RISING HIGH FASHION E-COMMERCE: OPENING CEREMONY LAUNCHES BOLD GROWTH STRATEGY
Pulled from the BeyondTheRunways.com archives Sept 2014:
Watch out Net-a-Porter and Moda Operandi, there's a new powerhouse in town, and it's unabashedly acquiring e-commerce territory in the high fashion space while maintaining an aura of exclusivity, something that few retails have accomplished successfully.
Opening Ceremony dates back to 2002, when two young fashion entrepreneurs from California, Carol Lim and Humberto Leon, wanted to create a store featuring rising international designers while catering to the young, adventurous, and fashion-conscious consumer with an eclectic and bold taste in clothing. In doing so, they managed to perfectly bridge the gap between the exclusivity of vintage consignment shops and the variety in assortment of stylish, high-end products from bigger retailers. Today, there are Opening Ceremony retail locations in New York, Los Angeles, London, and Tokyo. In addition, they have expanded to whole-selling their in-house branded items to over 200 stores worldwide and have created a blog featuring fashion, culture, travel, and food.
I will admit, the selection in apparel and accessories offered by Opening Ceremony is spot on, which is perhaps completely subjective to my taste in clothing, but considering that business is booming and the new addition of investment by Berkshire Partners (as of April of this year), they must be doing something right. With the new investment, Opening Ceremony is hoping to "accelerate...[the company's] growth, including plans to enhance its women’s, men’s and accessories collections and its e-commerce capabilities, as well as further expand its retail presence with Opening Ceremony stores" This opens up several opportunities for development. First, on a more creative design basis. OC is known for not only catapulting contemporary brands like Rodarte, Alexander Wang, and Proenza Schouler, it is also famous for its collaborations with individuals like Chloë Sevigny and Spike Jonze. The company is constantly ahead of the curve in staying relevant to culture through creative means, which undeniably adds to its success. Sure, Barneys is relatively undisputed as the iconic retailer to introduce new and local designers, offer a highly selective collection of items, and cater to the fashion-conscious ultra-wealthy, but the biggest downside to Barneys is that it has a reputation of delivering quality service specific to big spenders, creating what could be an intimidating shopping experience for customers who are slightly more price-conscious. That's where Opening Ceremony comes in; it fills the sweet spot between current and exclusive in luxury fashion.
The best place to observe OC's aggressive new expansion strategy is New York Fashion Week. Days before Apple's launch of the new iWatch, Opening Ceremony revealed the result of a collaboration with Intel. This watch is called MICA, which stands for My Intelligent Communication Accessory, and is the only smart watch on the market that is specifically targeted towards fashion and technology-savvy women. They have hit a soft spot in the industry: no one else has designed a watch with the stylistic preferences of a woman in mind so far. In addition, technology companies are definitely starting to take notice of this gap, with Fitbit teaming up with Tori Burch and Google collaborating with DVF and Rebecca Minkoff for Glass. The two different versions of MICA is made with the most luxurious materials, too: snakeskin, lapis, pearls, and obsidian to just name a few. Not many other details have been revealed so far because the back-end details are still being worked out, but come the holiday season this year, it will be available for sale at Opening Ceremony and Barneys (rumor has it that it will be offered for a hefty $1000). Holiday launches can be tricky, but should the marketing strategy be well executed, I'm rather confident that MICA will sell out.
Another event that occurred during NYFW is 100% Lost Cotton, a play written by Spike Jonze and Jonah Hill. Its star-studded cast (including Rashida Jones, Elle Fanning, Dree Hemingway, and, of course, Karlie Kloss) performed while showcasing the Opening Ceremony spring/summer 2015 collection. In addition, OC again collaborated with one of the most iconic brands from New York, DKNY, to launch 28 exclusive styles. Imagine a sporty, punk, mid-twenties girl with an infectious personality and that's what this collection brings you. In other words, they've created Cara Delevingne in apparel. Furthermore, OC saw an opportunity to collaborate with Versus Versace again, offering the collection for sale immediately after the show's live airing. This time, Anthony Vaccarello was Donatella's protégé, and he might be the best one yet. Their show gave the traditional Versace girl dripping with sensuality and confidence a dimension of rock'n'roll.
While Opening Ceremony does have an overwhelming amount of positive attributes, I do want to also address some opportunities for the company. The one that I'll focus on today is the website user experience. For an e-commerce site, this should be one of the most important aspects to focus on. Without a seamless, easy to navigate interface, sales/visit will be largely limited to dedicated customers. One interesting phenomena that I've observed over my own shopping habits is that the online retailers who sell at lower price ranges tend to be extremely focused on the customer's experience. Sites like Piperlime, Asos, and Topshop take site functionality and design incredibly seriously, and that is undoubtedly paying off in their financial success. Even Forever 21 is overflowing with dynamic content to drive customer engagement. There is so much potential revenue to be tapped into, especially selling what the industry refers to as "adult contemporary clothing". Here is a list of the gripes I've had on Opening Ceremony's site:
1) Lack of filtering capabilities. Simple elements like selecting multiple sizes, price scales, designers, and styles within categories are nonexistent. For an e-commerce site, this is one of the critical components to engage the shopper.
2) Poor and confusing use of side tabs. To start off, why are "Gifts" not a subcategory under "Categories"? Further, the organization of the sub-tabs is poorly structured. Many of the sub-tabs have less than a hand-full of products. There is no room for customization under this design, making browsing incredibly frustrating. This goes back to my previous point: customers should be presented with the ability to choose multiple designers when breaking down the search. Currently, products are presented in an "all or one" manner when it comes to brands.
On a less related note, I find the design of the tabs to be flawed. The guest is only able to click on the space each word in the tab fills up, not the blank space, not even the arrow. What may seem intuitive on another website is not easily presented here, adding another barrier to a satisfactory customer experience.
3) Small and discreet accessibility to view selection of products. This one's pretty self-explanatory with a visualization of the problem below. The font size is so small that the first time I was on the website, I actually didn't think there were more products than 16 products because that's the most the page would allow. There should also be an option of "View 50" or "View 100", along with "View All".
4) No mobile-appropriate site. When shopping on my tablet or phone, I found the site to be frustratingly difficult to navigate because the design of the site was not modified for mobile use. Therefore, without an actual mouse, basic features like scrolling and zooming, and checkout become unnecessarily tedious. All of the previous points are, subsequently, exponentially harder to use on a mobile device.
It didn't take long for someone to notice the creative geniuses behind Opening Ceremony. In 2011, Carol and Humberto were selected to become the new creative directors of LVMH-owned house of Kenzo. Their inaugural spring/summer 2012 collection breathed new life and energy into a struggling brand, and by the time their fall collection came out, the fashion world was mesmerized by the artistic revolution that Carol and Humberto showcased. Soon enough, there were wait lists for the famous Tiger print sweaters and Beyoncé was sporting Kenzo prints on her manicures. The brand exploded under its new creative directors and there's been no sign of decline. Solid choice, Pierre-Yves Roussel.
If you can't tell already, I love Opening Ceremony, and hint, hint, I also love Kenzo. A little over a year ago, I had the pleasure of meeting the man who elected Humberto and Carol to their new position, Pierre-Yves Roussel, along with visiting the Kenzo workshop. I am still in awe of the amazing design and strategy that go into the brand. Carol and Humberto, in case you guys ever stumble upon this blog post, please give me a job at Opening Ceremony or take me on at Kenzo! I would love an opportunity to be a part of your team.
You can check out all Opening Ceremony for yourself here.
