See a sneak peek of View From the Front Row’s upcoming interview with ToVieFor’s co-founder and CEO. Shopping as we know it may never be the same.
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Go Try It On wants to be the solution to all of your wardrobe dilemmas. Founded by Marissa Evans, the site relies on real-time peer-to-peer style advice to help you look your best. View From the Front Row recently sat down with Evans to talk entrepreneurship and much more.
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As second-year MBA students at Wharton, Cherif Habib and Stephan Jacob identified an opportunity to deliver brands and products to students on a tight budget. Kembrel, a private shopping community for students, selling clothing, computer gadgets, and accessories at 40-75% off was born. Relying on social networks to drive consumption, with friends telling friends about hot products and brands, Kembrel has been able to create meaningful connections with its users. Innovative features include a Kembrel shop on Facebook, pop-up campus tours and a business model that leverages the work experience and creativity of real students. I recently spoke with co-founder and CEO Cherif Kembrel to discuss what metrics he uses to define success, how Kembrel stays ahead of the competition and why it may be less risky to be your own boss than to work for a large corporation in today’s economy.
Jennifer Sung: What is Kembrel? What are you offering that is new and different from what’s already out there in the online space?
Cherif Habib: Kembrel is a private shopping community for students. What we are doing differently is that we are targeting only students and the reason we are doing that is because we think that the current offerings [online] don’t cater to students as well as we do. So from a merchandising and assortment point of view, we think we are better. In terms of content and community, we are also doing something different. To give you some examples: every model on the site is a student, every photographer is a student, the content writers are students and the bloggers are students. This community driven [aspect] makes Kembrel unique. We also have the first private sales store running on Facebook–we are the first in the industry to have that–and that’s unique because our demographic is obviously spending most of its time online on Facebook and by bringing the store to [them], we are increasing the chances that they will find something they like and they can interact with us without ever leaving [Facebook].
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Dannijo, founded by sisters Danielle and Jodie Snyder in 2008, has emerged as one of the most sought after jewelry lines in the world. A celebrity clientele list (including Beyonce, Katy Perry, and Natalie Portman), multiple collaborations with fashion houses (including Luca Luca, Carlos Campos, and Walter) and a nomination for Inc. Magazine’s 30 Under 30 Coolest Young Entrepreneurs in 2009, are just a few of the many accomplishments they’ve achieved over the last three years. I recently spoke with Danielle and Jodie to learn more about the experience of running a business as sisters, their recent decision to do their first ever presentation at London fashion week and why sometimes it’s just as important to reject opportunities as it is to take them on.
Jennifer Sung: How would you describe your style and personality?
Danielle Snyder: I’m a little bit more bohemian and rock and roll inspired. I’m inspired by music culture from bygone eras like Woodstock to present music festivals like Coachella. And Jodie is a little more classic and inspired by old world sensibilities with a mix of vintage. So for the collection, we really work off of each other to create a well-rounded collection that speaks to a range of personalities.
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1 bag equals 1 child fed for 1 school year. With this simple idea, FEED has made it possible for one person to make a huge difference in another’s life. Co-founders Lauren Bush and Ellen Gustafson founded FEED in 2007 to do something about the 350 million children that go hungry every day. In this edition of 20 Questions, Bush and Gustafson explain the accidental birth of their business, how the root causes of hunger and obesity are actually related to problems in our global food system, and why conscious consumers who choose to wear causes over company logos are their real life heroes.
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Founded over 85 years ago, Maidenform revolutionized women’s intimate apparel with the creation of the first modern day bra –a bra that separates and supports breasts, highlighting the natural shape of a woman’s figure, or her “maiden form.” Since then, the company has sold millions of bras through department stores, mass retailers, its own specialty retail outlets, and its website Maidenform.com to become a market leader in intimate apparel. Since July 2008, the company has continued to experience great success under the leadership of CEO Maurice Reznik. In this edition of 20 Questions, Reznik discusses his personal career path in the retail industry, why great product is key to a company’s long term success and Maidenform’s exciting new brand initiatives (including the roll-out of a new juniors’ brand).
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Name: Sang A Im-Propp
Job Title: Founer and CEO of Sang A handbags
Brimming with exotic materials such as python, fox fur and crocodile, handbag designer Sang A Im-Propp’s Soho showroom screams modern luxury. Im-Propp’s beautifully crafted handbags marry the finest materials (she uses the same skins as Hermès) with contemporary design. A former actress and singer in Korea (by the age of 26 she had released three albums), Im-Propp studied at Parsons School of Design and interned for VPL designer Victoria Bartlett before launching her own line in 2006. In this edition of 20 Questions, she explains how her previous career as an entertainer prepared her for her current role as a designer, how the recession has impacted luxury businesses, and why discipline and hard work are so important.
