The Glossy Podcast

Prior to taking the lead at Schutz International, Marina Larroude was vp and fashion director at Barneys New York, a role she took on after holding fashion director roles at Teen Vogue and Style.com. For this week's episode of the Glossy Podcast, Larroude joins Jill Manoff to talk about her multiple career changes within the world of fashion, the untapped market for good, affordable boots, and the reason brands should consider bucking the usual wholesale purchasing timeline.

With 25 years of experience at luxury brands like Burberry and Céline, Ulrik Garde Due’s reputation for revitalizing companies led him to his current position as president and CEO of Mark Cross, America’s oldest luxury accessories brand.

“I saw a real opportunity in creating a lifestyle positioning," he said on this week’s episode of the Glossy Podcast. “[Not only with] women's accessories, but also [by] relaunching men's, which we [did] last year ... [and] creating more of a gifting destination for top-class quality and American luxury."

When the pandemic hit, however, “We went from this survival to contingency planning to then, as I like to call it, ‘thrival’ mode,” said Garde Due. “It was our job to start thinking of the opportunities that this pandemic created for the industry and for the luxury consumer, and look at the post-pandemic era and what was needed to get executed during the pandemic to be ready for that.” That meant focusing on developing Mark Cross’ wholesale and directly operated channels and catering to consumers in the U.S. and in mainland China, which Due sees as ”an ever-growing market share” opportunity.

Mark Cross first began to cater to the preferences of the millennials and Gen-Z consumer demographics in the fall of 2019 by launching an “in-house vintage website.” Even more recently, the brand has reacted to the changes accelerated by Covid-19 by “investing heavily into the digital sphere.” That's included partnering with companies like Hero and a personalized delivery service.

“Getting back to the [20]19 [sales] volumes, as well as enlarging our community, are the two main goals this year," said Garde Due.

Amanda Parkes never thought she'd wind up in fashion. Then again, 2-year-old Pangaia, where she serves as chief innovation officer, isn't your typical fashion company.

"We are a materials science company," Parkes said on the latest Glossy Podcast. "We're all about the future of materials, and we really think that's an approach that can change the fashion industry from the inside out."

However, many fashion fans best know Pangaia as the brand behind the rainbow-bright sweatsuits with lines of text that have been worn by Harry Styles and Kourtney Kardashian.

Parkes started her career as a mechanical engineer and product designer, before eventually going back to school, at the M.I.T. Media Lab. There, she earned a hybrid computer science-materials science Ph.D. and the rare job title of fashion scientist.

"I came into fashion through the back door," she said. "When I was in college, 20 years ago, there was no such thing as a fashion scientist."

But, she said -- despite the lack of interplay between the two worlds -- fashion and science go hand-in-hand.

"Fashion is an amazing platform to be able to show off science," she said, adding, "I was really shocked when I got more into the fashion industry to realize that big fashion companies don't have internal research. I was coming from tech, working with companies like Intel and Google. They are doing their internal R&D 5-10 years out to change and transform and make their industries what they want them to be. Fashion didn't have that as much inside of the big companies or at all. So I saw that as first of all massive opportunity for [Pangaia] to fill in the space."

Parkes also discussed the power of the Gen-Z shopper, the state of greenwashing and the future of sustainability in fashion.

According to Loretta Choy, chief merchandising officer at Stitch Fix, data is one of the most important factors in fulfilling the Stitch Fix customer's personalized demands.

Choy joined the Stitch Fix team in 2019, only a few months before the pandemic upended the workforce. She said her team's ability to adapt and analyze data was key to keeping the business afloat. Choy's team uses billions of data points to inform which products and new categories Stitch Fix introduces to its assortment. Under her leadership, Stitch Fix added athleisure and activewear to its offerings after noticing consumer shopping trends had shifted.

"We were thinking, 'How do we ensure during Covid that we have apparel that is right for [the consumer]?" Choy said on the latest episode of the Glossy Podcast. "Some of the [demand we saw] from our clients was item [specific], but often, it was about the end use. It was about, 'How [do] I shift my look or my wardrobe?' Those were important data inputs we received."

Choy admitted that working in traditional retail environments for close to 20 years presented a slight learning curve when joining Stitch Fix, but she said the transition enabled personal growth. Now that Choy feels more settled in her role, she is focused on expanding Stitch Fix's men's, children's and womenswear into more apparel categories.

The executive's expansion efforts are in line with Stitch Fix's growth strategies. Stitch Fix announced during its Q4 earnings report conference call on Tuesday that its net revenue and active clients in the quarter were lower than expected, due to a turbulent retail market. However, leveraging Choy's intentional use of data, the company hopes to tap into under-serviced demographics and increase consumer acquisition.

On this week's episode of the Glossy Week in Review podcast, fashion reporter Danny Parisi and editor-in-chief Jill Manoff start by discussing some of the honorees at this year's CFDA awards, including Zendaya, Anya Taylor-Joy and the Model Alliance.

Also on the slate this week: the rumors that Richemont may divest from its stake in Net-a-Porter, the distinction between Net-a-Porter's and Farfetch's strategies, and Farfetch's new private label brand, There Was One.