Starting a D2C brand: Learning from industry leaders Gomi Hayakawa, Mori of FABRIC TOKYO, and Masuda and Yoshioka of TO NINE
Hi, I'm art director Sato.
On November 14, he said, D2C Path: The Start of the D2C Brand I've been participating in '.
It was an event that I learned a variety of things with precious stories, so we would like to share it with everyone.
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Session by Top Runner at D2C
The main event was a panel discussion by the following people who are taking pioneering initiatives as D2C cases in Japan.
FABRIC Tokyo Yuichiro Mori
D2C brand that handles custom-made suits, etc. FABRIC TOKYO The new brand, "September of this year" is representative. STAMP I was launched.
Custom order denim can be ordered by measuring with ultra-high precision 3D scan at unmanned stores.
The brand has been built that does not allow other follow-up such as a completely new user experience and sophisticated world view as fashion brands, but it is disrupting the old-fashioned industry to achieve rapid growth.
TO NINE Co., Ltd. Tomoshi Masuda (To Nine Corporation) Yoshiaki YOSHIOKA
Order shirts that eliminate the concept of size. KEI Supporting the D2C brand while developing its own brands such as “D2C. TO NINE He is co-represented by the D2C brand, which revisits how weddings are done and proposes simple weddings. iwaigami Double Inc. is co-founded with Smiles, KIGI and others to develop the “Double” brand.
It is wonderful that we have built a cycle that returns the know-how to client work while developing our own brand, and we have a rich support track record of D2C brands.
Guest speaker: Utsuwa Hayakawa Gomi Co., Ltd
running a problem-solving apparel brand. Utsuwa Corporation I'm a representative of .
Women's Lingerie Brand Worries About Size feast Double Chaca” is a one-piece brand that has been launched by various apparel brands, and it’s also famous as an influencer. This year we are launching our new physiology service “Double Chaca”. illuminate We’ve launched a new product called “Available.
By reframing existing values and creating a brand that gathers deep empathy, generation Z is the main influence.
D2C is a business that can make customers happy in front of them
During the panel discussion, I actually launched a D2C brand to realize growth and heard about people who are currently on the front lines with a sense of the field.
Instead of superficial content, I studied with concrete stories based on actual experiences.
how to make a brand
When it comes to the way brands are made, at first it’s important to narrow down and ask for “why do you do that?”
- It is important to sharpen the features. You can spread them later, but it's hard to sharpen them later on.
- It’s easier to focus on a single category and create a presence.
- If you don't make one product carefully, you won't be able to deliver satisfaction.
- The conditions for success include "no blur" (consistent identity and no falsehood), "inevitability" (meaning that a person does it in this era) and "essentialism".
how to gather customer feedback
The D2C brand is focused on listening directly to customers, with the following approach to how they’re collecting their voice:
- Research what kind of user panes there are on social media.
- They go to the target’s location and research what they are using now, why they chose it, or if they can switch between them.
- There are about 20 people to meet in the field, and there is also a street interview.
- Some merchants use anonymity, such as Twitter or LINE Open Chat, rather than face-to-face interviews and questionnaires to hear the truth.
- If you're a persona, you can plan your own business by your own standards. Interviews should be conducted as a verification of that.
- As a research subject, your friends are good (because you know what kind of person they’re).
start-up fund
In this case, there were cases such as Hayakawa Gomi who started at 300,000 yen when he was a student; in the case of around 10 million yen and FABRIC TOKYO that had raised more than 2 billion yen.
In the latter case, it was said that fundraising would be useful because there is a difference in the way to aim for growth of three-digits billion yen or stable at several hundred million yen per year.
How to find a factory and how to get along
At first, people looked at the town page and made calls from scratch, but there are also tips such as using a chamber of commerce.
In addition, the number of digital native generation is increasing in factories where there was an alternative, and I was impressed by the story that some factories want to change the way they have done so far.
- You go to local chambers of commerce and industry, consult with them for a list of factories.
- Credit is important for dealing with factories, and in fact it may be cheaper to intervene between trading companies.
- In the early days, he went to a factory with stickers and was involved in manufacturing.
- They also offer suggestions on where to cut costs in a factory, and sometimes they don’t do it for granted, such as stop shipping small parts.
importance of offline
As for offline (real store), there was a talk about the function as a showroom and the function as a place to make fans.
- With offline, customer acquisition costs are reduced. Especially high-priced products can go from looking at a site to real-world purchases. The first hurdle is so high that it’s easier to get customers when they have an offline product.
- Offline makes it easy to create a strong community and make fans.
- You can visualize the amount of heat, and you can make a ready-made fact about how many people there are.
- If you create a good relationship offline, it will be a repeater.
On the other hand, for a D2C brand where data utilization is important, managing customer IDs is an important issue and it was said that they have been devised as follows.
- To manage your identity, they’re asking you to buy it in real-world stores on their e-commerce site (we have WiFi).
- It’s recommended to create only one customer channel from scratch.
- In general, department stores are central accounting, so it is difficult to do that.
time to open a real-world store
- It’s best to check who you stab online and build a real store after you know it.
- The timing is good when the product meets its needs, and if it fails there are real stores that can’t go back.
- For example, a year or two after launch.
- At first, we recommend office and showroom.
brand-launch KPI
When we launched the brand, I was curious about the criteria for determining if a product would be accepted in the market and received the following advice:
- See customer satisfaction. Are you repeating or word of mouth? If there are two to three people in 10, they will be needed.
- PMF is hard to fit into KPIs, though.
- The verification period depends on the characteristics of a product (how often it is purchased) and in cases, 3-6 months or 1 year.
- When you have fewer users, you get insights from the core users who buy a lot of stuff.
- Rather than looking at many people, it is important to look at N1 (one real customer).
Summary
It was an event where the top runners in the D2C field had a sense of the field, and it became very exciting and studyable.
I think that the transmission of content behind products is becoming more and more important for branding because it is connected to the original experience of founding members “why do this” and sympathy is gathered in a series of stories leading up to production.
What impressed me was that “In social media, companies and individuals are the same as each other, so corporate accounts can be seen as something of a personality like people.” I felt that it is necessary to express what kind of character brands are in an easy-to-understand manner and convey them with care.
Also, as an aside, I think I have figured out why guest speaker Hayakawa Gomi is so popular : )
-- Even though he has a proven track record, it is not great at all.
• Actively tackling unfamiliar work that others may avoid, in order to create what they believe in
-- I feel like I'm reading the trends a little ahead of my time.
While unicorn companies have emerged in the U. S. and China, while large enterprises such as Nike are also gaining attention for their D2C strategies recently, we feel deeply empathy as a business that can make customers happy by pursuing and delivering better things.