Want your wobbly toddler biking like a pro sooner than his preschool chums? A well-kept secret says you should start by pitching the pedals and getting your kiddie onboard a “balance bike.”

And, thanks to RunBikes.com, based in Sylvan Lake, Metro Parent is giving one away, a $69.99 value, free of charge! The new PLIM Swiss Roadie Runner Wooden Balance Bike features sleek aerodynamics, super-durable birch wood and a snazzy motorcycle motif, all certain to please any 2- to 5-year-old. But what about those missing pedals? The logic behind the design, popular with wee Europeans for decades, is that toddlers need to get comfortable with steadying and steering before tackling a two-wheeler. “It gets rid of that struggle with the training wheels, because they can learn the balance at an early age,” says Laurie Freeman, site manager for RunBikes.com. “They have no fear because they’re running.”

Ready to win? E-mail jelliott@metroparent.com with “Bike Contest” in the subject line. Include your name, address and phone number; entries must be received by Monday, June 30.

In a deal penned with French outdoor equipment company Lafuma S.A., Michigan based e-commerce company Niche Retail, LLC is proud to announce the launch of www.shopLeChameau.com — America’s premier online shop dedicated to natural rubber boots made by legendary French boot maker Le Chameau.

Sold in over 25 countries — but thus far under-represented in the US market — Le Chameau of Normandy, France is renowned for producing the highest quality rubber boots and outdoor gear, favored the world over by discriminating outdoor enthusiasts. Built on tradition but perpetually receptive to new technologies and boot-making methods, Le Chameau maintains its position as an industry leader by paying close attention to detail, adopting innovations and materials that improve its products, and referencing lasting lessons from the company’s 80 years of experience.

Better known by the general term “Wellingtons” or “Wellies” in the UK, Le Chameau rubber boots are hand made of eco-friendly, 100% natural rubber drawn from the Hevea trees of the Amazon (rubber is tapped from the Hevea, which does not harm the tree). Shipped in blocks to the Le Chameau factory in Normandy, this natural rubber is then refined and hand crafted by skilled boot makers. First introduced in 1927, the leather-lined Chasseur rubber boot was Le Chameau founder Claude Chamot’s first step into footwear — effectively establishing the company’s lasting legacy.

Because Le Chameau has limited distribution in the US Market, only a select number of web stores currently sell and ship Le Chameau boots in the United States. ShopLeChameau.com (http://www.shoplechameau.com) is an easy-to-navigate retail website devoted exclusively to Le Chameau natural rubber boots for American men and women, as well as select Le Chameau accessories. As part of the Niche Retail family of web stores, shopLeChameau.com integrates as much information as possible — providing accurate and detailed descriptions and benefits for every Le Chameau rubber boot model, style, and accessory offered.

shopLeChameau.com (http://www.shoplechameau.com) is the only US based online retailer that deals exclusively in Le Chameau rubber boots, offering a wealth of information on the products, as well as fast shipping to anywhere in the US. In addition, Niche Stores provide customers with knowledgeable customer service, a 30-Day, ‘No Worries’ Return Policy, and an ‘Order today, Ships today’ guarantee.

ShopLeChameau.com is also proud to offer something available nowhere else, the exclusive Chasseur Prestige Pack (http://www.shoplechameau.com/Le-Chameau-Chasseur-Prestige-Pack.pro) for men.

The Prestige Pack includes not only a pair of flagship Chasseur Prestige boots, but also a Le Chameau Boot Bag, Silicone Boot Spray and a cleaning cloth - all packaged in a special-edition luxury box.

The Chasseur Prestige Pack represents the ultimate package for those looking for the complete Le Chameau experience.

About Niche Retail, Le Chameau, and Lafuma S.A.: Niche Retail, LLC, currently ranked #300 on the Inc. 500 list of fastest growing American companies and listed on Internet Retailer’s Top 500 Guide, owns and operates category and branded web stores serving niche markets.

Niche Retail also operates LafumaFurniture.com (http://www.lafumafurniture.com), a retail site dedicated exclusively to the sale of Lafuma’s portable recliners, camping, and deck chairs.

