A dress by Jonathan Simkhai from Intermix’s Wedding Edit.
Courtesy of Intermix
As weddings come to fruition after Covid-19 pandemic postponements, retailers such as Intermix are zeroing in on brides’ every sartorial need – except the actual gown – and are catering to guests with occasion dresses.
Millennials, which happen to be the specialty chain’s fastest-growing demographic, are attending weddings as their peers come of age and are getting married themselves. The Wedding Edit, as Intermix is calling the collection, features appropriate attire for all the numerous events leading up to the big day itself.
“Over the past year, we saw over 7 million searches for bridal-related items by data provided by our digital SEO agency via Google, Yahoo, Bing and other search engines as it relates to fashion and Intermix,” said Jyothi Rao, Intermix chief executive officer. “Bridal-related searches were 15% of our total search volume on our site. It seemed like such an obvious opportunity for us to expand upon.”
The Wedding Edit, launching on March 17 online at intermixonline.com, and March 18 through April 3 at Intermix’s Meatpacking Annex at 810 Washington Street in New York City, consists of more than 25 collections and 200 items, featuring exclusive styles from designers Jonathan Simkhai, Alexis, The Sei, No Pise La Grama, Solace London, Aknvas, Et Ochs, Manning Cartell and Gauge 81. Prices in the exclusive capsule range from $348 to $988, with dresses in the entire Wedding Edit ranging from $320 to $2,990.
The pop-up shop at the Intermix Annex will feature rotating activations during the weekends of its operation, including a selection of fine jewelry from Ring Concierge, manicures by Paintbox Nails and hand-drawn portraits by Diana First.
And while brides traditionally focused on the gown for the main event, they’re now looking for styles for all the events leading up to the wedding.
“Before, it was all about the wedding gowns and the big day,” Rao said. “The brides now have a bridal outfit really for all those events leading up to the actual big day and so that’s really what that capsule is going to be focused on. Previously, we were very focused on guests of weddings, and this time we’re focusing both on the bride and guests of weddings, which is really huge for us.
“We’re doing a dinner next week with brides and we’re working on putting the final touches on a partnership right now that’s focused on brides,” Rao added. “We have such a large file of Millennials in our current customer file and that’s growing so quickly. Even when we’re going out to market in the digital channels, we’re seeing a lot of engagement because we started teasing this out in e-mail lead generation, and channels like that and we’re getting more traction on weddings than I think we’ve gotten on almost any other marketing strategy we’ve put out there.”
The Wedding Edit includes mini dresses like this one from Alexis.
Courtesy of Intermix
Rao said the reason is pent-up demand, which is responsible for the spike search volume, which has been ticking up in the last six months, with month-over-month increases in searches that have the word “wedding” in the search, increasing over 20% in the month, “so clearly there’s a lot of pent-up demand for people attending a lot of weddings this year.”
“The great thing is, people are getting married throughout the year, so this can be an ongoing business for us,” Rao added. “There’s so many crossover lines because there’s so much that people wear to weddings that could be worn to other events as well, so it’s a little difficult to [pinpoint the size of the opportunity], but if you look at all the wedding appropriate dresses, for example, it’s a quarter of our business, so it’s huge.”
Dresses, after all, is Intermix’s number one category and the retailer plays a lot more in the more special end of dresses spectrum as opposed to casual designs. “It’s a pretty material percentage of our overall business, but pure bridal will be small. The guest of weddings will be significant.”
Nonetheless, the broad price range will ensure that there’s something for a lot of different people. “What they’re willing to spend, especially for our Millennial generation, there’s really a lot of options, whether you’re going to a more casual wedding that’s being hosted in Williamsburg on the rooftop of a super cool hotel, or whether you’re going to Cipriani for an all-out luxurious wedding, we should have something for everyone and everyone in between. I do like to get dressed up for a good event.”
Intermix in May said Altamont Capital Partners, a private equity firm with more than $2.5 billion in capital and over 20 investments, had entered into an agreement to purchase the omnichannel retail business from Gap Inc
GPS
There’s plenty of room for color in the Wedding Edit, like this look from Gult Gaia.
Courtesy of Intermix
The San Francisco-based retail giant has owned Intermix since 2012, but the smaller business often seemed to be an after-thought for Gap, which operates billion dollar-plus brands with vastly different operating models.
“It’s been really exciting to be in the private space again,” Rao said. “We’ve been able to move so much faster on all of our strategic priorities, this being one of them, but so many others. We’re making a tremendous amount of progress on our priorities, whether it’s improving our customer experience or growing private brands, or digitizing our buying process, it’s been really fun and there’s tons of momentum behind us.”
