Building a brand around Co-Creation is more than just about allowing users to come onto the site and design their own dress shirts. Co-creation is a business philosophy.
Part of the passion that drives us everyday is we don't think most big companies give a shit. Period. We just don't think they care. Yes they have design teams paying hundreds of thousands traveling the globe for inspiration, going to the fashion shows to party and drink *cough* I mean get inspired, to tell you what you should wear this spring. To us, that's f***ing pretentious and a waste of your money. We really see the development of Blank Label, every component of it, from the dress shirts that we produce, to the site features we have, as something to be co-created.
Courtesy of facecocreation
We actively, but not even actively enough, seek feedback from customers who've gone through the entire design process and believed in us enough to purchase something from us. You trusted us, and that's massive. I, as the founder of the company, will pick up the phone and speak with customers and chat about their experience. I massively appreciate the feedback, and they like speaking with the founder and knowing that we care about what they think. Now compare that with experiences you've had in retail recently.
I'm going to be honest, we're sometimes pretty lousy at guessing what people want in a co-created dress shirt, or what they think should be the ideal customer experience. But guessing is foolish, ah so so foolish. Especially when it's just so much easier to ask. We were thinking about adding a widget to our site that allowed you to create a unique page that you could display your dress shirt design on, but people told us the idea sucked (but in nicer words).
"Really, don't you think it'd be cool to design something, name it and then show it off to others?"
"NO! But more fabric options would be nice, and the sizing is still a little confusing. You've been talking about making changes to that for a while, but it's not quite there yet."
In this new age where everyone has a voice, it's more just listening to customers, which most companies already fail at, but it's about actively asking them and engaging with them throughout your development as a company. Co-creation for us is about Designed By You, Stitched By Us, but it's also deeply ingrained into our business philosophy. Blank Label is Y(our) Company.
P.S. We now have a new hub at www.formspring.me/blanklabel where you can ask us any question you want that will get shared with our community.
