Inside Rent the Runway’s New Subscriber Freeze

Rent the Runway’s no good, very bad day turned into a week of supply chain misses and customer service missteps. Let’s review:

• Customers flooded Rent the Runway’s social media channels and customer service hotlines starting early last week, complaining that their clothing rentals were late or never delivered.
• On Friday, CEO Jenn Hyman said the delivery delays were caused by an update to Rent the Runway’s fulfillment software.
• The company promised to reimburse some customers up to $200 for missed orders. Its head of supply chain, Marv Cunningham, also stepped down.

What’s next: Rent the Runway won’t accept new customers until October 15 at the earliest, the date it says its new software will be operational.

Short-term pain for long-term gain? Possibly. The fashion rental unicorn says the source of all its trouble will eventually boost inventory capacity and allow it to process orders more efficiently.

But those improvements may not keep dissatisfied customers hanging onto Rent the Runway. As I’ve noted in Retail Brews of yore, companies from Banana Republic to Nuuly have launched comparable services.