In her genre, Viviane Lipskier is a popess. A graduate of the famous École du Louvre in Paris, this observer of weak signals is the first in France to have grasped and theorized the importance of clothing labels for which the Internet is a launch pad and also the belt of a mind carried by values. The famous DNVBs, as they should be called in America - Hast is one, for example. The one who today is in charge of advising brands, on behalf of her "DNVB factory", even produced a book from it published in 2018 "DNVB: The gifted of digital commerce". In this "covid" era, where buying clothes online and the appetite for a form of ethics are things that matter more and more, it was necessary to take stock with the author.
What does Digital Native Vertical Brand mean?
We tend to confuse brands that launch with a website and an Instagram account, which are nothing more than modern brands, a kind of Insta-brands, and the real DNVBs that, behind their activity, have a model. A DNVB is a technological start-up that, instead of offering a dematerialized product, develops a physical consumer good, such as clothing for example. DNVBs were born online. They do not have a store to start with, no showroom. They make most of their sales online, on their site, but also everywhere else on the Internet, and it is also there, above all, that they will express their brand mission and build their community. The idea is to deploy a spirit.
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In what context did these brands appear?
It's a model that was born in Silicon Valley, obviously, after the wave of the first Internet companies, at the beginning of the 2000s. It was a time when it was easy to be referenced on search engines because there were few sites, but when the Internet was slow. It was lagging! And you had to build your own sales platform. There was no turnkey software available yet. For these brands, it was about investing in parts of the economy that were then abandoned by large consumer goods groups or in which a single player reigned, as was the case in the eyewear market where a major player had established a global monopoly, producing most lifestyle lenses and frames.
The DNVBs collect a certain amount of information online from their customers in order to produce in small quantities, at the right price, without promotion, so as not to waste anything.
DNVBs also came along, arguing that the in-store customer experience was no longer very interesting. If you had a figure outside the usual sizes, finding a pair of pants that fit perfectly could be complicated. And the salespeople were there more to fold up the clothes you tried on than to advise the customer (especially in the world of fast fashion). It was in 2007 that the founder of one of the first DNVBs, the one who invented the acronym, came up with the idea of creating a startup that would sell pants online that were perfectly fitted to each person's figure, using an algorithm and data to multiply the possible combinations and thus satisfy everyone. It was like a giant virtual store, which was impossible to reproduce in real life.
You say that the DNVBs are attached to an ethic…
It is a model that allows you to control the value chain, to make the system as transparent as possible and to be able to prove it. All this to, ultimately, ensure that you sell the right quantity at a fairer price. This last element is central to the way in which DNVBs are evolving. In the traditional system, brands produce far too much, make people consume too many clothes that people do not need or want, and end up with excess stock, which will then have to be cleared out through sales, or destroyed. DNVBs, on the other hand, collect a certain amount of information online from their customers in order to produce in small quantities, at the right price, without promotions, so as not to waste anything.
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What is the relationship with the environment of these brands, in ready-to-wear?
DNVBs have the luxury of being able to choose their raw material supplier, ensuring all possible environmental and social criteria, whether it is the quality of the fabric, where the cotton was first grown, the amount of water used to grow the cotton, or the pay of those who picked it. It was an American brand that launched this movement in 2010, explaining that fashion should no longer be an opaque environment. People there decided to produce on demand using algorithms. Analysts began to predict which pieces would work best in order to produce clothing as fairly as possible, without waste. At the same time, it was a question of playing the card of total transparency by breaking down the price of each piece for the customer, so that they could fully understand what they were buying and spending. It has become a real model today, in the world of ready-to-wear. This now allows people to have confidence in the brands they buy from.
Is the idea of the physical store obsolete?
Bad physical business is obsolete. Standard brand stores where absolutely nothing happens, where you try, buy, and leave almost apologizing for having stopped by, it doesn't work anymore. There is no life in these places, no adventure. We are drowning in clothes, the salespeople are only there to sell a product in order to fill the customer's cart.
This now allows people to have confidence in the brands they buy from.
Today, a store must be unique in its kind, it's the new rule of the game. This can be what is called a "destination store", that is to say a kind of place in which traffic is limited to preserve a certain intimacy; each piece that one wants to try on is specially taken out of stock. For some of these stores, it is sometimes necessary to make an appointment. We are received by someone who is more of a guide than a salesperson, who takes great care of the customer, who advises him and even offers, at the end, to deliver the clothes to his home so that he is not encumbered during the rest of his day. The store remains important because a large part of the population still likes to buy their clothes in this way. People need to go and see, to touch, before spending. What matters is the social bond that this translates.