Consumerism: What and how to buy at Asos
Wonderzine parses, how the famous online stores are arranged: what to buy in them, how to save money and what to look for when delivering. The first store in the new category is Asos, which launched the Russian version a month ago. The site was translated into Russian, express delivery throughout the country and a convenient return system appeared. A retailer that sells its own line of clothing and accessories and more than a hundred brands has been popular with us before, but no one really used all of its capabilities. Wonderzine talked with the main designers of the home brand Asos about Russian customers, and also figured out what lines the store has, how designers choose and what is remarkable about the Marketplace - a fair of clothing from around the world.
You can write a book about building an Asos business.: The company's phenomenon is as interesting as the stories of Apple or Starbucks. In the 2000th year, Asos began with the concept of As Seen On Screen - selling clothes like celebrities - and teams of three young people, and now thousands of people work for the giant delivering parcels to 200 countries. The fact is that Asos offers something for everyone: women and men, pregnant women, people with non-standard size lines, young and old, lovers of minimalism and gothic, those who go to a music festival, and those who go to a party in the style 1980s.
Reitler releases clothing under his own name.. It is divided into a dozen lines, and each of them is distinguished by the quality of tailoring and fabrics, and hence the average price tag. About ranking lines - just below. Asos sell several hundred other brands, and it is difficult to distinguish a bias in any market segment. Both democratic brands like River Island and Vero Moda, adidas and Nike sports shoes and clothing, Boy London and Carhartt street brands, and Chalayan design lines, House of Holland, Marc by Marc Jacobs are presented.
For 13 years Asos got the American, German and French versions, and now is going to enter the Chinese market. Moreover, if the creator of the store, Nick Robertson, calls the same Russian adaptation of the store just a business, then the Chinese will become a more global project. For example, all products will be stored in China, and not in different European countries, as in our case. The store's next innovation is shipping, which can be monitored in real time, but only in Britain.
Asos lines
British retailer also produces its own brand, divided into lines: and if the H & M or Topshop lines have a maximum of five, then here we are talking about the top ten.
Revive
What is it: Party clothes, such as dresses with a train in sequins.
Prices: 2,000-13,000 rubles
White
What is it: A line of minimalistic things from Asos stylists. Cropped shirts, skirts in the spirit of the Japanese avant-garde and denim suits, as a rule, are kept until sales.
Prices: 2,000-12,000 rubles
Black
What is it: Collections of guest designers. Now on sale - leather items by Marcus Lupfer.
Prices: 5 000-11 000 rub.
Salon
What is it: Elegant dresses for all occasions, with floral embroideries and stone appliqués
Prices: 3500-8000 rub.
Reclaimed Vintage
What is it: A team of vintage hunters is looking for items and fabrics from past eras and recycles them in a modern way.
Prices: 600-4000 rub.
Africa
What is it: One of the most worthy initiatives of Asos. Clothes of ethnic style are sewn by hand at the Soko workshop, thereby providing jobs for Kenyan residents. Production is sustainable: it implies an ethical attitude towards the environment and an emphasis on recycled materials.
Prices: 1 500-3 000 rub.
Asos
What is it: The main line of the store includes basic T-shirts and sweatshirts, and leopard fur sweatshirts, and numerous polyester dresses.
Prices: 1,000-5,000 rubles
Given the particular climate, Russian women are always eager to get dressed from head to toe, and this is evident in all fashion blogs from Russia. In developing our collections, we think about global trends that will be of interest to buyers of 20 years around the world. So we do not take into account the tastes of a particular country when working. But we see that Russian customers love to dress up and buy dresses very well. You rarely acquire basic things or something androgynous.
How is the collection created? We have 28 designers, each of whom is responsible for one type of product, for example, denim or knitwear. Every season we gather in our office, it is located in the building of the former Art Deco tobacco factory, and we start brainstorming. Designers talk about their research, which is held at exhibitions and in clubs, vintage stores and blogs with magazines. Every two months should be devoted to two different trends, because our customers are literally addicted to the pursuit of new products, so you need to comply. Collections consist of three segments - base, more trendy things and bold things with character - we call them cherries on the cake, they attract the attention of customers. I really believe that good design is commercial, because who wants to create things that no one wears?
