Is Ssense hurting the cool-clothes ecosystem?
Is Ssense hurting the cool-clothes ecosystem?
The e-commerce giant is valued in the billions. People compare it to Am*zon. What does its rise mean for small designers & shops?
8 Replies
I can’t take any article seriously that can’t just spell out Amazon
I remember this article from when it was put on reddit. I also remember being torn about it, as essentially it's just Ssense out competing other retailers by being larger. As a consumer it's hard to justify not simply buying the cheapest option. While centralizing the clothing market is bad, I don't think the article offers any compelling solutions.
The writer is also cringe lol
fwiw i dont find ssense to be the cheapest option for a lot of stuff becuase their algorithm is so good at determining the best sale price for shit
this is interesting to me in that i actually didn't realize how massive ssense was tbh
I also have found a lot of stuff outside of ssense to be cheaper
But ssense is a place where I find what I like and then do heavy googling to see if I can find a cheaper outlet
And sometimes they’re independent stores
Honestly I think the only sinister bit of ssense highlighted in this article is basically how they can make/break a brand through deciding to drop them as a stockist
I have found cheaper deals elsewhere, I do also use ssense to centralize and browse as it has so much, but I'm never married to a specific site to buy from
being weird and corny is kinda BBSP's thing
I think this really ain't that bad of an article and the point is not to make Ssense outwardly sinister
If you just want to read a headline I think they actually lead with a reasonable one and you can take that summary and walk away, it's not clickbaity, they don't bury the lede
My summary of the article is that Ssense and other of a small few large retailers may be Amazonifying in a handful of key ways - impersonal/isolated photos and styling, algorithmic sales, scale (which has been wielded for position and contract manipulation starting to look like mono/oligopoly), and unsustainable return practices (I'm sure I've missed some others)
And that the business leaders there think they're doing the right thing, but it might hurt the growth of the industry and the hobby in the pursuit of profit
Obviously we know that's a story that's been told in other places and other ways before and if you don't want to read it, so be it, but I found the piecing together of quotes from other retailers corroborating the behavioral patterns compelling
I think the most outwardly sinister thing is that Ssense can override contracts because they have a scale no one else seems to be able to compete with --- that brands say "we have a standard contract" and Ssense is even signed onto that contract, but they or another large retailer can break terms without punishment, but a small shop can't, that's x-poly behavior. That's market manipulation.
Walmart style