Fabric Unlimited

Apr 4, 2022

By Birds of Fabriclore

AS PUBLISHED IN EVOLEV ON APRIL , 2022

Fabriclore was started In 2016 as an experiment by 3 colleague cum friends to make Indian crafts available at every doorstep. With a lot of learning while walking and falling, and a vision towards growth, the brand ventured into sarees, stoles, accessories and more in no time.

HIGHLIGHTS

Fabriclore is evolving to become a hybrid product company cum marketplace, so that they can independently manage fabrics design & production and connect fashion designers and consumers on a single platform.
The brand is moving from just a product-centric approach to a solution-centric ecosystem.
The brand is focused 100% on clothing. Though a lot of clothing fabrics are used in home furnishing and vice versa. In the near future, they plan to launch a comprehensive range of home furnishing fabrics too.

Fabriclore is attempting to revive consumption of both traditional and modern fabrics of India on online medium bringing high-quality curated fabrics. Their brand in collaboration with modern designers is constantly inspiring creative people to achieve stand-out boho and fusion designs in both clothing and home furnishing. Even more, the traditional fabric merchant heritage of the founding team allows them to pay meticulous attention while curating each piece of fabric that they exhibit at their online store. These fabrics are sourced directly from the masters of the traditional craft and even from the traditional keepers, making them value for money. They are on course to enhance their collections with the best and widest range of tastefully curated and traditionally crafted fabrics.

Customer Acquisition

Acquiring in style: "We never had an agenda to start a business in fabrics or textiles as I had no idea about it, though somewhere inside, I always yearned to be a part of a consumer design-oriented project. So, it was a mere stroke of luck. My partners and I realized the demand for fabrics in the market was not being fulfilled. Hence, after plunging into the segment deeper, we were surprised to be acquainted with the sheer diversity of fabrics in India! This is how we hatched the idea of starting a business in the same field," Anupam Arya, Co-Founder and VP, Fabriclore mentions.

Both the backward side supply chain i.e. fabric artisans, manufacturers, and forward side consumer i.e. designers / bou / consumers are highly fragmented and diverse. So, achieving economies of scale is the biggest challenge the company is facing, but once reached a minimum feasibility mark, the market is exponentially big. Another challenge is the rising digital advertising costs. Within the digital realm, traditional means of advertising i.e. Facebook and Google are increasingly becoming very costly. So, reaching out to customers beyond traditional means of advertising is a challenge we are actively trying to overcome.

Shopper Behavior & Retention

Being ready: "In addition to feedback and surveys from our set of customers, we constantly go beyond our set of media channels to see consumer sentiment trends using new age tools available as software as service. As part of product development, we engage with academia and students to capture trend forecasts in fashion and then make our own mood boards throughout the year. Feedback is central to the user journey. We have an automated workflow to capture feedback which is analysed by customer support lead and then periodically presented to the product development and marketing communications team," Anupam adds.

When talking about creating new opportunities and innovation, Anupam highlights "Firstly, on the product development side, we are collaborating with brands working with proprietary yarn like LIVA to bring traditional crafts on a global scale. Secondly, we're opening a beautiful Experience Studio. The buying will still be online, but one will get to experience, touch & feel the fabrics that they already love at the studio. Thirdly, we want to be the brand to reckon with by any designer or boutique, DIY/ Sewing enthusiasts, - anybody who is conscious and is aware of what they are wearing or creating. We want Fabriclore to be the first thing that pops in mind".

Loyalty & CRM

Market watch: Being a digital firs thigh traffic brand, data analysis is quintessential. The brand has deployed a team entirely to analyse data on the user journey. They have segmented the journey into 7 steps and apply various metrics to automate omnichannel marketing. "Al is something that is quite overrated especially given all fields and frankly we don't feel that Al is even the right term to define automations. We have developed a team entirely as a foundry of data for the rest of the organization. Each functional team has set their requirements and are held accountable to data driven analysis," Anupam adds.

"Customer retention is the hardest part in the new era of D2C. We drew this conclusion long back that loyalty has to do with what value we add in either helping or inspiring consumers.

Our experience with loyalty programs is not that great, which drew us to conclude that the loyalty essentially lies in additional value beyond discounts. Therefore, our focus is to build a great community that we call FABTRIBE. With this community we are creating a whole ecosystem of anything one would expect to design and style that includes workshops, style guides, sessions, designers profiles, and trends forecast," he sums up.

"MY PARTNERS AND I REALIZED THE DEMAND FOR FABRICS IN THE MARKET WAS NOT BEING FULFILLED. WERE SURPRISED TO HATCHED THE IDEA OF STARTING A BUSINESS IN THE SAME FIELD. HENCE, AFTER PLUNGING INTO THE SEGMENT DEEPER, WE BE ACQUAINTED WITH THE SHEER DIVERSITY OF FABRICS IN INDIA! THIS IS HOW WE HATCHED THE IDEA OF STARTING A BUSINESS IN THE SAME FIELD".

-Anupam Arya

Co-Founder and VP, Fabriclore