Decorator Profile
more responsive and offering greater variety, which changes weekly. Sort of like the next frontier of fast fashion.
– Tim Williams, CEO of YR Store
Tim Williams, CEO and co-founder of YR Store
needed to fill it with three full-time members of staff to do the printing and that was the difficulty with us doing the live printing. We werenʼt really charging a premium for the product, but we were staffing quite heavily because itʼs quite a labour intensive process at the point of consumption. The costs of running retail stores and a tech brand didnʼt add up,” explains Tim.
Cue a change in direction for YR Store. In 2015, YR Store closed all of its stores and quietly removed itself from the retail world. Rather than be a fashion brand, the team took the decision to work with other fashion brands and help them achieve their customisation dreams in their own stores.
“One of our big selling points to the brands is that we have run our own retail stores, we know what the customers want from in store customisation, we know how to keep it simple. All the learnings that we made from our retail experience, we can pass on to the brands,” says Tim.
Software is at the core At the core of what YR Store does is the software. The software that YR Store has created allows the customer to make their own personalised design and then send that design seamlessly through to the printer or embroidery machine. A piece of software can be customised to each brandʼs own customisation needs. With offices around the world, Tim is in the unique position of seeing how the personalisation market differs from
www.printwearandpromotion.co.uk
country to country and as he says, there are definitely quirks to each market. For example, over in the States, events, exhibitions and conferences are big business. Companies use YR Storeʼs software as a way to print on demand for visitors as a reward for coming on to their stand or filling in a quick survey. Tim provides this example: “A big side of our business is the promotion side. For example an insurance company will pay us to go to an insurance conference and allow guests to create a design on a touch screen and give the product away. The insurance company is effectively paying us to provide a service at an event to give a gift of a customised product. The promotional products industry is worth $20 billion in the US alone and itʼs pens, T shirts, tote bags, all that sort of stuff. Our argument is instead, of pre-printing these products, why not print them live at the event and create the experience. You get people onto your exhibition stand, you get people to talk to you at your conference. You create a spectacle and a buzz by having this live printing aspect on your stand. “For events we can actually collect data as well. As long as weʼre upfront with people and they know their data is going to be kept in a GDPR compliant way, itʼs actually a very effective way of getting really good data.”
While over in Japan, merchandise is the growth market. “In Tokyo, the Japanese business has seen a lot of success with
online music merch. The company works with two of the biggest labels over there. These labels will have a roster of artists under them, who have a massive loyal following. Now, imagine a supermarket filled with products with your favourite band on them all from the same label. Towels, sweets, protein shakes, shoes, every sort of product you can imagine from apparel through to knickknacks for your house all branded with the band merch. They just fly out the door,” explains Tim. “We do carry out some live printing in these stores, but where we are seeing the real growth in Tokyo is this online platform where you can go in as a fan and check the progress of your group and what the latest news is and also create your own custom product or on demand product which isnʼt customised. We are fulfilling these orders. Weʼve got a print set up, a factory called the Garage which is able to print and ship these orders direct to the customer. Itʼs the same business offering, but they are really focused on the online and production aspect.”
A customer using one of YR Store’s in store customisation screens
The on-demand market After cracking the online and in store customisation business model, the next move for YR Store is to target the on-demand market. YR Store is currently working on a project in a bid to change the way fashion is manufactured and to turn the phrase ʻfast fashionʼ on its head. As the project is currently being kept under wraps, Tim can only go into so much detail, but he is able to give a brief outline of how this will work: “As an order is placed on a retailerʼs e-commerce site, whether thatʼs a customised or a pre-existing design, it is only at that point that it will be printed or embroidered. Each item will be one of one. “Thatʼs the clever part. Manufacturing like this means you donʼt get any waste, or very little waste, and you are also super responsive to trends. This is 2019 and if your supply chain is a year long, then you have definitely got some issues. We see the future of retail being much more responsive and offering greater variety, which changes weekly. Sort of like the next frontier of fast fashion. Fast fashion has got real negative connotations and it doesnʼt need to have” explains Tim. Customisation and personalisation is changing the way consumers shop and will soon change the way fashion is manufactured in the 21st century. YR Store intends to be at the forefront of this revolution.
September 2019 | 63 | We see the future of retail being much
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