The online specialty store and digital gifting will outlast the holiday season

Sometimes, you just need to feel ~special~. Enter: online specialty stores, like Telfar’s pre-order shop and CoachOutlet.com, designed to be curated digital shopping platforms.

For big sales events (*cough*, Christmas), from VIP promos to pre-orders and product drops, having a separate e-comm experience boasts a few benefits. There’s that feeling of exclusivity, for one. But it also gives brands an accurate estimate of product demand, while also directly engaging with consumers.

Game time: E-commerce solutions company Scalefast initially built specialty store solutions to handle digital and physical inventory for the video game industry, SVP of marketing Dan Wallace-Brewster told Retail Brew.

During high volume sales periods, like a new Final Fantasy release, “hundreds of thousands” of transactions are made globally within a short timeframe. Online specialty stores can corral that traffic and demand.

• Luxury companies have caught onto the trend, embracing more “bespoke, customer intense experiences,” Wallace-Brewster added.
• Gathering customer information and “points of intelligence” through these specialty stores can reduce excess product, adjust quantity, make design alterations, and allow for more flexible return rules that may not be possible under normal distribution.

Scalefast has recently worked with brands like Salvatore Ferragamo to create flash-sale sites for their employees. The company also helped build the L’Oréal Friends & Family store and powered Maison Margiela’s “Friends & Family” perfume sale just last week.

+1: Wallace-Brewster mentioned the utility of “re-commerce” specialty stores (a fancy way of saying resale), given supply-chain shortages and shipping delays. URBN, for example, rolled out its new Nuuly Thrift secondhand marketplace back in August. There’s also Patagonia’s Worn Wear resale site.

+2: Another way consumers can avoid supply issues? Digital presents. “That previously took the format of an e-gift card, but now we’re seeing the role of the virtual product in the metaverse,” Wallace-Brewster told us. “It’s going to get a foothold this year and gain a lot of steam for holiday 2022.”—JG