Kohl's, PopSugar Partnership Shows How Data Is Revolutionizing Apparel Design

We've got an interesting apparel partnership to spotlight this week. Retail brand Kohl's announced earlier this week that it would be teaming up with digital media company PopSugar to create a data-driven clothing line for millennial women. And, if it succeeds, it could be a sign of things to come in apparel design.

The collection will be available at 500 stores and online starting in September. Apparel offerings will include dresses, skirts, tops and pants at a price point of $24 to $84.

You might be wondering where the "data-driven" part comes in. Since PopSugar has access to a global audience of 400 million and reaches one in three female millennials, the company has a lot of data and analytics about what this demographic is looking for in apparel. (The promo industry has some ideas, too.) The Kohl's collection will be based off what readers are searching for and engaging with across its different channels.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Biplk49HDZB/?hl=en&taken-by=popsugar

“We see an opportunity to draw more millennial customers and young families to Kohl’s," Greg Revelle, Kohl's senior executive vice president and chief marketing officer, said in a press release. "This partnership is an illustration of how Kohl’s can attract and serve this customer with a unique experience that couples compelling new product with an engaging shopping and marketing experience."

Because Kohl's has the ability to turn around fashion pieces on short notice, it will be able to react relatively quickly to the trends PopSugar is predicting and update apparel design accordingly.

It will be interesting if millennial shoppers will respond to this model. Subscription start-up Stitch Fix has already seen huge success with its own data algorithms, so it seems like only a matter of time before most apparel design decisions are made with data. Nike also jumped on the data train with its Advanced Apparel Exploration collection 1.0.

What do you think of data-driven apparel? Could you see this expanding into the promotional apparel world?