Over the past decade plus size women have been advocating for fashion websites like Revolve and Shopbop to be size inclusive. Well Shopbop has decided to finally answer the call. This month Shopbop announced that they offer extended sizes. Yup! Shopping Shopbop plus sizes is a real thing now. Plus size women will be able to shop everything from dresses and coats to jeans and tops on Shopbop.
When it comes to an online shop that curates brands like Shopbop, there aren’t many plus size ones. There was Hello Gorgeous. An online fashion destination for contemporary plus size brands. They are no longer in business. And In 2018 we saw the launch of CoEdition. A plus size e-commerce site created by former Gilt executives, which planned to sell over 150 brands by the end of 2018. Hopefully, they have put plans in place to reach their target of 2018, especially as it is important to the sector and plus-sized customers. There is a lot of planning that goes into growth like this, so they may have consulted with various branding and marketing professionals by searching for keywords like ‘marketing agency london, digital marketing agencies, whitehat‘, for example, to get in touch with those that can be of service to their efforts. We can’t wait to see where this will lead them.
As far as luxury e-commerce sites selling high end designer names in plus sizes, 11Honore is the brand that is making some smart and strategic moves in that realm. Now that Shopbop is entering the plus size fashion space, there is a huge opportunity for them to have success. If they play their cards right. So, they may want to check out a website like Cell Phone Deal for some e-commerce statistics to give them a little bit of insight so they can see where they may be going if they want to adapt. It is important that they go into this carefully, covering all their bases and conducting the necessary research to make sure that they are appealing to their target audience, this is where software like Conjoint Analysis, as well as others, can come in useful for current and future marketing.
In the past straight size brands that offered extended sizes only went up to a size 18/20 or XXL. Which is why they never used the term plus size. They didn’t offer plus sizes in the traditional sense by going up to or pass a 24 or 3X. This infuriated plus size shoppers. However, Shopbop’s extended sizes includes a mix of brands that range between a size 16-24.
The extended sizes category on Shopbop.com has inclusive sizing from designer brands like Veronica Beard, Tanya Taylor, Rebecca Minkoff, Good American, Free People, Madwell, and A.L.C. just to name a few.
I checked out the Shopbop plus size section and found that the only brands that offer a size 24 and 3X at this time are Veronica Beard and A.L.C. In addition, popular brands like Theory, Derek Lam 10 Crosby, Equipment, and Vince go up to a size 16/18 and XXL.
Now that there is a Shopbop plus size category on their site, my hope is that they will promote it. Also, it would be great if they started to show plus size women on their social media feeds. All too often we see brands say they’re size inclusive but the only place it shows is on their website.
