Style.com, Condé Nast’s online fashion retail site, has shut down all operations just nine months after launching.
According to the New York Times, the parent company for magazines like Vogue, Vanity Fair and GQ reportedly invested over $100 million into the website. But when the website launched, several high profile brands like Maison Margiela and Chloé weren’t available. After debuting in the UK, Style.com was supposed to launch in the US as well at a later date, but that never happened.
Before the revamp, the website was dedicated to runway show coverage and reviews, which were then folded into Vogue.com in 2015. Style.com was intended to compete with luxury retail sites like Net-a-Porter and Farfetch but according to a statement from Jonathan Newhouse, chairman and chief executive of Condé Nast International, the “results of the business have fallen very far short of where we hoped they would be.”
Now visitors to Style.com will be directed to Farfetch, which has the highest traffic of any top luxury e-commerce site, according to the NYT. The shopping site, founded in 2008, is set to partner with Condé Nast with the publishing company picking up “content-creation” duties (Condé was an “early investor” in Farfetch as well). The plan is to eventually offer readers in the US the ability to shop magazines like GQ or Vogue in what sounds like a way to make fashion magazines into luxury catalogues:
Condé Nast publications will also create shopping guides like “20 Summer Outfits to Wear in 2017,” which will appear on its magazine websites as well as at Farfetch and feature items that readers worldwide can purchase via Farfetch, with the magazine company receiving a cut of each sale.
Finally, a quick and easy way to order that $5,000 Gucci dress you saw in Vogue!
