A New Year a New Fashion Week!
Today, for My Monday, I wanted to talk about something that I’ve been thinking and reflecting on a lot these last few weeks:
The state of Bloggers at the upcoming Fashion Weeks
A Shutterstock image from the MediaBistro website. Click on the image to visit the article “New York Fashion Week Has Had It With All you Bloggers” by Patrick Coffee
Something BIG is going on in the fashion world, something that to me signifies big changes in one of the most important industries on the planet.
I should have called this post:
Fashion Week A Tale of Two Cities
BERLIN & NEW YORK
The Mercedes-Benz NYFW Strategy = Fewer Bloggers
Catherine Bennet, senior vice president of IMG, the company that runs the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week in New York, announced in December that there will be cuts to the attendees of fashion shows.
Designers are complaining that the shows are becoming too cluttered and exhausting for buyers. Oscar de la Renta went so far as to say that there are thousands of people there that have no connection to the clothes.
Catherine Bennet has been criticized by some saying that her decision is “all about money”, but I don’t see what the problem is!
After all, Fashion Shows are just one part of Fashion Week. And Fashion Week is just another term for TRADE SHOW! I’ve explained it in-depth here.
Fashion Week is Centered Around Selling Fashion
As I’ve mentioned before here and here, I work with my husband for his artisan leather belt company that produces for some major labels and has their own niche luxury brand.
These fashion trade shows happen in all major cities in the world in conjunction with “Fashion Week”. Usually, each major city has 4 fashion weeks a year and therefore lots of different trade shows and hundreds of fashion shows during those times.
The difference is, that in any other industry the idea of going to a trade show is about as exciting as clipping your toe nails. So why is it then that the whole world is dying to go to these trade shows? Because THIS IS FASHION!
Do Bloggers Make a Difference in Creating Sales?
In my opinion the Answer is Yes and No.
Two important terms to learn when working in fashion is the difference between a Sample Collection versus Production.
The way I think about it is….if at a Fashion Show the prime seats are given to bloggers and not buyers, there is risk that the collection doesn’t get sold.
Only the styles that get ORDERED during the sales period (aka Fashion Weeks) actually make it into production. If a style doesn’t get ordered it won’t get produced that season. A designer won’t produce 100,000 pieces if 10 are ordered.
In this case the blogger’s photographs didn’t really produce much value for the designer. However, if the blogger promotes a style ALREADY IN PRODUCTION and available for sale, that’s another story.
Important bloggers have been known to help a designer sell out a style hours after promoting it on their blog. Bloggers with major sway, can move merchandise faster than a traditional marketing platform.
BryanBoy
Click on the image to visit Bryan Boy.com
Recently the Philippine Daily Inquirer interviewed mega fashion blogger BryanBoy about the recent NYFW changes.
And his reaction to the changes was so rational, level-headed and businesslike, that I just have to give him credit for his class. He is a professional blogger who truly understands the ins and outs of fashion.
He was quoted as saying
If anything, fashion month is a big, business expense for me—airfares, accommodation, car service, meals, long-distance calls, international roaming bills…..
One does not have to see the actual show to see the clothes
BryanBoy is a particularly special case in the fashion world, many of the designers he works with invite him to exclusive previews of their collections. Most bloggers don’t have that type of relationship with designers.
Unbearable to Watch!
After the Catherine Bennet announcement, Jimmy Kimmel did this segment as part of “Lie Witness News”, asking Fashion Bloggers what they thought of designers whose names the interviewer had completely invented. Each time I watch it I cringe! George Costanza anyone….God I felt old … who doesn’t know who George Costanza is!!!?
Ugh, this segment just made it so much harder for your everyday fashion blogger to be seen as a credible part of fashion week.
Bryanboy made a very accurate observation by saying t that bloggers are NOT journalists.
