This addictive new shopping website is the Kayak of clothing brands
It's a brand new comparison shopping site, where shoppers can select designer dresses, shoes, and handbags and from over sixty different retailers - such as Neiman Marcus, Saks Fifth Avenue, Shopbop, Nordstrom, and Macy's - and compare sizes and prices. The site keeps track of coupon codes for added discounts.
Founder Andrea Marron, former Vice President of Digital at Nicole Miller, came up with the idea during her tenure at Nicole Miller. She noticed that whenever the company would distribute product to retailers, the mark downs would vary tremendously. In spring 2013, she teamed up with ZocDoc developer Amit Sawat, and Shazop began to come to realization.
It's obviously in its nasceny, but Marron thinks of the website as the Kayak of online shopping.
"Way back in the day, you would go to ten different airline sites to try to find the best price on a flight," Marron said in an interview with Business Insider. "But now, it's a lot more convenient for a user to just go to Kayak to find the best flight. We want to be the one place that a consumer can go to to browse and find the best style for them and have all the information there for them on one page."
Right now, Shazop sells high end brands, like Tory Burch, Elizabeth & James, and Rag & Bone. This is intentional.
"We thought that it's easier to brand yourself as high-end and later add the lower-end brand then to do the reverse," she said. Right now, she wants Shazop to be a "curated experience." In the coming weeks, Shazop will offer more brands, including Kate Spade, Balmain, and BCBG. Shazop will continue to add products and designers as the site grows, and Marron said that a suggestion will allow users to request brands they'd like to see on the site.
Not only is this beneficial to consumers, but Marron believes that retailers can benefit from this service, because it's "an opportunity for them. Let's say someone is browsing on Shazop for a dress and it's sold out at a retail that they had in mind ... another retailer could potentially pick up a customer by having that size in stock."
It all is rooted in a tremendous amount of data. Shazop pulls data from the websites and brings the information to the consumer easily, making it a one-stop shop for consumers.
Naturally, Shazop has accumulated tons of data and information while making the product. To capitalize on this, Shazop offers a B2B service called Ragtrades, which sells data to retailers to help them handle their pricing and buying methodologies. Marron told Business Insider that Ragtrades' most popular product is a price tracking dashboard.
Marron knows that online shopping can be troublesome to many. "Finding something that fits you really well is certainly a big concern," Marron said. "And finding something that you love in your size that fits you at the right price."
But Shazop could be appealing to those who have disavowed online shopping.
Marron believes that online shopping and in-store shopping have a symbiotic relationship. In fact, it's partially the basis of Shazop.
"I really see them [in-store shopping and online shopping] as so separate; they both inform each other I'd say," she said. "If you love in-store shopping you can use something like Shazop - say you go tot the store and try something on [and use] a tool like Shazop to find the best price."
But ultimately, when it comes to in-store shopping and then going home to shop online, Marron believes that "the lines are getting blurred."