3closets.com: It’s all about brands and fashion awareness

Launched in November last year, 3closets.com, is the brainchild of Swapna Sitaraman and Chandrasekhar Kornepati. The founding partners and directors came up with 3closets.com an online shopping destination focused on offering top fashion

brands and luxury labels under its e-store umbrella. “Though organized retail has boomed, large formats don’t merchandise well. Sometimes they leave out the best of merchandise from brands and sometimes they leave out size when it comes to lingerie. When online you can provide the entire range and you can control the personality of your store. International sites have taken their time to develop an audience. They have taken their time to educate their customers. They have sensitized their customers to fashion. And now they are milking it. So it’s about creating a rapport with your customers which I felt none of the existing online stores was doing,” says Sitaraman.

Moving ahead, the platform is bullish on building a strong marketing strategy to get a bigger share of the e-shopping marketplace. Explains Sitaraman, “Inspired by the style, mood and attitude of a modern Indian woman, our merchandise is curated by a team of stylists, experienced buyers and guest curators who lookout for the latest in trends and fashion across the globe. We source products across categories such as- clothing, shoes, bags, accessories, lingerie, skin and beauty and gifts.”

“ Unlike other e-shopping platforms that offer branded merchandise at the discounted rates, 3Closets focuses on offering branded merchandise along with creating awareness about the fashion, latest trends on topics like what to wear to office or party and so on.

Commenting on the marketing strategy she says, “We started off by raising a small fund and now we are looking at getting the next round of capital by March. We are in talks with venture capitalists as well as private investors. We need money for online and offline marketing, and for select amount of inventory.”

As for attracting audiences to the website, she says, “We have a collated list of about 50 fashion bloggers in the country and have an active engagement with them in terms of acquiring a database. We have also designed a few Facebook applications, where we will run a contest coupled with ads. Here people will engage with us and pass on their details. I believe that there has to be a subtle engagement point and we can take it ahead from there.”

The site is clear that they are not a discount or a flash sale site. “We are focused on women as a segment. Clothing is the most sought after option among all the categories present on the site. Bust and waist and hip measurements are given clearly. There are consumers who call us, give us their measurements and ask if we have anything for them. We have women graduated in fashion, who take such calls. In future, we will get into a video chat and a Skype call as well to guide our customers better. Technology helps you convert a customer,” she says delving into details of running an e-platform.

As of now, a few mainstream brands and a couple of boutique brands including Latin Quarters, Forever New are available. Talks are on to get Chemistry and Guess on-board. “When the level of merchandise goes up to 1,000 to 2,000 products, we are looking at events, a lot more online advertising and digital engagements,” she sums up.