The allure of the boutique has always been the selling of individuality, the escapism from a world of mass-produced products where customers can buy their own slice of eccentricity and originality lost on the high street. While this is still the case, what defines a boutique is ever evolving. The traditional high street boutique or market stall is being shunned in favour of its digital counterpart.
?It?s quite a personal service I offer, it?s something you?re not going to find in your average accessories or crafts store,? Zoe Larkins explains. Zoe is the founder of Boscombe based boutique ?Love From Hetty & Dave?, a veritable treasure trove of textile manifestations. A fibre-based ecosystem with its inhabitants ranging from slugs to badgers, owls and sausage dogs.
Love From Hetty & Dave, however, is not exclusively based in Boscombe, and is expanding its presence online. ?The majority of my business now is done through online, especially compared to just three years ago. The shop is really just a base for me to use as a workshop,? She informs me.
Zoe is clever to adapt her business online as well as on the high street. The internet is now teeming with virtual crafts markets with designers, retailers and those in the arts and crafts industry exploiting the webs potential as a place to market their goods. Folksy and Etsy are the largest online marketplaces for handcrafted products, however there are countless more to be found on the net.
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According to Folksy, as of May 2012 their site attracted on average 3.5 million page views per month, with their number of unique visitors in that past year reaching 2.4 million. The number of items for sale on the site on 27 April 2013 was a staggering 156,914.
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?There?s so much stuff online now that people don?t even have to leave their house anymore, which is sad because it?s leading to the demise of the high street. I started off at the markets in London, and that?s where you always went if
you wanted something individual,?new and handmade, but online has kind of overtaken that now.?
Importantly while the method of buying such products has changed, the demand for Zoe?s creations has remained relatively constant despite the poor state of the economy in recent years, and she faces little competition with the high street just down the road.?I?ve got quite a big customer base now, and I think they come to me because they know they?ll get something different.?People are looking for interesting, more expensive things they won?t see on everyone else.?
Related Topics:
In pictures: Love From Hetty & Dave
Behind the scenes at Love From Hetty & Dave
The growth of online spending and internet retail
External links:
Shadow Business Minister warns ?digital train crash? will destroy more high street stores
UK Point of Sale throws its weight behind high street rejuvenation
Source: http://buzz.bournemouth.ac.uk/online-boutiques-growth-of-the-internet-crafts-market/
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While the time spent in apps may be starting to challenge television, mobile analytics firm Flurry examined today what it takes to reach a TV-sized audience on mobile, comparing U.S. app usage to traditional media as well as to other online audience measurements. During “primetime,” which for apps also includes those “after-work” hours of around 7 to 10 p.m., app usage among the top 250 iOS and Android applications spikes to a peak of 52 million consumers, the company found. App usage tends to drop off overnight, and weekends see higher daytime app usage through the day (9-5). During the normal workday, people use apps at least 75 percent as much as on weekends, the data shows. Of course, this is collective usage. In order to target an audience that size using traditional media, you would need to combine the audiences of the three most highly rated primetime TV shows on a good week, says Flurry. Or you’d have to combine the circulation of the largest 200 weekend newspapers in the U.S. “We believe this comparison says a couple of important things about the app audience: first that it has reached critical mass, and second that it is still highly fragmented relative to more traditional forms of media,” notes Flurry head of research Mary Ellen Gordon?on the company blog. The firm also noted that reaching the key 18 to 49-year-old demographic using traditional media will become increasingly difficult as they turn towards digital media more. Flurry cited a report from Morgan Stanley, which showed that there has been a 50 percent decline in TV audience ratings since 2002, illustrating this point. For what it’s worth, Netflix CEO Reed Hastings pointed to this same trend in a mission statement released yesterday, noting specifically that we’re moving towards a time when apps will replace channels. “Existing networks that fail to develop first-class apps will lose viewing and revenue,” Hastings said. It may be some time yet until that transition completes (if you even believe in this “either/or” scenario, that is). But meanwhile, when app usage is compared with the Internet audience using desktops and laptops, things are more even.?During February, for example, Flurry saw 224 million monthly actives using mobile apps in the U.S. That same month, comScore reported 221 million desktop and laptop users of the top 50 U.S. digital properties. Or in other words, though the app audience is fragmented,
