Vintage Clothing, an inspired industry

Veronica Cizmar, the owner of SomeLikeItVintage.com has written this article exclusively for our Weblog.

Vintage Clothing, an inspired industry

Every year consumer online shopping and spending increases. The average online purchase is now approaching $250 with consumers becoming more confident in buying higher ticket items such as electronics to cars, even homes. Online shopping has no closing time, it’s open 24/7 and retailers have significantly reduced shipping times. Loyalty programs that promote retailers offer incentives for shopping online, such as cashback, gift certificates and point redemption for merchandise.

The vintage clothing sector has benefited from this increased activity as well. Several retailers have simply closed their physical brick & mortar establishments to setup online. A worldwide customer base and less overhead expenses are a significant attraction to running an online website. With the current fashion trend of vintage clothing and vintage inspired clothing being seen on major catwalks, as well as the important efforts for saving the environment, the future for vintage websites is a healthy one!

SomeLikeItVintage.com has been selling vintage clothing & housewares online since 2005, first starting on ebay. In 2006, we re-launched with a brand new website. Establishing consumer confidence and trust is what we have successfully achieved by offering exceptional customer service.

With an online store, customer service must be assured as there is no face to face contact between consumer and retailer. Even a large, well known retailer with an encrypted, secure website needs to be re-assuring their customers. It can still be nerve wracking to make a purchase online. Not being able to actually try clothing on before a purchase is a shift in consumer behaviour and they must be able to trust the online retailer. By taking detailed photographs and listing detailed descriptions of our items, SomeLikeItVintage.com puts a consumer’s mind at ease when making an online purchase. The more information they have, the more comfortable they become while online shopping. A full refund policy also makes shopping risk free. That dress may look great in the photos but not on you! Send it back and receive a full refund, no hassles. Most, if not all shopping websites have customer service phone numbers to call if you just don’t want to key in your credit card information over the internet, but still wish to make that purchase.

During the design phase of our website, we looked at hundreds of other shopping websites. Many websites are simply not easy to navigate with too much information hitting the consumer right away. We wanted to eliminate the rush of information overload and allow our customers to get to what they wanted to see, as quickly as possible. Our filtering system allows customers to choose how they wish to browse: by price, by size, by style of garment, or simply type in a word in the search box. If a store in a shopping mall just threw all their clothes onto the racks without sorting, customers would quickly become discouraged and leave. We found many vintage sites lumping all their clothes into era-specific categories, and while this is helpful, one must sort through all the dresses to find one that would even be close in size. It simply takes too long. Our website was designed to be user friendly, efficient, safe and quick to navigate.

The owner of SomeLikeItVintage.com is a woman who has had over 20 years experience in customer servicee. No request is too small or too big to accomodate and everything possible will be done to fulfill it. She has also decided to donate 10% of all her sales to local women’s shelters in Toronto, Canada. Having been a victim of severe domestic abuse, she survived being held hostage by her fiancé for 18 months whereby he physically and mentally tortured her, trying to kill her dozens of times. He is currently serving a 15 year sentence in a Canadian prison.

As well as monetary donations, Ms. Cizmar volunteers her time at a local women’s shelter, inspiring other women and their children to be courageous and strong in the face of domestic violence. Working toward her black belt in Wado Ryu karate also keeps this busy lady physically and mentally strong!

Vintage clothing has been a longtime passion for Ms Cizmar, as well as the idea of reducing waste. Born to parents who lived through the depression, re-using, reducing and recyling was simply a way of life. Ms. Cizmar currently expands on this philosophy not just by finding fabulous vintage items to re-love, but re-creating stunning garments from vintage clothing. This private label, “Creative Vintage” gives another life to an otherwise unwearable garment. Less landfill, less waste, no emissions. Simple.

SomeLikeItVintage.com ships worldwide, and has several promotions throughout the year. Contests, free shipping days, bargain bin deals and a wonderful, large selection of vintage and retro items.

Posted by: admin | 11-06-2007 | 09:11 PM
Posted in: Clothing