High-end fashion a click away on eBay

By Robin Givhan
The Washington Post

EBAY Ebay expands the market for runway samples including this dress from Proenza Schouler.

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Only days after the fall 2004 runway shows in New York, garments from Proenza Schouler went up for sale on eBay. Barely a year old, the design house has nowhere near the brand recognition of Ralph Lauren or Donna Karan. But to astute readers of glossy magazines and red-carpet watchers, Proenza Schouler was the new designer drug.

Characterized by its gunmetal sequins, structured bodices and lean tailoring, the company's merchandise is not the sort one expects to find amid eBay's old compact discs, garage-sale collectibles and oddball tchotchkes.

But eBay, the Internet auction site with $2.17 billion in net revenue, is evolving. It had helped to sponsor designer Narciso Rodriguez's runway show and auctioned pieces from his modernist collection as well as autographed bottles of his new fragrance. Cozying up to the fashion industry and lasering in on its rarefied customers has become part of eBay's bigger plan.

"With 105 million users, we can find a customer for every product," says eBay's style director, Constance White, who signed on last summer expressly to raise the company's fashion credibility.

One of White's first contributions to eBay is "Personal Style," an online trend report with links to the appropriate live auctions. The newsletter's mission is to give sellers a better idea of what to hawk and shoppers more information on what they should buy.

EBay hopes a more muscular, articulate fashion presence will help increase the overall volume of its clothing, shoes and accessories category. High-end brands and their hyped designers are expected to generate prestige and visibility for the site. Fashion-savvy customers are already eBay users — and more are surely sniffing around the site. Cater to them with appropriate products, and not only will more like-minded shoppers follow but so will more middle-of-the-road consumers and bargain hunters.

Young designers' success

With Proenza Schouler, eBay not only was aiming at a truly committed fashion customer but was also touting its own fashion expertise. The young label's designers, Lazaro Hernandez and Jack McCollough, had famously sold their Parsons School of Design graduation collection to Barneys New York.

Almost overnight their runway shows had become a breathlessly requested ticket, and eBay co-sponsored their fall 2004 show. Many companies — from cookie makers to cellphone manufacturers — offer financial assistance to designers to align themselves with an industry noted for its glamour. But eBay was looking for more than a sprinkling of stardust.
 
Months before the Proenza Schouler fall collection would arrive in stores, eBay bidders had a chance to purchase the urbane ensembles that had just been strutted down the runway. The designers also offered about 100 other items from fall 2003, as well as pieces from their spring collection. They sold all of their runway shoes, which had been created for them by stiletto king Manolo Blahnik. None of these items were currently available in stores.

They even auctioned off four tickets to their spring 2005 show. New York fashion week isn't open to the public, and tickets typically are not available for purchase.

"With eBay, it's so easy and fluid," Hernandez says. "It's just another store: Barneys, Bergdorf Goodman, eBay."

The site — with its vast reach and low overhead — allowed the designers, during the 10 days of their auction, to connect with potential customers from California and New York to those scattered across the Midwest and South.

"Our biggest market is New York, California and Texas. But in the Midwest, there's millions of people reading fashion magazines and we don't have a retail outlet in most of those areas," Hernandez says. "EBay is very democratic. Anyone from anywhere can access it."

Like two entrepreneurs who just had their stock posted on the Big Board, Hernandez and McCollough logged onto eBay every day, eager to see how their merchandise was selling. "We sold samples from previous seasons, production overage. Instead of shipping it off to Century 21," the discount store, "we tried to make money out of it," Hernandez says.

"For our show, we have to make 60 pairs of shoes ... and we don't have a shoe line yet — 'yet' being the operative word. Sixty pairs of shoes at $400 a pop. It's hard to get that [back] through a sample sale," Hernandez says. Traditionally, sample-sale shoppers pay wholesale prices or less.

"At the end of the day, we need to make money," he says.

The four tickets to the upcoming September show sold for a total of $1,571.99. That's pure profit. The seats will cost the designers nothing except the stress of rejiggering their seating chart.

"It's a really great thing and we're so happy they discovered us," Hernandez says. "It has no downside."

Changes in marketing

EBay is transforming the way the fashion industry does business, not just by expanding the market for runway samples but changing how designers market themselves, judge consumer demand and research their collections. Last year, $23.8 billion worth of goods were auctioned or sold at fixed prices on eBay. Clothing, shoes and accessories accounted for $1.8 billion.

"We've got our foot in the water," says Allie Stearn, manager of eBay's clothing, shoes and accessories category. "Now we're establishing ourselves in the marketplace."

Last year, the division grew by 56 percent to move $659 million worth of merchandise in the United States alone, according to eBay data. And more than half of the items listed are new, compared with only 15 percent in 2001.

In March, the most commonly searched term across all of eBay, which sells everything from BMWs to old gym socks, was "Louis Vuitton." The most expensive fashion item sold in 2003 was a multicolored Louis Vuitton Murakami handbag for $50,831.

EBay has become a new kind of retail outlet, allowing designers to sell merchandise, collectibles and one-of-a-kind pieces that in the past might have gone directly into their archives, been sold at rock-bottom prices in a sample sale or written off as a loss.

EBay is helping lesser-known designers get their names and merchandise in front of fashion consumers without easy access to stores stocked with the trendiest items. Thanks to catwalk footage that runs virtually unedited on cable television, the enduring influence of "Sex and the City," makeover shows that regularly spout designer names and the transformation of celebrities into walking billboards, it is possible to find shoppers tucked into the farthest corner of Podunk who speak longingly about Jimmy Choos. EBay provides a direct, inexpensive link.

Gauging trends, value

The Web site has become a barometer of trends and a rough measure of fair market value. At any moment, one can look at eBay to get a real-time reading on the heat being emitted by certain brand-name items. Are Ugg boots still hot and selling above retail or have they cooled off? In November, there were 3,400 listings for Ugg boots. By the end of June, there were 320.

As demand fades, so does the supply. Last May, eBay averaged 1,870 listings for Louis Vuitton Murakami handbags. Last month, there were only about 500. An item on the rise? Luella Bartley handbags.

How much is a used Hermès Birkin bag really worth? What's the value of a 1950s-style mink jacket now that practically every designer showed one on the runway for fall? The answer is available on eBay as users bid against each other.

Hunting for merchandise

EBay's biggest hurdle is finding the merchandise. Combing through hundreds of listings for the one elusive gem can be time-consuming and exasperating. A recent search for "Manolo Blahnik" turned up more than 600 hits. Typing in "Prada" produced 7,197 listings. Sometimes the photographs, which are generally not professionally shot, make it difficult to judge quality and color. And there is the matter of enduring the sight of a good deal of profoundly bad clothes.