The excellent relationship between Niche Retail and Lafuma facilitated the creation of shopLeChameau.com.

Niche Retail is excited to bring its e-commerce expertise to the sales and marketing of outstanding Le Chameau rubber boots in America.

Lafuma S.A., based in Anneyron, France, acquired boot and clothing maker Le Chameau in 2005, strengthening the French outfitter’s foothold into European outdoor equipment market. The Lafuma brand continues to broaden its presence in the American market, bringing high quality hand-made furniture, footwear, and outdoor equipment to discerning American consumers.

From: http://fashion-fox.com

Fashion Marketing news: A slew of studies, data, and articles seem to point out the growing success of niche sites, especially in the fashion industry. Hype or Fact? How can big online retailers and local fashion stores benefit from internet niches?

I like reading about pragmatic ideas to boost online sales of fashion goods, from apparel to accessories. I think that too much time is wasted in theorizing about internet marketing, and not acting about it.

Yet, I am going to talk about hard-core statisical studies and hype. Why?
Because I found in this month’s INC. magazine an article about niche marketing that made me connect together a lot of issues facing local apparel stores as well as big online fashion retailers.

Make money online by not carrying best-sellers

First, the article titled “A world without bestsellers” dabbles with buying patterns specific to internet consumers.
These patterns make up the Long Tail. You may or you may not know about it. For a concise explanation, go the Long Tail page on Wikipedia. Let’s just say that consumers can find and buy online products that a regular store could not carry. For instance, 40% of Amazon.com’s book sales reportedly consist in unknown titles that your regular Barnes and Noble cannot afford to carry in the bookstore next door.

The same seem to apply to fashion goods. For instance, in the INC. article, Zappos’ Tony Hsieh says that:

“Today the company sells more than three million products across 1,000 brands. The top 20 percent of products account for half of revenue, the bottom 80 percent, the other half.”

So, at Zappos, the 20 best-selling items represent only 50% of the revenues. This is a far-cry from the usual 80/20 rule that usually applies offline, when the top 20 best-sellers make up 80% of the revenues. The 80/20 rule is drawn from the works of economist Pareto.

Long Tail curve (credit)

Online sales of fashion goods make Pareto Principle redundant

This is the gist of a February 2007 study called “Goodbye Pareto Principle, Hello Long Tail: The Effect of Search Costs on the Concentration of Product Sales.” It was written by researchers at the Sloan School of Management at the MIT. Better, this study is based on “several years of sales data at a private-label women’s clothing company that offered the same merchandise through its catalog and its Internet store.”

Fashion goods are really at the forefront of this trend. Think about all the sites of the specialty sites that have sprung up, from sites selling discontinued lines of products to sites selling only to a sub-demographic. Buyers will turn to the web for hard-to-find glasses or for styles that regular retailers would deem too original to carry.

A company called Niche Retail is specialized in doing just that. The company says that they actually avoid carrying best-sellers, as big retailers can usually manage to kill the business by discounting the most sought-after items. By the way, Niche Retail’s logo reprents the Long Tail graph.

Style is a personal matter. Fashion professionals did not wait for the Long Tail theory to launch niche product lines. But the internet does offer interesting further niche opportunities:

- established brands and big online retailers can find relevant niche sites for some of their product lines

- local fashion stores are indeed niches themselves; they can use the internet to get more exposure

Big brands and retailers going after niche consumers

This very site spends time presenting you new fashion blogs, new fashion sites, and new fashion communities (see Fashion 2.0). Because fashion can get very personal, it has always been a good conversation topic. Now, the internet allows you to become a fashion critique in a snap. Big fashion actors can go after these niche sites to get their attention.

For instance, niche TV channels are popping up on the internet, due to the low barrier of entry, as reported in this article of the Wall Street Journal. The newspaper gives the example of clothing chain Express sponsoring the Ford Models web tv channel. I would add the example of “Ask a Gay Man“, the colorful and popular fashion critique show on YouTube (see my previous note on the subject), which has gotten founder William Sledd a TV deal with Bravo.

