The direct-to-consumer opportunity
Western retailers are increasingly open to stocking luxury goods with an African provenance. Lemlem sells to Net-a-Porter and Le Bon Marché, while MatchesFashion.com and Shopbop are stockists for Brother Vellies. However, the traditional wholesale model can be unkind to African infrastructure that hasn’t traditionally been geared toward exports. While Liberty & Justice has built good relationships with Liberia’s government, it still has to deal with problems at the port, where shipments can get held up for prolonged periods. “We’ve done big projects with Bloomingdale’s where we didn’t deliver on time, which didn’t make them too excited,” says Liberty. “Power and connectivity are major structural challenges that can affect doing business at the speed we’re used to here in the US,” says Kebede of Lemlem, which shipped 35,000 pieces around the world last year, and recently began distributing from a European warehouse. Another challenge is that retail buyers and consumers are accustomed to standardised manufacturing coming out of China and might not know how to merchandise African artisan fashion. There’s no space on the shelf for an entire brand story. “I struggle with buyers,” says Erwiah. “They have to adapt to a new type of client, with different interests and different needs. I don’t think they know where to put it in their store and how to position it.” “You can pivot a lot easier in a direct-to-consumer model if something isn’t working out,” says James of Brother Vellies. “Versus wholesale, where they’re like, ‘This cow print is a little bit different from the sample.’ Well, because it’s a real cow, not a print. The customers know that it’s a Nguni cow, from the Nguni people.”DISCLAIMER: The Views, Comments, Opinions, Contributions and Statements made by Readers and Contributors on this platform do not necessarily represent the views or policy of Multimedia Group Limited.
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