Disqus - Latest Comments for dmreinke

Re: WWD CEO Summit: Howard Tubin On Investor Concerns - Fashion and Retail Business News - WWD.com

dmreinke — Tue, 09 Nov 2010 08:31:59 -0000

"Beyond questions of the top line and takeover, Tubin said investors are zeroing in on costs as well as margin expansion opportunities."

With over $.25 of every dollar in fashion and apparel retail lost due to poor product performance, investors should be looking more closely at product performance improvements during due diligence. Companies like StyleHop perform fast-batch assortment, allocation and pricing analysis to systematically quantify and capture significant gross margin opportunities. Our quick-turnaround projects can be leveraged during due diligence and post deal with minimal cost and complexity.

www.stylehop.com/enterprise

Re: Threadless Rides Crowdsourcing Wave - Retail Store and Industry News - WWD.com

dmreinke — Mon, 08 Nov 2010 15:20:48 -0000

The challenge by crowdsourcing to traditional fashion goes beyond just design. Merchandising, marketing and even production will eventually be affected.

www.stylehop.com/enterprise

Re: Ann Taylor's Q2 Earnings Climb - Fashion and Retail Business News - WWD.com

dmreinke — Mon, 23 Aug 2010 11:36:59 -0000

Ann Taylor is back. Both divisions have some momentum.

Re: Reinventing Fashion Via Crowdsourcing - Fashion Markets News - WWD.com

dmreinke — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 11:38:41 -0000

While crowdsourced design is creating lots of buzz, the real opportunity for the fashion industry is leveraging the crowd to better match inventory with consumer preferences. My blog post on the topic of crowdsourcing and fashion: http://www.stylehop.com/blo...

Re: Hungry? Eat your bra

dmreinke — Tue, 18 May 2010 12:41:52 -0000

test comment

Re: http://jeffmiller.tumblr.com/post/526183027

dmreinke — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 14:02:04 -0000

Good stuff. I just don't buy that forcing everyone to buy health insurance is in any way extreme given the number of folks who want it, what other industrialized nations require, and the fact that we all pay for uninsured today anyway (since -generally- no one is denied care).

Re: http://jeffmiller.tumblr.com/post/526183027

dmreinke — Mon, 19 Apr 2010 12:42:24 -0000

Interesting topic, Jeff.

Based on the demographics of the tea-party supporters, my sense is that they have this vague notion that government is taking too much control of our lives and that everything is changing too fast. These fears are exacerbated by democrats running Washington (even though in recent history, both R & D have shown propensity to grow govt) and the severe downturn.

What makes this "vague notion" activate into full-fledged fear and anger, in my opinion, is the level of current political discourse. Political leaders need to tone down the rhetoric - they are the ones ginning this crowd into a frenzy and many of us believe this is not going to end well. Perhaps a good reflection for this 15th anniversary of Oklahoma City bombing.

As an Obama supporter, I think you are missing why we supported him. It wasn't touchy-feely things like transparency. As hard as it may be for Libertarians or Republicans, we actually want a more activist role for government. I wanted Health Care reform. Even though I understand it could run our country into a ditch, I think it's a calculated risk and is worth it to insure 31million more people and start attacking the cost curve.

I read (sorry I don't have the source) that in the last 30 years there has been a dramatic decline in economic mobility across generations.....in other words, the ability for children to surpass their parents economically.....and the likelihood that children of the wealthy might go down a peg or two. I lot of folks like me voted for Obama because we have a "vague notion" of this.....and we don't like it. So I don't think my continued support of O is rationalizing transgressions. I think Obama is doing what I hoped he would do - he's pragmatically driving a left of center agenda.

Re: The NYC Echo Chamber (It's a good thing!)

dmreinke — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 16:44:51 -0000

NYC startup ecosystem continues to evolve.

Re: Editorial Team

dmreinke — Thu, 25 Mar 2010 10:58:15 -0000

The fantastic StyleHop Editorial Team.