But you not have to be big to go after these niche sites. For instance, Ujeans, a made-to-order jeans company sponsors competitions on social network site StyleMob (”a new community for street fashion inspiration”).

Local fashion stores are so niche

I see here a chance for local apparel stores as well: a niche can be geographic.
A local store owner may be the best person to know what senior citizens like wearing in the Boca Raton area. Why not put up a website, where you can share your expertise? When local people use Google to find information about clothes they like, they will find your website, enjoy your expertise, and visit your shop.

Marketers are encouraging local stores to go online and advertise. A book called Marketing your retail store in the internet age does a great job of giving pragmatic and inexpensive tips to local store owners. Meanwhile, Google is pushing local ads heavily. Its AdWords system allows you to display your ad only to people searching from your zip code. Moreover, Google Maps allows you to mention your store in the popular map system, so that when people search for “women’s fashion, 97108″, your store shows up.

No wonder that local advertising on the internet is booming. According to eMarketer, local online advertising spending in the US will reach $2.9 billion in 2007. Local search is great for a local fashion store or a geographical niche site. One of the best resources about the subject, with how-to-s and advice, is Clickz’s Local Search column.

Fashion sales are booming online and online fashion marketing may be one of the hottest topics right now.

Niche Retail, LLC announces the launch of http://www.RECAROChildSeat.com, a webstore devoted to providing extensive information about the entire line of baby car seats offered by the automotive safety experts of RECARO.

http://www.RECAROChildSeat.com is a website that provides detailed information about each RECARO child seat — including specifications, comparisons, related media, warranty information, and a comprehensive buying guide. At RECAROChildSeat.com, parents and caretakers interested in purchasing a RECARO child seat can gather knowledge of the specific benefits, features, pricing, and limitations that each child seat by RECARO offers.

RECARO has over 100 years experience in the production of vehicular safety devices, from saddles to the first car seat with an integrated seatbelt. Germany-based RECARO maintains its North American headquarters in Auburn Hills, MI.

RECARO set a new standard in child safety seat design with the RECARO Start aluminum framed booster and new convertible car seats like the RECARO Como. All child seats by RECARO meet and exceed the world’s most stringent safety standards, use only the highest quality materials, and set a new precedent for side impact protection in children’s vehicular safety. http://www.RECAROChildSeat.com is powered by the Michigan-based e-commerce company Niche Retail, LLC — a growing Inc. 500 company with years of experience in car seat sales and safety.

“Our expertise in SEO, consumer education, and our strong understanding of e-commerce with high-end partners made a prominent car seat manufacturer like RECARO an excellent fit for Niche Retail. We are thrilled about this relationship,” says Niche Retail owner Bradley Sorock.

http://www.inc.com/magazine/20070901/a-world-without-bestsellers.html

Creating a “long tail” product mix.

By Susan Greco
In the pantheon of management theories, the Pareto Principle–better known as the 80-20 rule–has always been on a pedestal. Seventy years after the phrase was coined (in honor of the Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto), it has been used to describe many aspects of business–most notably the idea that 80 percent of a company’s sales come from only the top 20 percent of its products. Many CEOs have embraced 80-20 as a way of life, focusing resources on their elite merchandise.

But there’s strong evidence that on the Internet, the 80-20 rule no longer applies. The skepticism began four years ago, when researchers at the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology wrote about the rise of niche products on the Internet, noting, for example, that obscure book titles not even carried on retail shelves accounted for almost 40 percent of revenue at Amazon.com. After that, Chris Anderson, editor of Wired magazine, developed his Long Tail theory. He wrote that, collectively, the 80 percent of products that usually get short shrift in the 80-20 world could, on the Internet, rival the sales volume of all the mainstream hits. (Anderson’s best-selling book The Long Tail was published last year.)

Now researchers from Sloan are back with a new study called “Goodbye Pareto Principle, Hello Long Tail: The Effect of Search Costs on the Concentration of Product Sales.” The authors looked at several years of sales data at a private-label women’s clothing company that offered the same merchandise through its catalog and its Internet store. The data showed that while catalog sales adhered perfectly to the 80-20 rule, customers purchased a significantly wider variety of clothing online. After discovering this, executives (who wish to remain anonymous) revamped their marketing efforts, sending fewer printed catalogs to top online customers.

