Recently, Clo Willaert , our belgian queen of the blog & organiser of the  Girl Geek Dinner group , invited 40 bloggers for a special day event in London. I was honoured to be part of this community beeing able to test a new ground-breaking application for smart phones using Flickr to share photos &  Twitter for tips messages. The idea is to be able to follow and contact each other in real time during a Shopping day in London.

Eurostar brought us to London for an exclusive shopping hunt and gave us a number of great advantages. In more than 9 shops in Regent Street, we enjoyed discounts and whole bunch of other advantages : a glass of Champagne in the Swarovski Crystallized Lounge, …

We also followed an unique presentation in the Apple Store. Molly Flat, female blogger for the Guardian and Jess Greenwood of Contagious Magazine, gave us an overview of the top 10 trends of 2009.

As you can see here, this great application contains an interactive map of London where you can see all the participating shops and the precise position of all the 40 bloggers. We can also post messages and pictures with the application and automatically exchange them with the others!

Just listen to an interview about what a Girl Geek really is here:

And now back to online shopping!

Tagged: Eurostar, Girl Geek Dinner, London, Shopping ]]> http://cmoitier.wordpress.com/2009/04/10/shop-and-blog-till-you-drop-ggsl-london/feed/ 1 cmoitier map http://cmoitier.wordpress.com/2008/12/03/biometric-sizing-technology-beats-savile-row-tailers/ http://cmoitier.wordpress.com/2008/12/03/biometric-sizing-technology-beats-savile-row-tailers/#comments Wed, 03 Dec 2008 14:35:10 +0000 cmoitier http://cmoitier.wordpress.com/?p=143 ]]>

In a test of made-to-measure shirts, Which?, the consumer watchdog, found that Marks & Spencer’s £30 service was twice as good as a shirt from 40 Savile Row, a retailer based on London’s most famous street for tailoring. This shirt costs £165.50.

The test examined three over-the-internet shirt makers, but found the fit and comfort of the M&S shirt easily beat the 40 Savile Row shirt, giving the M&S shirt 16 points out of 20, compared to a mere 7 out of 20 for the upmarket version from Savile Row. The shirt from Tailor Store, an online specialist, garnered 14 points out of 20 and costs just fractionally more than M&S’s at £30.90.

M&S, which launched its made-to-measure service a year ago, has found it very popular with customers. They just need to tap in their collar size, age, height and weight into an online form and the computer “uses BivolinoServices biometric technology to work out the correct size and fit”.

A spokesman for the retailer, which has been suffering from faltering sales in recent months, said: “We’re thrilled but not altogether surprised. The made-to-measure service has been very popular.”

The French e-commerce is growing very dynamically : 10 bio € for the first 2 quarters 08 with 21 mio online buyers according to the FEVAD, the french distance selling association.

The average e-shopping basket is around 94€, a growth of 3%. The number of merchants has also increased by 50% making an estimated 43.000 total e-merchants. Today, the e-shoppers are very representative of the whole french population. Buying online is now possible for anyone.

These are the general positive facts and figures. Now let’s have a look at the most progressing product category: fashion. According to the ‘Institut Français de la Mode‘, fashion online is already making 4.5% of the total fashion retail (it was 3,8% last year).

Lingerie is the top online fashion category, followed by kids fashion and sportswear. Regarding the pricing, womenswear is 15% cheaper than in ‘bricks-&- mortar’ fashion retail while mens fashion remains at the same pricing level as in the traditional retail. This suggests me that men are first seduced by the rapidity & conveniency of online buying. 50% of the online fashion business is ‘discount’ pricing (promotions, discounted brands,…) while this represents only 30% in the traditional fashion retail. Female heavy fashion e-shoppers are 25-44 years old while male are 15-24 years old.