Re: Using Crowdsourcing to Control Inventory

dmreinke — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 16:43:19 -0000

Modcloth using Crowdsourcing to Control Inventory: http://bit.ly/5WGIea At StyleHop, we're doing this for the entire industry: www.stylehop.com/enterprise

Re: A new competitor in prediction markets, and their brilliant case study

dmreinke — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 13:42:36 -0000

Jed - great comment. Really appreciate your talking about how prediction market gets around problem of algorithms not responding quickly enough to dramatic market changes.

That's the reason we have high hopes at StyleHop that crowdsourced forecasting could make a big difference in fashion - the algorithms have never worked because of the changing trends. However, we don't use PM methodology - just too complicated for our fashionista panel.

Re: A new competitor in prediction markets, and their brilliant case study

dmreinke — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 11:40:49 -0000

Thanks for sharing, Jed. Great Slides by the CrowdClarity team.

Re: The Difference Between Big Markets and Great Markets

dmreinke — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 11:30:43 -0000

Great post, Rob - good reflections for this entrepreneur. For the VC these are fundamental questions as you try to answer, "Should we invest?". For the entrepreneur, similarly, this is a critical analysis in determining "Should we raise money?".

Early on in the formation of my company, I didn't fully appreciate these issues. Our company is creating a new market and trying to solve a huge problem in our industry - I thought that was enough. However, I've since realized there are critical market questions that, while unknowable now, must be answered. First, are there real barriers to entry in our market? Second, how much value can we capture? Until we have some more insight around these questions and the ultimate size of the prize, it's probably not wise to start splitting the pie into pieces.

Re: How to measure if users love your product using cohorts and revisit rates

dmreinke — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 09:17:06 -0000

I agree cohort analysis is best - especially for key strategy team members. However, the shorthand metric that I use with our entire team is Average Monthly (or weekly) Visits per Visitor. This is simply taking total visits divided by unique visitors. This metric is a single number that, when combined with traffic growth can tell the team whether engagement is growing/declining. It's obviously negatively affected if you have a big increase in the % of new users to your site....however, we really like this number as a balance to pure traffic growth.

Re: Speaking My Mind

dmreinke — Thu, 10 Sep 2009 11:08:17 -0000

To expand the conversation just a bit, the more I've been engaged in this political conversation around healthcare and how the actual policy is (or might be) shaping up, the more impressed I am with our political system. I really believe the wisdom of the crowd is at work in this debate in a very powerful (and effective) way.

A separate lesson I'm learning - I really need to put up good filters so I don't over-expose myself to self-reinforcing information streams or the 5% fringe that make me cynical even though good debates/things may be happening. There just aren't that many forums that let folks both engage and think for themselves. I need to expose myself to real debate about the issues (and not debate about the debate or politics). Places like aVC work, quite simply, because it's a forum of intelligent, independent thinkers.

Re: Enterprise 2.0 is a Crock: Discuss

dmreinke — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 11:10:13 -0000

Maybe I'm over-simplifying, but I don't think E2.0 needs a "model" or a particular culture to take root in organizations - at least the way Andrew describes it. Rather, I think the E2.0 takes root in organizations that are performance based when it offers a superior solution to a business problem. It's worth noting that in my own business (a crowd-sourcing fashion demand forecasting company) I have never once internally or externally used the term E2.0. In regards to culture, we're consistently adapting our solution to work inside our client's existing culture vs changing a culture - let's give this thing a chance!

Re: Enterprise 2.0 is a Crock: Discuss

dmreinke — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 10:59:07 -0000

Joe,

Great comment. I think you are right on. I started a 2.0 company by accident - I wasn't focused on revolution. I was focused on a particular business problem in a particular industry and stumbled upon the social web as a sensible part of the solution.

I think there is a valid concern if more practitioners don't start leveraging 2.0 and creating real ROI stories, the "drum-beaters" may turn business leaders temporarily against e20 as another management fad.

