The e-commerce giant and the media company are bringing products and influencers to a 10-day shop in their first joint live experience.
The e-commerce giant and Refinery, just acquired by an evolving Vice Media, will host a shop featuring products from Amazon’s home and fashion sections “curated” by Refinery editors through Dec. 15. Naturally, the shop will also feature Amazon’s Alexa device and its Discover tool, aimed at getting customers to experience the search abilities for home and fashion. Influencers such as actor Jamie Chung and chef and cookbook author Gaby Dalkin will also host daily events during the 10-day pop-up in New York, including sessions on personal styling and party hosting.
While Carmen Nestares, chief marketing officer of Amazon Fashion, said this pop-up partnership is part of a “larger collaboration” with Refinery (the site frequently links to products on Amazon for shopping content and the like), it is also part of a continued push to reach new shoppers.
“We’ve seen a growing response to immersive, interactive experiences, and this one-of-a-kind pop-up further enables customers to engage live with our fashion and home selection,” Nestares said.
As for whether Amazon is working to reach any specific demographic, like the Millennial women audience that frequents Refinery, Nestares said the pop-up is aimed at “the whole family.”
“Of the tens of millions of customers shopping fashion on Amazon, no two are the same,” she added. “So above all, we aim to give each of our customers a delightful, convenient shopping experience.”
The selection of gifts will be available to shoppers on Amazon’s site as well, branded as “influencer-inspired picks” from Refinery, with the influencer area being one that Amazon has been working its way into for a few years now. With the site’s focus on shopping since it was founded in 2005, Stacy Fuller, senior vice president of marketing at Refinery, said building a custom event with Amazon “was a natural next step to extend our commerce offerings” and “connect with our audience in real life.”
Refinery has worked with Amazon for some time, across many of its verticals, and is also experienced in live events — part of the reason Vice wanted to bring the site into its fold was its growing and revenue-generating events business.
Fuller said shopping events like the pop-up with Amazon “are complementary to our digital shopping experience, and reflect the content and commercial stories we bring to life across our channels.”
Specifically, Fuller said internal metrics show 84 percent of Refinery’s audience “seeks out experiential events” and 64 percent “want to interact with brands and products at these kinds of events.”
“Consumers are looking for functional integration throughout their shopping experience, with a trusted partner that can recommend new touch points to discover and engage,” Fuller added. “Live activations like these can deliver one-to-one brand interaction and brand halo you can’t buy, yes, but ultimately, we want these events to help consumers move seamlessly between their online and in-store experiences so that we can deliver value and a differentiated experience on the way to their purchase.”