Fashion retailers looking to compete with online warehouses need to consider playing up their hometown appeal. In Paraguay, a bank capitalized on local pride in a song about the country's Ypacaral Lake. During its 70th anniversary, the bank invited people to play the song on an installation of giant wind pipes. Visitors crowded around as soon as the display opened.
Even though Rob Bowhan's "August" shop in a college town carries international streetwear for students from around the world, he hosts occasional performances by local hip hop musicians, hangs paintings by local artists, and features student models and musicians wearing the shop's clothes in his promotions.
At age 17, when the British founder of House of CB, Conna Walker, launched her successful business, she hounded celebrities with emails asking them to wear her clothes and offering the outfits for free, if they managed to credit photos of them wearing her designs. Ms. Walker knew she wanted to dress curvy women who craved figure-hugging, covered but sexy clothes, often with revealing cutouts. Working with a neutral, not flashy, color palette and quality textiles, her bodysuits and clingy clothes manage to help women project a classy, not cheap, vibe. This House of CB titan knew she was lucky to find manufacturers willing to convert her drawings and explanations into technical directions and patterns. To spur future growth, she brings out new items every Monday, the way subscription cosmetic companies do. And she plans to open more stores and expand into an entire lifestyle brand with her own cosmetics and items for the home.
Instead of hounding celebrities to wear his clothes, Daymond John of TV Shark Tank fame badgered rappers to wear his FUBU brand. His growth plan led him to invest in other startups, to write motivational books, and to share his life lessons on the lecture circuit.
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