Fashionphile Aims to Play With Luxury’s Heavy Hitters

Sarah Davis envisions the day when brands such as Hermès, Chanel and Louis Vuitton partner with luxury resale ecommerce sites such as Fashionphile, the company she founded in 1999, recognizing that circularity matters to consumers, and that the the sale of an unwanted item frees up room in closets for something new, bringing sales back to the brands. If the idea of closely held French couture and ready-to-wear house Chanel (which is already suing Fashionphile competitor The RealReal and What Goes Around Comes Around), or luxury groups like LVMH Moët Hennessey Louis Vuitton, Compagnie Financière Richemont or Kering hooking up with the 20-year-old Fashionphile sounds a little far-fetched, it would be a mistake to discount Davis. The fact that most luxury brands don’t sell handbags, fine jewelry and very expensive watches online is by all intents and purposes an engraved invitation to Fashionphile and similar sites to sell “gently used” products to consumers who don’t have access to brands’ boutiques, which are typically in major cities and very selective secondary and resort markets. “Louis Vuitton was the first to sell online, Chanel, Hermès and Goyard are forcing consumers to resell and losing hundreds of millions of dollars to recommerce,” Davis said. “We want

Follow WWD on Twitter or become a fan on Facebook.

Read More...

from WWDWWD https://ift.tt/2IYVYpb