I totally understand the comments made by the disgruntled customers who have had bad experiences. If they have personally had a bad experience with the website you can’t blame them for feeling negativity towards the company. These micro experiences I am sure can however be isolated and dealt with by farfetch which will hopefully turn those negative feelings and thoughts towards the business around.

On a macro scale I hope farfetch will deal with these issues and iron out the creases to create a website that really matters on the global fashion scene. The main reason for that being that it helps support independent boutiques across the globe stay alive, which in turn promotes entrepreneurship, creativity and individuality.

Keep up the good work Jose and the rest of the team and before anyone says it. No I don’t work for farfetch nor do I know the team in anyway shape or form.

We have, in the beginning of April 2011 introduced a free returns collection service worldwide.

In particular, international customers will greatly benefit from this new service as it means any returns via our designated courier will be free of return transport charge and free of return duties. Please refer to our new returns policy for exact details.

I am confident that with this new service, the satisfaction levels when purchasing in Farfetch.com will improve significantly.

Following the introduction of our free returns and collection service, we took the initiative today (12th April 2011) of offering a 100 USD voucher to ALL US or non-EU customers who have ever bought and returned an item with us.

We know we have a long way to go, but we are working hard to make sure the logistics challenges of international trade do not get in the way of customer satisfaction.

José Neves

CEO
farfetch.com

We are a young company and we are improving our processes, feedback is, therefore, very important to us.

I would like to comment on the 2 posts above.

I don’t know where Rebecca is based, but judging from the post, I think this may have been an order shipped to the US from and European boutique (hence the mention to “taxes” in Rebecca’s post).

It is true that if you live in the US buying in *any* European retailer does not offer the best shopping experience. First because there are import duties on the inbound, and second because in case there is an return, there are more duties applicable on the inbound.

At farfetch.com we are very clear in our checkout information that these duties will apply and won’t be refunded in the case of a return to the EU from the US.

We recommend US residents buy from our US boutiques whenever they can. Not only there are no import duties applicable, our LA based customer service staff will also be able to respond faster.

We have plans to implement some measures which will facilitate EU-to-US sales in early 2011, as we continue to have US customers who – in spite of the costs associated with shipping and returns – still wish to shop from European boutiques.

In what regards Michael’s comments, I understand the point of view and.

I am an independent fashion retailer myself, as founder and owner of bstore ( http://www.bstorelondon.com ), so I understand the remarks.

I think Michael is unaware of the fact that we actually build and power independent boutiques’ web sites (shop.leclaireur.com and feathersfashion.com to give 2 examples).

This allows the boutiques to have their own independent web site where their aesthetics and ethos can really be “isolated” from other retailers, and the customer communicates without any “middle-man” to use Michael’s words.

The investment and know-how needed to operate a fashion ecommerce web site should not be underestimated, and few retailers have the resources to be successful in the online market. Farfetch.com’s mission is to provide a platform for such retailers.

The idea of gathering all these boutiques selection under “one roof” serves the purpose of generating traffic, optimizing marketing costs, and also providing a service to shoppers who do not wish to browse 70 web sites at the same time to find that specific product they are looking for.

Some times we want to shop in a specific boutiques, and sometimes we want to “see everything” and are looking for a specific product which we want to find fast.

farfetch.com also hopes to be a connector of a global fashion community.

By supporting the boutiques who scout the world – not only for the best designers but also for young talent and the stars of tomorrow – farfetch.com hopes to be a platform for designers, retailers, and fashion enthusiasts.

We know we have a long way to go, but we are determined to fulfil that mission and welcome any comments along the way!

José Neves

CEO
farfetch.com