At Shoptalk, brands were cautiously optimistic about AI The last two years saw the fashion and retail worlds overrun with speculation about the imminence of the metaverse and Web3, much of it hyperbolic. At Shoptalk 2023 this year, executives treated the latest tech craze — AI and large language models, particularly OpenAI’s ChatGPT — with a comparatively reserved...
Weekend Briefing: California garment factories routinely underpaid employees Last week, multiple major companies in fashion saw legal challenges. Elsewhere, Authentic Brands Group is back to acquiring fashion companies, while J. Crew laid off 3% of its workforce.
‘The worst is yet to come’: Brands, investors reckon with tougher fundraising environment The last year has been tough for founders seeking funding. Pre-pandemic, venture capital funding was plentiful, and startup and DTC brands were able to achieve massive growth based on that funding without reaching profitability. At Shoptalk 2023 in Las Vegas this week, brands and investors alike reckoned with the reality...
Buying resale is easier than ever, but brands see challenges on the selling side Branded resale has become table stakes for many in the retail industry, and it’s never been easier for customers to buy secondhand clothes from brands like Michael Kors to Zara. But at Shoptalk 2023, brands and resale companies alike wrestled with the idea of how to improve the selling process...
Social shopping could be the answer to e-commerce’s discoverability problem At Shoptalk 2023 in Las Vegas, brands and platforms alike wrestled with the idea of discoverability. E-commerce has become so saturated, and customer acquisition costs have gotten so high, that one of the biggest challenges facing brands today is getting noticed amid the sea of other brands.
‘Brick-and-mortar retail is coming back’: How brands are rethinking the store At Shoptalk in Las Vegas this weekend, AI may have been the most novel concept of focus, but a much more established idea was the subject of many conversations: brick-and-mortar retail.
Weekend Briefing: Fashion’s emissions are rising Last week, several big fashion brands announced that their emissions have increased recently, sliding back on some of the carbon goals the industry has set for itself. Elsewhere, The RealReal drops beauty and Snap offers its first AR product for brands to use on their own sites.
With new brand, Christian Siriano aims to make inclusive sizing more than a trend Designer Christian Siriano is one of the most notable names in fashion to embrace size inclusivity beyond a single-season trend. His new brand, C. Wonder, offers lower-priced clothes. After being announced late last year, C. Wonder launched its first collection this week in collaboration with HSN, continuing the extended sizing...
Week in Review: AI in fashion, Jeremy Scott departs Moschino, Telfar’s live pricing model This week, we discuss new AI tools like ChatGPT and StableDiffusion and how they may (or may not) have an effect on the fashion business. Later, we talk Jeremy Scott's departure from Moschino and Telfar’s innovative new pricing model.