A company called Niche Retail sees itself as the vanguard of the philosophical shift away from Pareto. Based in Sylvan Lake, Michigan, the company was founded in 2001 on a business plan that anticipated today’s long-tail principles. Today Niche Retail runs 25 different consumer e-commerce sites, each stocking a comprehensive product line in a narrow area–jogging strollers and car seats, for example. The company also develops websites for manufacturers to help them build online sales. “To me, the 80-20 rule is dead,” says co-owner Tyler Smith. “The public is demanding choice, so it doesn’t make sense to train employees on only a few products.”

In practice, breaking the 80-20 mold often means politely ignoring the advice a manufacturer gives you. When Suunto, maker of the Vector altimeter watch, first partnered with Niche Retail, it wanted to build a site featuring only the popular black-and-green models that make up the top 20 percent of its product mix. But Niche Retail found that Web customers wanted harder-to-find colors, offbeat shades such as champagne–which wound up selling briskly for two years. At another Niche Retail site, Elitecarseats.com, a cow-print model that the manufacturer’s rep had written off became an instant hit. At most of Niche Retail’s sites, the sales-to-product ratio is incredibly fluid. “There’s no historical top 20 percent, and the top sellers move quickly and change,” Smith says.

In fact, whenever sales become consistently 80-20 at one of the company’s Internet stores, Smith sees a red flag. He believes that it’s hard to be profitable with a small number of products. It won’t be long before Wal-Mart or Target starts carrying your top 20 at a discount, killing your business. Niche Retail actually sold a marginally profitable site that marketed radar detectors because sales of the bottom 80 percent were so sluggish.

In the old 80-20 world, bestsellers were so lucrative that there was little incentive to invest in risky new products. The long-tail approach, by definition, requires you to be constantly on the prowl for underdog and underexposed offerings. SkinStore.com, a Gold River, California, company that sells about 5,000 products on the Internet (and about 400 of those by catalog), demonstrates the lengths some companies will go to find those unique products. To gain access to specialty items sold only through spas, SkinStore bought a day spa, which it now operates on the side, so that it can sell spa-only items online. “One question that’s always going through our mind is where’s the product that is No. 595 on our list but is No. 1 on someone else’s list?” says John Crisan, SkinStore.com’s chief financial officer. “We want to pursue those.” With the expanded inventory, the top 30 percent of the company’s products account for only 35 percent of total sales.

The post-Pareto world also tests a company’s customer service abilities. Eight years ago, when Tony Hsieh became CEO of Zappos.com, the biggest online seller of shoes, he didn’t know what to expect for sales patterns. “I thought 80-20 might apply,” he recalls. Instead, many customers came to Zappos looking for offbeat styles. The more variety the company put online, the faster it grew. Today the company sells more than three million products across 1,000 brands. The top 20 percent of products account for half of revenue, the bottom 80 percent, the other half. “It varies from brick-and-mortar quite a bit,” says Hsieh.

This “wide and shallow” strategy, as Hsieh calls it, is a massive logistical challenge. Zappos’ warehouses are the size of 17 football fields. Customer service reps have to be trained to indulge a customer’s whims. “Our customer loyalty team may spend an hour trying to help” someone find a shoe, Hsieh says. Though it sounds expensive, Hsieh maintains that by embracing complexity, Zappos has actually reduced its exposure to the vagaries of fickle fashion trends. “We don’t have to take a lot of risk on any one product,” he says.

LafumaFurniture.com announces significant changes to its website, services, and product catalog.

Sylvan Lake, MI (PRWEB) May 26, 2007 — The team behind LafumaFurniture.com is proud to announce that significant changes to its website, services, and product catalog have strengthened its role as the premier online dealer of Lafuma Outdoor Furniture in the United States.

