From "Screen to Door" to "Screen to Store"

The FT report yesterday that ASOS are seeking partnerships with high street retailers as pick-up points has got our friends at eNova smiling. Fellow fashionista, Sophie Albizua, a multichannel advocate, has contributed this post to share her excitement with us. Sophie writes:

"The fact that home delivery can be a barrier to some consumers is no news and solutions such as physical drop boxes or collection store networks have been talked about for years. But no one has taken the click to brick plunge yet in any meaningful way. This might be the catalyst.

Pure online retail, in spite of all the hype surrounding it, possesses one fundamental barrier to growth; the fact that, as those of you who've been waiting around for hours for a parcel or had to rush to the post office before 5pm to get it know, home delivery is not convenient for many people working or leading busy lives. What still amazes us is the number of high street retailers who have an e-commerce arm that acts as a pure play, thus falling in to the same trap. Not that we believe you can’t have a successful on-line pure play, as ASOS has demonstrated.

Let's remember online retail only represents 7% of total UK retail sales and its growth is slowing down to mid teens and soon single digit numbers. We believe that the growth is in multichannel, where the purchase goes through the website but doesn't end there, which we and other market observers estimate will grow at over 20% p.a. over the next 5 years to represent 40% of total retail sales in the UK by 2013.

Fashion retail has ignored this for too long. Will the one that led the fashion innovation on-line, stir the debate once again? We hope that this will act as a call to action to other fashion retailers who have been shying away from click and collect models for too long. If ASOS feels the need for stores, those who already have them and are not linking them to their websites should reflect upon the missed opportunity that this might represent. Here's a crack at the answer for you: in our experience, properly executed click & collect should double your website takings within a year as a starting point.

Having created several of the leading order on-line, collect in store services, including Argos, Halfords and Boots, we suspect there are still a number of bumps that will need to be ironed out when trying to mould a home delivery set up with a store pick up as to not reduce margin. To this end, store based fashion retailers may still have an advantage if they get to grips with the opportunity sooner rather than later. Most importantly, let’s remember customers are the ones driving these developments, which will be the fastest growing part of retail for the next 5 years."

Is "click and collect" going to be the next growth area? Fashionista would love to know your views, so join the debate!

The Advantage of Vintage?

We all have clothes languishing in our wardrobes which we haven't shown much love to of late. Not because there's anything wrong with them, but because we're simply tired of wearing the same old thing over and over again. That's why fashion keeps changing: because our taste does. But what may look old and past its sell-by-date to one, may be given a new lease of life in the hands of someone new.



Enter ASOS - leading online clothing retailer which reported a 38% annual rise in sales for the year ended in March 2010 and which has a 5 year plan to become a £1 billion business - and its plan to launch an online marketplace allowing customers to recycle their wardrobes, and businesses the opportunity to shift unsold stock.

Hot on the heels of eBay which recently launched its dedicated "fashion only" site, ASOS' new marketplace is being hailed as an environmentally friendly way for customers to get rid of old clothing - and to make some money in the process. Details are limited, but an article in The FT yesterday suggested that prices will be fixed rather than determined by auction and that no luxury brand goods can be sold.

ASOS' level of involvement at this stage is unclear. Will it simply provide the platform and then sit back as customers buy and sell between themselves? or will ASOS take a far more "hands on" approach, helping customers to determine (or even dictating) the price at which goods will be sold? News reports suggest that ASOS' involvement will be more than minimal as ASOS has already indicated that it will also carry out security checks and will screen potential businesses wanting to sell their goods through ASOS' new platform.

The prohibition on sales of second hand luxury branded goods is a sensible one to reduce the risk of sales of counterfeit goods and parallel imports. It should also reduce the level of monitoring which ASOS will need to carry out of what is being sold on its site to make sure that ASOS is not at risk of being sued for faciliating the sale of counterfeits and parallels. Whether or not the policy will work in practice - and how ASOS plan to police it - remains to be seen.

The idea of an online marketplace for consumers (and not just businesses) to sell clothing is a good one and may be one of the reasons for which ASOS' Chief Executive Nick Robertson is one of seven people shortlisted for the New Media Age award for the "Greatest Individual Contribution to New Media" in the 2010 NMA Effectiveness Awards.

Whilst Fashionista is a fan of green initiatives, she can't help but wonder whether charity shops are going to miss out on much needed donations as a result.