I would add that many do not want to be thought of as such. They are a completely different and new component of the fashion media mix. The problem is, that many of them after spending hundreds of hours writing posts and promoting themselves, thousands of dollars updating their wardrobe and putting together their “brand” of personal style, and leaping through all the hoops necessary to be at a real fashion week get caught up in the moment.
I don’t know how fair this jimmy Kimmel segment is. I mean think about how a blogger’s reputation could be destroyed if the ONLY time they were on tv being interviewed about fashion they responded with “Louboutin’s Uniboot? never heard of it”. DISASTER.
Anyways, the reason I thought about calling this post “A Tale of Two Cities; Berlin and New York” is because Catherine Bennett’s announcement wasn’t the only major news affecting Fashion Weeks everywhere.
Berlin’s Bread & Butter
The Berlin Fashion trade show Bread and Butter also announced, that for the first time, the show will be open to the public starting in the summer 2014 edition. Anyone can enter for the last two days of the trade show, you just need to buy a ticket! Read all about the new Concept here.
This is HUGE. If you’ve ever attended a fashion trade show you know that you have to organize your entry weeks, or even months in advance, proving your blogger “credentials”.
I think this decision will turn the Berlin Fashion Week into the new Blogger MECCA!
For those of you already familiar with Bread & Butter, you know that this is THE European Street Wear Fashionfair, and that most of the brands that show have a much more contemporary, edgy vibe.
You will find up and coming labels from all over the world, a sea of bloggers and non bloggers that flock to the German city to snap pictures and have their own picture taken. Bringing with them, of course, a carefully selected array of clothes to be as alternatively, blogger trendy as is humanly possible.
What does this mean for the brands that show at Bread & Butter?
They have to completely re-think of how they present their collections at the show. The BBB trade show will divide the Fair so that one day is for press, a few days are for professionals only and two days will be open to the public.
Brands can customize the things they display, directly engage with bloggers and the public and have multiple communication strategies going on at the same time. For example promoting sample and production collections contemporarily.
Berlin’s Bread & Butter, in my humble opinion, is the perfect decision for this Fair. Up and coming street style and urban labels will benefit for the direct access to all of the international bloggers that will flock to the city, especially since all barriers to entry will be removed.
And, let’s be honest, smaller brands don’t always have the resources to create completely new collections each season, this is a great way to help them move their merch, especially since most already have an online store.
Street Style
Street Style Photographer The Sartorialist captures not only the runway shows but what people wear to them. This image is from his post “On the Street At Marni Milan”, click to visit.
I don’t actually think that the NYFW’s decision to have fewer invitees at the FASHION SHOWS is actually a direct slight against bloggers. It’s not like they are limiting bloggers from attending the Fashion Fairs, or other events.
Everyone knows that bloggers play a huge role in other ways during fashion week, just look at the importance of Street Style.
The amount of research, care and preparation that goes into every outfit worn during fashion week would just be wasted if there was no one there eagerly waiting to snap street style pictures!
I think, in the future, bloggers will be given specific entry rights. Maybe more “street style” events, areas and days will be created. Street Style photographs have turned your average fashion show attendee into as much of a statement as the designs that walk the catwalk.
Street Style photographer The Sartorialist often posts more pictures of what people wore to a Fashion Show as opposed to what was shown in the show. I love him for it!
In this way blogger provide the public with the alternative creative side of fashion week while traditional media captures what was walked.
What do you think? Do you think that NYFW is making a mistake? Do you plan on going to Bread and Butter in the summer?
Tomorrow Pitti Immagine, the mega Men’s Fashion trade show, based out of Florence opens, will you be there?
Tomorrow, I’ll be linking this post up with a NEW LINK UP dedicated to ….YOU! A place for women and moms to link up their opinions, thoughts, life, passion or style. Follow the #AllAboutYou link and pin party by visiting Mama and More, City Girl at Heart and Mother Wife Me.
Life link-ups!
Sometimes I like to link up My Monday or Thursday posts or my instagram pictures with these amazing bloggers. Feel free to visit their sites for inspiration on everything from life, recipes, photography and crafts.