Since establishing a partnership with Lafuma - the legendary 85-year-old French outdoor equipment company that has grown into a revered, multinational business known for its high-end, high-quality products - online retailer Niche Retail, LLC has grown LafumaFurniture.com into a lynchpin of its expanding Internet presence. By managing a website dedicated exclusively to Lafuma ‘zero gravity’ recliners, camping chairs, loungers, and Lafuma’s entire selection of light and comfortable outdoor relaxation gear, Niche Retail has crafted the foremost ecommerce destination for customers looking for stylish, lightweight outdoor furniture of unsurpassed comfort and quality.

but the new look and feel of LafumaFurniture.com is the icing on the cake. It’s never been easier for our customers to quickly find exactly what they’re looking for, and the site has never looked better!

Lafuma Furniture’s General Manager Guillaume Linossier states that, “We selected Niche Retail for its reputation of high-quality customer-centric web stores, coupled with outstanding customer service.”

LafumaFurniture.com now features a dramatically improved visual presentation as well as a more intuitive navigation system. Now online shoppers who visit LafumaFurniture.com can find the most popular models quickly and easily, shop by their preferred activity or category of chair, and quickly find the accessories or replacement parts that will preserve and enhance their outdoor enjoyment.

“We’ve always prided ourselves on providing our customers with as much information relevant to their buying decisions as possible, whether it’s our extensive collection of real user reviews or the immediate accessibility of our dedicated customer service team,” said Brent Norton, site manager of LafumaFurniture.com, “but the new look and feel of LafumaFurniture.com is the icing on the cake. It’s never been easier for our customers to quickly find exactly what they’re looking for, and the site has never looked better!”

In terms of services, the partnership between Lafuma of France and LafumaFurniture.com has strengthened to a point where Lafuma has entrusted the customer service department at LafumaFurniture.com with its customers’ warranty concerns. Rather than having to contact Lafuma directly with warranty issues, owners of Lafuma outdoor chairs can address these matters with the friendly and knowledgeable staff at LafumaFurniture.com - regardless of where the chair was initially purchased.

Additionally, LafumaFurniture.com’s product catalog is experiencing the same growth and diversification as the customer service department. Three new recliner models, the Lafuma Hybrid, Lafuma Futura (and larger-sized Futura XL sibling), and Lafuma RT, are now available for 2007 - all in a full range of styles and colors.

Consolidation in the long tail is imminent. Small e-tailers currently comprise roughly one-fourth of online retail revenues, resulting in a profusion of small Web sites eating up margins and valuable shelf space on key marketing pages, states the analyst in the report. This will likely spur consolidation, “by aggregating small players in key categories, larger companies could consolidate their lead, learn some of the secrets of scrappy marketing and boost margins,” according to the study. “Two such consortiums that exist by executing exactly this model are NetShops and Niche Retail, the latter of which owns sites like Joggingstroller.com.”

http://www.ecommerce-guide.com/news/trends/article.php/3664086

Thursday, November 30, 2006

BY NATHAN BOMEY
nbomey@mbizreview.com
——————————————————————————–

A five-year-old company that sells products through 17 highly specialized Web sites has opened an office in Ann Arbor.

Nicheretail.com has opened a location on Main Street, where the company plans to begin conducting its own Web design. The company has plotted a business strategy of offering a specific set of products through its individual sites.

Tyler Smith, the company’s de facto president whose official title is “integrator,” said sites like Joggingstroller.com present an example of what the business has to offer.

The sites target specific audiences, choosing not to expand their product lines beyond their specialties.

“From a customer’s perspective, it’s like you’re walking into a store that sells jogging strollers,” Smith said.

Smith said Niche Retail tries to offer helpful product reviews that are difficult to get at a place like Amazon.com.

Specific information about highly specialized products is a valuable tool for small sites like those operated by Niche Retail.

“You’re not going to find that kind of information on a general category (site),” he said. “The model is very much the opposite of Amazon, although Amazon does a good job. (But) it’s not really a 100 percent accurate review of the product.”

The company, promoting what it calls “relationship-driven e-commerce,” prides itself on offering multi-faceted customer service to its Web visitors.