Jennifer Sung: You started out in the entertainment industry as a Korean actress and singer. Why the career switch?
Sang A Im-Propp: I came [to the US] on a business trip and stayed in New York for about a month for business meetings when I was younger. Afterwards, I wanted to take some time off to go to school. I actually went to NYU to study film and while I was living in New York, I realized I really wanted to do something in New York and build something here. I actually started with cooking to become a chef but four months later, I dropped that and started studying at Parsons [School of Design] to become a designer.
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Name: Apar Kothari
Job Title: Founder and CEO of MyNines
70% off is the new 20% off, according to Apar Kothari, the founder and CEO of MyNines. If you are one of the millions of savvy online shoppers who get a rush from scoring designer bargains (up to 90% off) through invitation-only private sale sites, but can’t seem to keep track of all of the best deals then get MyNines on your radar. The site launched in March 2010 and is a one stop shop for all of your favorite private sale auction sites, meaning you’ll never have to miss a great deal again. An avid shopper herself, Kothari tells us why she chose to get an MBA, what brands can do to stand out and why online sample sale sites are good for the fashion industry.
Jennifer Sung: What is MyNines and what value are you offering to your customers?
Apar Kothari: MyNines is the Kayak.com for private sales–we aggregate different sale sites that are out there and help you find them all in one place. Most people have heard of the top four (Gilt Groupe, Ideeli, Rue La La, and HauteLook) but there’s a whole bunch of others out there that most people don’t know about that have access to fantastic brands. They just aren’t being discovered because they don’t have the marketing budget that a Gilt Groupe does, so we’re also a discovery tool for people to find all of these fantastic deals out there. Our value proposition is that you don’t have time to open twelve or fourteen different emails so you can come to one place and find it all here. We will also have an online shopper strategy–if you are familiar with Shop It To Me (a free personal online shopper), it’s similar to that. If Prada is your favorite brand, every time something from Prada goes on sale, you can set up an alert and we will send you an email in real time so that you don’t have to monitor the sales.
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Name: Suzanne Xie
Job Title: Co-founder of Weardrobe
If you like flipping through fashion magazines for style inspiration, you will love Weardrobe, an online social platform that gives you the opportunity to not only follow fellow fashion enthusiasts with great style, but also to produce your own lookbook—essentially creating your own virtual closet. Co-founded by Suzanne Xie and Richard Tong in 2008, Weardrobe is on the cutting edge of fashion and social media, attracting over 35,000 visitors daily and shifting the source of fashion inspiration from highly edited magazine pages to everyday street styles. The start-up has quickly garnered an impressive list of achievements in less than two years—it hosted the first ever conference for fashion bloggers, got start-up funding from Facebook’s development fund and was acquired by Like.com last November. Xie recently left Weardrobe for some much needed time off, and in this edition of 20 Questions she reflects back on Weardrobe’s humble beginnings (a simple Excel spreadsheet), why she thinks social media is not just a temporary fad, and hints at what might be next for her.
Jennifer Sung: How would you best describe Weardrobe?
SX: Weardrobe is really about people sharing their own personal styles online. It’s a fashion community for bloggers and people who want to be bloggers to share their daily outfits, get style inspiration, etc. The user base—the people who are actually posting photos—is generally fashion bloggers, but in terms of who visits the site, it’s for anyone just looking for style inspiration. [The fashion blogging community] is pretty big now. We are close to about 20,000 users and the actual [fashion blogging community] is in the hundreds of thousands and their reader base is in the millions. As Weardrobe continues to develop there will be more features [and] more interviews, but the site is really about inspiration.
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Name: Kim Phan
Job Title: Founder, CEO and Head Designer of Yumi Kim
Meet fashion designer Kim Phan, founder and CEO of clothing line Yumi Kim. A self-described “Jane of all trades,” Phan launched her own clothing line in fall 2008, focusing on vintage prints and silhouettes with a touch of funk and urban femininity. Sold at upscale boutiques and department stores including Saks Fifth Avenue, Intermix and Bloomingdale’s, Yumi Kim has quickly become a favorite among the Hollywood crowd. In this edition of 20 Questions, Phan tells us about her love for Twitter, why her clothes give her customers an instant mood boost and why you should have paid attention in that accounting class you slept your way through.
Jennifer Sung: You started out in the music industry but decided to take the jump into the fashion world. Why the career switch?
Kim Phan: I moved to New York in 2001 and I ended up working for the president of Arista Records from 2001 to 2003. I was there for almost two years and when you work for the [president of a music company], you get to see the whole entire operations of a record company and learn how music is made. You also work with a bunch of different celebrities. However, I realized in the two years working there that I wasn’t passionate about music. I just wasn’t for me. So I decided to pursue what I love, which is fashion.
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