Fast Fashion & DTC: The Metrics that Matter
The disruption of DTC and “Fast Fashion” is rapidly evolving. Consumers are consciously moving away from brands that neglect their carbon footprint and waste byproducts, and instead are leaning into supporting mission-driven brands, such as the online thrifting company Goodfair.
Last week, Topper Luciani, founder and CEO of Goodfair joined Pete Sena, co-founder and CCO of Digital Surgeons for a 4:4:4 webinar session “Fighting Fast Fashion: How Goodfair is Reimagining the Apparel Industry.” Their conversation peeled every layer of the onion, from talking about core business principles, to explaining social media speed.
Pete asked Topper during this 4:4:4 about insights and data. Specifically, what is Topper and his team seeing before, and now during COVID-19 regarding Goodfair’s customer behavior. Topper’s response and explanation was fascinating.
“There was a shift starting to bubble up before COVID-19. A shift starting to promote sustainability, a shift happening towards dressing casually, a shift happening towards fiscal responsibility and frugality. When COVID-19 happened, it was this extraordinary catalyst, or as if something put all of that on steroids and sped it up 100 years. Included in the shifts mentioned above, is the fourth shift towards e-commerce. That exploded even more.”
Being at the right place at the right time is half of the battle. Consumer mindsets and purchasing decisions are always shifting, but it’s without a doubt e-commerce and DTC models are here to stay and continuously evolve. Companies selling products from apparel to soft drinks will have to build a Brand DNA that tells a unique and differentiated story.
Pete often talks about Brand DNA. From his perspective, Brand DNA is when the spirit of the founder is something that rings true even in some cases post-mortem. For example, there’s still a part of Steve Jobs in every Apple product and in memoriam at their headquarters. Pete aims to understand how Topper and every founder injects their personality into their brand. Having fun with the brand tone and personality is instrumental.
Pete and the audience also wanted to learn from Topper about what metrics Topper and Goodfair are focused on. Here’s Topper’s reply.
“It depends on where you are with your business, or what your strengths and weaknesses are. Basically, I’m at the stage now with a little bit of capital in the bank and a great margin, and a huge audience. I want to be building enterprise value. How I build this is trying to deliver a phenomenal customer experience for anyone to tell their friends and continue coming back. You can see how this translates into a Customer acquisition cost to lifetime value equation.”
One more interesting concept Topper brought up during the conversation was the speed of social media. Emphasizing and encouraging everyone, especially anyone in a business that’s considered DTC, to learn about optimizing your brand’s social media content and diversifying the platforms you’re present on.
Topper warned the crowd that he believes Instagram’s organic reach has fallen flat. Basically you have to “pay to play” to reach people on Instagram. Where a new platform that’s trying to grow like TikTok, will show a lot more people what you post.
A big thank you to the founders, brand managers and everyone else interested in apparel, DTC and e-commerce that joined us live during this 4:4:4 session! You can connect with Topper Luciani on LinkedIn, or follow Goodfair on Instagram to learn more about the brand and its mission.
Check out the video below, to watch the full episode of this 4:4:4.
Join the next 444 session! We’d love to have you.
-Kyle