Marketplace
Marketplace - a platform through which clothing can be sold by any person or company in the world. People sell their wardrobe items, they can be found in the Individuals section, for convenience, there is a special card on which sellers from different countries are marked - including Kazakhstan, Mexico and Korea. Vintage stores, multi-brands and independent brands are located in the Boutiques section. Each seller sends the order on his own, but if he doesn’t come and the sender does not respond to your letters, you need to contact Asos. There is also anti-counterfeiting and other useful options. In the Marketplace, each brand receives feedback from customers - they express their attitude to the thing, giving it a negative, negative or neutral mark.
Bukki
A young London brand specializes in denim jackets and shorts with printed inserts, and also creates two-color shirts made from African fabrics.
Prices: 750-3255 rubles
Positive reviews: 87 %
H.S! by Hayley Scanlan
Hayley Scanlan is the best young designer of 2012 in her native Scotland. New collection of her second line H.S! consists of tops, skirts and dresses with a snake print.
Price: 2000-7300 rubles
Positive reviews: No reviews
Fabitoria
The brand from Taiwan is already quite famous, now it is sold in the Marketplace. Its main advantage is skirts with photo prints, and of structural tops with panels. Clothing made by hand.
Price: 8110-13500 rubles
Positive reviews: No reviews
In Real Life
The brand new In Real Life is inspired by the underground culture. Her collection draws attention to the tops - cheap T-shirts from two-tone fur and printed T-shirts oversized.
Price: 2500-6500 rubles
Positive reviews: No reviews
The whitepepper
The brand is only available online, based in East London and inspired by street style. In fact, you get beautiful voluminous dresses and shoes on a massive platform.
Price: 1600-4500 rubles
Positive reviews: 99 %
Men's clothing makes 12 people, we sit next to each other to exchange ideas. We’ve just finished shaping the trends for the season SS 2014. We start work on the season with traveling around the world, collecting samples of graphics and fabrics. So we make up 20 trends and choose 5 of them for 1 season. We work in retail, so a combination of commercial and non-commercial sales dictate. We always try to add something new and fresh to the design, but still we feel that all our clothes are fashionable - this is how it is sold, and we still want the car to provide the customer with the desired and make money. At Asos, we have to think globally, take more moments into account - we’ll be fools if we start focusing only on the guys in Britain and forget about climate change in Australia.
Asos Collaborations
Stamps build a policy on collaboration in two ways. Some, like H & M and Gap, collaborate with famous designers like Albert Elbaz and Stella McCartney. Others, such as Topshop and Uniqlo, prefer to discover and promote young talents - they worked with Christopher Kane and G.V.G.V. before these brands became popular. Asos combines both approaches. A couple of years ago, the collections for the store created the rising stars of the British fashion scene Jonathan Saunders, Louise Gray and Holly Fulton. Now the retailer is engaged in collaborations with Marcus Lupfer and Puma as part of the Asos Black collection. Headwear for the store was created by Pierce Atkinson, author of numerous hats with Anna Dello Russo's cherries. Recently Milli Goddard dresses for Asos appeared on sale: a graduate of Central Saint Martins and favorite of Nicola Formichetti updated the expensive Salon line.
Marcus Lupfer Collection for Asos Black
What is it: A collection of leather items by British designer and Asos. Before the sale, most of the things lived - dress, jacket, pants, shoes and bags.
Prices: from 1400 rubles to 6 800 rubles (with discount)
Puma Collection for Asos Black
What is it: men's line created by a sports giant especially for Asos. It is worth paying attention to windbreakers, T-shirts and training.
Prices: from 1 000 rubles to 3 500 rubles
We want buyers to always leave us with an order and get what they want - clothes for work or a big night party - that's why we sell hundreds of other brands. The influence on the selection of brands have celebrities and street style. These are, perhaps, the most relevant to our time and our concept ways of forming the basis of the store. We try to choose the right brands, for this we need to hold many meetings in Britain and abroad, choose the right things from the collections, negotiate exclusives that can be commercially successful in Asos.