NEW YORK, United States — Having moved the buying process online in 2010, JOOR offers B2B products and platforms for brands and retailers to connect, strengthened by the data collected and shared between transacting parties. JOOR's partners can also access essential metrics, trends and participants. With over 8,600 brands and 200,000 curated retailers using the platform worldwide, JOOR describes itself as the world's largest wholesale platform and data exchange for fashion, beauty and home.

Since the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic, wholesale management platform JOOR generated 3x new business since last year.

To date, 10 events hosted on their new platform JOOR Passport has attracted over 100,000 visitors and nearly 28,000 buyers from Europe, Asia and the US. JOOR will be hosting another 11 events this autumn and extending their reach into new markets through Ontimeshow Shanghai in China, MBFWI in Turkey and Bogota Fashion Week in Colombia, while continuing partnerships with the CFDA and NYFW Runway 360, Liberty Fashion and Lifestyle Fairs, resort wear tradeshow Splash Paris and London Fashion Week. Earlier this year, JOOR also partnered with ORB360, an interactive tool allowing brands to showcase designs in 3D imagery, uploaded to the platform instantaneously.

Kristin Savilia by Sophia Wallace | Source: Courtesy

The digital platform also held its own event in September, JOOR Showcase, focused on elevated contemporary brands across apparel, accessories and shoes, designed to highlight the diversity of its brand community, with 23 percent of participating brands minority-owned, 24 percent female-owned and 15 percent family-owned.

Now, BoF sits down with JOOR CEO Kristin Savilia to hear more about how the B2B platform has assisted the industry in its digital pivot, as well as their learnings and long-term evolution post-pandemic.

What trends have you gleaned from your data sets over the last 6 months?

Shopping didn't totally stand still. Europe bounced back faster than the United States. By May 2020, GMV was creeping up, and by July, we were double our normal GMV pace. The bounce back was driven outside the United States, which is just starting to come back now in September 2020.

While department stores struggle and some retailers race to be digital, others are only buying brands they trust as opposed to new discoveries, but this won't be permanent. It is the environment we're in right now however. The important thing is that I see a lot of fight in our industry, not a lot of roll over. Brands are looking to find a path to business continuity.

What competitive advantages are gained through digitisation of the wholesale process?

By digitising the interaction between brands and retailers, it enables a 365 day a year marketplace where retailers discover new styles and designers, and brands generate more connections.

Digitisation allows for these events to be larger than they ever would've been. This fully digitised ecosystem is JOOR's secret sauce. It's what I'm most passionate about — getting this industry working together in the same place. This year, it'll be close to 20 events users can attend, with one login and one training. As a brand, the reach far exceeds the reach you would have otherwise and retailer access is also greatly expanded.

Digitisation allows for these events to be larger than they ever would've been. This fully digitised ecosystem is JOOR's secret sauce.

Digital is also making the process smarter and faster. You can't afford to waste time anymore or make a bad purchase. So, we’re able to bring data transparency to ensure our customers can make better decisions. Brands used to wait six to eight weeks for buyers to confirm orders. Now, the platform provides the data both need to make better, quicker decisions. Digitisation, with its ease, reach and availability, will remain a permanent fixture in the post-Covid world.

What tools and services does JOOR offer?

Our focus is providing products to buyers and sellers wherever they are. Ten years ago, we launched our brand product, through which we provide, very simply, via desktop or iPad, a digital way of selling your collection. With that, you have full transparency on data across the wholesale process. Our brand product is agnostic, allowing brands to work with any retailer they do business with. About 75 percent of luxury brands selling on high-end retailers globally use JOOR as a platform.

Then, 5 years ago, we launched our retail product — a retail-centric product that builds upon brand data, providing an assortment planning tool. The brand and retail product work in sync and the data feeds within the same ecosystem. We offer the ability to see the collections available in the market, in a centralised platform. So, when a brand drops a style, or a brand changes their price, you as a retailer, have full understanding of the changes real-time.

Now, we have created JOOR Passport, a universal trade show app which digitises the entire trade show event, again capturing and understanding the data, and providing it to retailers and brands. Passport takes the burden off of our partners to, first of all, collect data, and it allows retailers and brands to connect across the different shows, be it Cabana, Splash Paris or On Time Show in Shanghai, and the logistics are easy. All three parties are seeing the same information and it centralises the event logistics, while maintaining the individuality of each event.

How are you adapting to your partners’ needs?

Our partners’ primary concern is business continuity right now, and that's what JOOR has adapted to: “how do I keep business going?” But other concerns are more short term: “how do I attend trade events? How do I see new items? How do I not only continue business with my existing clients, but keep up a trend of what's out there?”

All of our functional iterations originate with us listening to our audience.

All of our functional iterations originate with us listening to our audience. We listened to our partners when they said, "We want to be able to favourite items before committing; can we have 360 images? 360 imaging is great, but we’d also like to see the flow of the garment. Can you provide that?” So we launched our styleout feature, The Edit, which allows brands to present styleboards where they can visually collaborate with their buyers and edit the assortment down to the final selections. This enables the buyer, who walks the assortment virtually, to see an entire collection rich in content including videos by style.

How do you see the B2B wholesale space evolving long-term?

Digital is here to stay. When the pandemic goes away, we're not going back to Excel or pen and paper, so this isn't some transient thing. The silver lining of the pandemic for this industry is the push to digital and JOOR is seeing it in statistics. Our demo requests are up 400 percent and our new business has grown by 3x. Brands understand that for business continuity, they have to be digital.

We're forced to be fully digital right now, but we started out omnichannel and we'll go back to omnichannel — and that's the way it should be. I believe in the physical fashion show. I believe in the trade show. We're not looking to permanently replace the trade shows but to complement them. That’s why everything that we’re building is also in a mobile device. JOOR offers one app to download that you can use at every event — one comprehensive experience for the industry. We will return to the omnichannel approach, but it will lean digital more than in the past.

This is a sponsored feature paid for by JOOR as part of a BoF partnership.