Re: Doubling Down

dmreinke — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 10:20:52 -0000

Good post for those of us facing the entrepreneurial double-down question. Fred would love to see a post by you talking about the impact of doubling down for entrepreneurs.....when it works, it's a beautiful thing. But even when it's the right decision at the time, it doesn't always lead to success for the entrepreneur. No portfolio for us!

Re: Chris and Malcolm are both wrong

dmreinke — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 10:06:51 -0000

The "how" is still unclear to me, but I have a vague notion that these native business models Brad mentions will revolved around the continued backward integration of marketing (ie meeting consumer needs) into the value chain. How can we use technology to systematically push consumer feedback into the design and production phases of products and services? While this is already happening with web services like Craigslist, I can't think of any reason it won't happen in real products.

Re: Recap of Fashion2.0 Meetup Event

dmreinke — Fri, 31 Jul 2009 09:01:34 -0000

Darren. I think your comments are great.

My two cents on these three companies.

I've known Seph at ProperCloth for a little while now. I think he is a fantastic entrepreneur who is on his way to building an incredible company. I've learned a lot from him.

iStyle - Mike Albanese is really onto something. I agree that refining his pitch will help - but that's a much better situation than having a great pitch and a crappy business model. I mentioned to Mike that investors love comps and he should compare iStyle to Polyvore because it similarly involves self expression but is better than Polyvore - iStyle has built in virality and monetization.

Pier Eleven - Who knows if this concept will work but it's an amazing idea. I'm going to be watching these guys really closely. The challenge whenever you do something completely new is who do you target? Art folks or fashion folks? I think the answer is probably art - they wear clothes. Lots of fashionistas have little or no interest in the art world.

Re: Fashion 2.0 & the consuMEr in the MEconomy

dmreinke — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 12:52:09 -0000

Looking forward to Fashion 2.0 Meetup tonight and hearing from some great companies. I'll be sharing about StyleHop.

Darren, the NYC Fashion 2.0 community needs to be talking more about how to leverage new technology to get the consumer more involved in fashion. The history of fashion is that consumers don't play a role....they are just passively told what to wear. but the democratization of fashion is happening with or without fashion companies consent. The best companies new and old will be those that get on the edge in terms of pulling consumers into their companies to help guide and direct design, merchandising and marketing. Because the big fashion companies are not innovators and tend to sit on their hands when it comes to leveraging new technologies, the opportunities for emerging companies in this space is huge.

Re: Building Successful Long Term Relationships

dmreinke — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 13:40:46 -0000

Love it, Fred. Been married for 13 years and plan on growing very old together. Whenever Michele and I make some implicit complaint about the other's schtick getting old, our refrain back to the other is always, "Ya, but you married me!"

Re: If The Rumors . . .

dmreinke — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 08:19:35 -0000

Maybe the political mood is beginning to change in this country. I haven't seen any longitudinal polls about what the numbers are for folks in favor of drug legalization......I only know I'm more interested in that conversation than I ever have been.

I'd like to look and legalization and then tax the hell out of it.

Re: Message to Startups: Risk hasn’t increased….it’s just changed

dmreinke — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 11:06:08 -0000

I'm not personally convinced that VC is dead.....it's just going to get smaller. But this can't happen overnight. There are lots of funds that raised $200mm + in the last few years. They have capital they need to deploy.

Re: Message to Startups: Risk hasn’t increased….it’s just changed

dmreinke — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 19:12:31 -0000

Stage does matter, I agree. We raised over $500k in a family/friends seed round in March of 2008 to get us in the position we are today. It's true we couldn't get that kind of round done today.

However, now there are more people on the sidelines in the tech world that you can put to work for equity (vs cash)....so bootstrapping is MUCH cheaper than it was in early 2008. We have a lower burn and a stronger team than we had just six months ago.

While building a $10mm company still makes you an entrepreneur, it definitely doesn't make you a fundable startup - even for angels. With that kind of business the risks are still there but the upside is gone for investors. I highly recommend you spend no time trying to raise money and focus all your efforts on gathering people up that believe in you, the business and are willing to help you do the work.