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Alexander Wang breaks first leather goods collection in exclusive eBay sale

June 15, 2011

Apparel and accessories designer Alexander Wang is targeting young, fashion-forward consumers with an exclusive pre-sale of its first wallet and leather goods collection in the eBay Fashion Vault on Friday.

The designer is selling accessories from the collection with prices ranging from $235 to $525. The sale will last 60 hours and starts at 6 a.m. EST on June 17.

“EBay gives established and emerging designers, as well as brands and retailers, a platform to reach a broad audience with an attractive business model in today’s competitive retail environment,” said Karen Bard Sayah, public relations and social media manager of eBay Fashion, San Francisco.

“[The] eBay Fashion Vault offers a customizable selling format enabling brands and designers the ability to harness the power of the Marketplace to reach more customers and drive incremental sales,” she said. “Through the eBay Fashion Vault, we are partnering with brands to enable them to reach new customers and move both exclusive and excess inventory quickly.

“As a result, our buyers get ‘Buy It Now’ instant access to new, direct-from-brand merchandise at a value.”

Pre-sale
Alexander Wang is selling a number of its accessories such as the Zelmira wallet in ponyskin, the Mini Adriel bag in ostrich, the Campact Quillon in metallic and the Prisma biker purse in printed ostrich.

alexander-wang-mini-adriel

The Mini Adriel bag from the Fall 2011 collection

“This initiative can introduce new customers to the brand and can create automatic brand ‘buy-in’ when placed beside already highly regarded brands,” said Courtney Albert, consultant on marketing and branding for Parker Avery, Atlanta.

“It is also a strong promotional tool for the brand as the site counts down to the opening of the event,” she said. ”For this particular event, it is a one-day sale meaning that there is not a long-term connection to the discount site.

“If a potential customer misses the opportunity to purchase, then this will either move them to seek out the brand through a primary channel, store or its own online site, or wait for another possible event.”

The eBay Fashion Vault sales are typically 60 hours.

The items in the sale will be under the “Buy It Now” option and are not available for auction.

This sneak-peek limited collection is exclusive to eBay.

Alexander Wang could be using this strategy as a test to see how consumers respond to the new collection.

Also, by only offering a limited number of pieces for a narrow length of time, it could pique consumers’ interest and build hype for when the full collection goes on sale in July.

“The strategy is awareness and to gauge interest within the core audience as well as those that are on the fringe,” said Kimmie Smith, designer, style expert and founder/editor in chief of Kitten Lounge, New York.

“These types of sales pull more people into [a brand's] core and allows consumers to see what their market truly represents,” she said.

Flashing, not slashing
Luxury brands have been dipping their toes into the flash-sales market for a while.

Gilt Groupe, Rue La La and Haute Look are just three of the main flash-sale sites that offer discounted luxury products for a limited amount of time.

However, eBay offers the excitement and urgency of flash sales, without the sale. The items in the eBay Fashion Vault sale will not be discounted.

This will most likely add to Alexander Wang’s value, as it shows that it is not willing to drink the flash-sale Kool Aid and dilute its products through discount.

“The opportunity to have a temporary time period to obtain [products] for less creates more urgency as opposed to making the brand appear diluted,” Ms. Smith said.

Still, brands have been reluctant to sell on eBay until recently.

For instance, Derek Lam has tried this new sale on flash-sale sites a few weeks ago (see story).

Now that these brands have tried it out, other brands will be on the lookout to see how the eBay Fashion Vault fares for them.

Other luxury brands could potentially be using the site as a vehicle to build brand awareness and possibly test new products and services to an eager and tech-savvy consumer base.

“I would not expect luxury brands that have legally fought to keep their products off the site, such as Dior or Tiffany to use utilize eBay vaults,” Parker Avery’s Ms. Albert said. ”But for younger luxury brands that are still not as mainstream but have a huge following, there is the opportunity to control a channel that buyers/sellers of the brand are already using.”

Final Take
Rachel Lamb, editorial assistant on Luxury Daily, New York

Rachel Lamb is an associate reporter on Luxury Daily. Her beats are apparel and accessories, arts and entertainment, education, food and beverage, fragrance and personal care, government, healthcare, home furnishings, jewelry, legal/privacy and nonprofits. Reach her at rachel@napean.com.