fashion industry from the inside out."

However, many fashion fans best know Pangaia as the brand behind the rainbow-bright sweatsuits with lines of text that have been worn by Harry Styles and Kourtney Kardashian.

Parkes started her career as a mechanical engineer and product designer, before eventually going back to school, at the M.I.T. Media Lab. There, she earned a hybrid computer science-materials science Ph.D. and the rare job title of fashion scientist.

"I came into fashion through the back door," she said. "When I was in college, 20 years ago, there was no such thing as a fashion scientist."

But, she said -- despite the lack of interplay between the two worlds -- fashion and science go hand-in-hand.

"Fashion is an amazing platform to be able to show off science," she said, adding, "I was really shocked when I got more into the fashion industry to realize that big fashion companies don't have internal research. I was coming from tech, working with companies like Intel and Google. They are doing their internal R&D 5-10 years out to change and transform and make their industries what they want them to be. Fashion didn't have that as much inside of the big companies or at all. So I saw that as first of all massive opportunity for [Pangaia] to fill in the space."

Parkes also discussed the power of the Gen-Z shopper, the state of greenwashing and the future of sustainability in fashion. 

On the Glossy Week in Review podcast, senior fashion reporter Danny Parisi and editor-in-chief Jill Manoff discuss some of the biggest fashion news of the week.

This week, a number of brands canceled or postponed their traditional NYFW shows. Nigo, the streetwear designer recently named artistic director of Kenzo, showed his first collection with the brand in Paris. And Fashion Nova was fined by the FTC for blocking bad reviews from appearing on its site, making it the first company to be formally punished for review-blocking.

Over the last two years, the fashion industry has experienced plenty of ups and downs – but 19-year-old contemporary brand Ba&sh has managed to remain on the upswing for the last 10 months.

“[2021] was a record year,” Desiree Thomas, CEO of Ba&sh North America, said on the latest Glossy Podcast. “Since the middle of March last year, we’ve seen this excitement around getting dressed again; a lot of women are just wanting to take a moment for themselves and celebrate the joys of life.”

As a result, Ba&sh has seen “explosive growth” in each of its sales channels. “We saw retail explode in all of our freestanding stores in North America,” she said. “And digital was also on fire.”

Thomas joined Ba&sh in May 2021, after serving as brand president for 3.1 Phillip Lim and holding top sales roles at BCBGMaxAzria and Nicole Miller. She said she was lured by the brand’s focus on “joy, female femininity and empowerment.” Ba&sh was founded in France in 2003 by entrepreneurs and best friends Barbara Boccara and Sharon Krief, whose first names were combined to create the brand name. 

Moving forward, Thomas plans to maintain the brand’s trajectory by opening more stores, including in first-time markets like Greenwich and Aventura, hosting pop-ups and collaborating with influencers, among other strategies, 

“We have a very ambitious growth strategy in place,” she said. “We are going to see double-digit growth this year, for sure.” 

On this week's Glossy Week in Review podcast, senior fashion reporter Danny Parisi and editor-in-chief Jill Manoff discuss three of the biggest fashion news stories of the week.

This week, the pair discuss the legacy of the late André Leon Talley, an outsized personality in the fashion world for decades, as well as LVMH's new minority stake in Aimé Leon Dore and Bally's hire of Rhude's Rhuigi Villaseñor as its new creative director.

Ariane Goldman is a serial entrepreneur with a specialty: “I'm always gonna try to create things people need,” she said on the latest Glossy Podcast. 

In 2007, that meant launching Twobirds Bridesmaid, focused on bridesmaid dresses that women can wear more than once. And in 2011, she introduced Hatch.

“I was pregnant with my first daughter, excited about this new endeavor that I was about to embark on. And I was absolutely surprised that there was nobody speaking to me. I didn't know how to speak the language, and I didn't know what to look for,” she said. “That was the lightbulb that went off. I knew that if I was feeling this way, there must have been other women looking for the same companionship and guidance through this next chapter.” 

She started Hatch as a direct-to-consumer brand centered on clothing women can wear before, during and after pregnancy. Today, 20% of the company’s customers are women who aren’t pregnant, Goldman said. 

The company has since expanded to product categories including beauty and “fourth-trimester” products, like nursing bras. And in 2020, it launched a content platform called Babe.

At the center of the brand’s success is an engaged community that has worked wonders to fuel its growth. Hatch’s annual sales grew 80% in 2021, and Goldman is projecting 40-50% growth this year.  

Among other topics, Goldman discussed how Hatch has grown its community using education-focused events, even during pandemic-forced store closures. 

On the latest Glossy Week in Review podcast, senior fashion reporter Danny Parisi and editor-in-chief Jill Manoff discuss the biggest fashion news of the week.

This week, there was a flurry of news around Yeezy and Gap, including a new TV spot, a new product and the announcement of yet another collaborator -- "Yeezy Gap Engineered by Balenciaga" is set to roll out later this year. Also, data from The RealReal's annual consignment report shows a resurgence of ’90s fashion, and Savage x Fenty is opening its first five stores in the first half of the year.

More than seven years after working at J.Jill as CMO, Claire Spofford returned in February of 2021 to take on the role of CEO.

“I already knew a lot about the customer and how connected and engaged she is with the J.Jill brand – that’s a strong foundation for any business,” Spofford said on the latest Glossy Podcast. “Plus, its premium casual positioning in the market is really relevant now. And there were all the fundamentals of it being a great brand with heritage.” 

Indeed, J.Jill is more than 60 years old. But Spofford has moved fast to ensure evolution across the business and adoption of emerging tools and technologies that can contribute to its current growth. Personalization, an optimized store fleet and next-level customer experience – the latter, with the help of a new hire – are among her priorities. In mid-December, J.Jill reported a nearly 30% year-over-year increase in quarterly revenue.  

“We’ve made great progress against our [pandemic] recovery this year and have gained some real traction,” she said. “And that gives us a much stronger foundation from which to really drive profitable growth as we go forward.”