Lafayette 148 revamps as China business takes off

New York fashion label Lafayette 148 has relaunched its e-commerce platform, revising its marketing approach in China in the process.

The brand has effected a number of adjustments to its business processes that serve to switch its target market from older professional women towards younger consumers. Its online retail arm constitutes its most prolific sales channel, while 16 of its 20 physical outlets are in China.

Co-founder and CEO Deirdre Quinn said: “The influence of the Chinese shopper has upped our game, upped everybody’s game. We bring that back to the US, and that pushes us forward.”

The firm recently partnered with AgilOne to build an AI resource to promote products based on previous buyer interactions.

A report on glossy.co revealed the firm is “bringing the benefits of its vertically integrated business model to the forefront in order to appeal to modern customer interests… all of Lafayette 148’s collections are designed in-house and produced at the company’s own factory in China, meaning it can customise items by customer request, react to fast-selling pieces in a week’s time and drop new collections on a three-week production cycle. It’s collected years of first-party data based on customer trends… and can work on one season’s collection up until it drops, rather than nine to 18 months out.”

Lafayette 148’s VP of international retail and e-commerce Paul Lechlinski said: “When we started, customers didn’t care to hear about business models. But now we’re going to use that in our storytelling to our advantage: showcase our speed and agility because we own our factory. That comes alive on the site.”

Dan LaCivita, CEO of Firstborn – the agency responsible for designing the new targeting strategy – added: “The brand needed to figure out who they were, and build off of that. We built a services hub that can schedule stylist appointments in one click, order customers swatches for new fabrics, fast-track made-to-order pieces – everything customers didn’t know they could do is now much more in their faces.”

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