Urban Outfitters to launch fashion rental service
The owner of Urban Outfitters is launching a women’s apparel subscription rental service in the US called Nuuly.
The service will launch this summer.
As part of a monthly subscription, Nuuly will offer items from URBN’s own brands and third-party labels for rent via a custom-built, digital platform. The service will also include one-of-a-kind vintage pieces.
Nuuly subscribers will select their styles each month, wear them as often as they like, and then swap into new styles the next month. They will also be given the option of purchasing any items they are renting.
Subscriptions will cost $88 for one six-item box per month.
Richard Hayne, chief executive and chairman of Urban Outfitters, said: “Since our founding in 1970, our company philosophy has been to give our customers the creative, compelling shopping experience they desire. Nuuly is the next step in that mission, and with it, we set out to be the subscription fashion leader by offering an unmatched curation of aspirational brands, coupled with extraordinary value.”
Nuuly will stock over 1,000 styles at launch and there are plans to add over 100 new styles a week and triple style count by the end of the year. The assortment will include URBN’s own brands Anthropologie, Free People and Urban Outfitters and hundreds of rare vintage items.
The wide range of other brands participating in the service will include the likes of Reebok, Champion, Levi’s, Citizens of Humanity, Universal Standard and Anna Sui.
URBN said it has a dedicated team of engineers, product managers and data scientists developing the technology needed to power all aspects of the user experience, with a focus on data driving many aspects of the business. Nuuly will also be using a warehouse and fulfilment centre near Philadelphia which houses state-of-the-art laundry equipment operated by experienced laundry technicians.
David Hayne, chief digital officer of URBN and Nuuly president, said: “URBN enters the rental landscape with many strategic advantages. We bring our distinctive brands and their proprietary assortments, millions of existing customer relationships with rich preference histories, long-standing brand partnerships, a broad point-of-sale distribution network, as well as deep, operational know-how and investable capital. When paired with our proven ability to develop creative lifestyle brands, we believe Nuuly is uniquely positioned to deliver the dynamic subscription rental experience the modern customer desires.”