Customers can call a toll-free number for help, e-mail a company representative or chat online with someone.

“What we try to do is create sites that will either mimic or be better than an in-store experience,” he said.

Nicheretail.com has an 80,000-square-foot facility for its operations and warehousing in Sylvan Township. It also has a location in Minneapolis for business research and development. The company’s net sales in 2005 topped $11.6 million. Part of the decision to open a location in Ann Arbor was because of the young talent produced by the local universities, Smith said.

He said Google’s decision to open its AdWords facility in Ann Arbor didn’t have an impact on Nicheretail.com’s decision.

Smith said “fresh minds” would be critical to Niche Retail’s success in starting its Web design operation in Ann Arbor. ”

We’re very young-minded and fast-moving and we want people who are coming out of school and aren’t tainted by the corporate culture,” Smith said. “This is a high-tech area.”

Smith estimated the company would conduct about 95 percent of its Web design internally and continue to contract with other firms for the remaining work.

Nathan Bomey can be reached at (734) 302-1725 or
nbomey@mbizreview.com.

Sylvan Lake, MI — (PRWEB) Sept 12, 2006. Niche Retail, LLC, a fast growing web-based retail company with offices in Minneapolis, MN and Sylvan Lake, MI, is excited to announce that its rapid development has garnered the attention of Inc. Magazine, who ranked Niche Retail at #300 in the 2006 Inc. 500.

Inc. Magazine Editor Jane Berentson refers to the Inc. 500 as “A tribute to American business ingenuity and ambition.” It is a comprehensive ranking of the fastest growing privately-held companies in the United States, and Niche Retail is proud to be included amongst these elite rapid-growth businesses. The Inc. 500 is compiled based on a company’s growth over a three year period, and only takes into account companies that have at least $600,000 in net sales in the base year.

Only 33 of nearly 6,000 publicly traded companies in America have 3 year growth percentages over 304%, solidifying the now common knowledge that private companies account for the vast majority of new jobs created in the United States. The aggregate revenue of the companies ranked in the Inc. 500 is $19.7 billion dollars, up from $16.5 billion last year.

About Niche Retail
“I’m a man with ideas, not just a domain name or a product to sell,” says Niche Retail CEO and resident visionary Brad Sorock, who was inspired to start Niche Retail while riding his bike in Crested Butte, CO. “I have hundreds of ideas for the improvement and advancement of Niche, but it’s the team behind me that has allowed this company to be so successful. Without them, I would have failed in the first year.”

Niche Retail, LLC has expanded its staff from 8 to 40 people since 2002, and has experience growth of over 450% in three years – with net sales in 2005 topping $11.6 million. Niche Retail carries a wide variety of higher-end retail items on 17 different websites. The products offered vary from Finnish Suunto Watches, Bugaboo Strollers from Holland, and Italian Peg Perego Car Seats – as well as their more affordable counterparts. Niche Retail’s key to success isn’t discounts and closeouts, but excellent customer service, an honest attitude, and great customer relationships.

“We’re not a discount store,” Says Sorock. “Competition keeps us on our toes, but we don’t compete on price. Instead, we compete for relationships. We win and keep customers through excellent customer service, easy navigation, good presentation, educational materials, comparison shopping, and real product reviews . . . That’s what people want, so that’s what we focus our energy on. We offer only the very best in information and services for people researching a product on the web.”

This eco-conscious retail company with a casual office atmosphere has a firm policy regarding the numerous children’s products it offers: “We wouldn’t carry anything we wouldn’t trust with our own kids.” All new products are tested and inspected before being given a staff review. In addition, every customer review posted on the sites, no matter how scathing, is given space on the product’s page.

With over 17 retail websites, and several more currently in development, Niche Retail has established its own special “Niche” in the internet retail business, and is running with its formula for success and diversifying its interests in preparation of even better returns and increased profitability in the years to come.

Niche Retail, LLC is eager to continue its already rapid growth, and expects to move up on the Inc. 500 list in the coming years. Niche is proud to be a member of Automation Alley, and bring its unique business approach to the table alongside the who’s who of business leaders in Southeast Michigan.