Style.com Enters Luxury eCommerce Arena

Muchaneta Kapfunde | @FashNerdEditor

A worthy opponent has entered the arena of selling luxury online, say hello to an old friend Style.com, the new global e-commerce destination.

Style.com has been around for years. Those who have seen it evolve, will remember how brightly its light shone in the early 2000’s. It was the most-visited women’s fashion magazine site online. I personally loved it. I unashamedly immersed myself in their fashion news reporting, trend reports, and extensive galleries of fashion-show photos.

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Now with a new plan in mind they have decided to target the $1.5 trillion global e-commerce market. It is a strategic move, a high risk bet that is likely dependent on the brand’s good name. With this news circling the industry, I am sure that there is exciting times ahead for the style.com brand. It is throwing its stilleto in the ring of luxury e-commerce by standing up on its own two feet without the cushioning of Vogue’s content, which will now be moving to voguerunway.com. Of this, Bob Sauerberg president of Condé Nast, stated; “Vogue.com in the US is going through a massive growth period,” he continued, “we are investing into it and expanding it to create that as our premium digital fashion destination. It’s about getting behind Vogue.com and taking much of the content at Style.com and bringing that content and the audience over to Vogue.”

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The restructuring of style.com is an ambitious undertaking, so therefore it comes as no surprise that they are planning to reshuffle and rehire talent. So far they have confirmed that former ASOS editorial director Melissa Dick will be coming on board as editorial director of e-commerce along with yet to be named individuals head hunted “from other businesses like Yoox and Net-a-Porter“.

Leaning towards luxury, Style.com, according to Condé Nast, will have a potential customer base of more than 300 million people. They will be launching between 100- 200 brands with the objective of offering you the convenience of shopping directly from editorial content. To understand the direction that style.com is taking we think that Franck Zayan, president of Style.com put it best when he said, “we are building: a lifestyle destination for commerce.”

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With its HQ in London, we look forward to seeing Style.com’s potential tested as they compete to become top dog among competitors like fashion e-tailers Moda Operandi, Farfetch and Vestiaire Collective

Condé Nast plans to suspend the publication of Style.com’s  print magazine and invest around $100 million, into Style.com e-Commerce store, which will open its e-doors with a UK pilot launch in the Autumn of 2015 and a global roll out from 2016.

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SOURCEImage Credit: style.com