Looking for support from HN for my Beacon campaign - for anyone who'd be interested in reading founder's stories and posts covering successes/lessons learned.
Beacon is like Netflix for news. They use a clean, no-ad reading interface with the ability to directly fund writers through their platform.
About Me: I'm a contributing writer to an LA-Based news pub called TechZulu. We cover breaking tech news among other topics, but I've found most of my passion in learning the stories of the people behind the businesses. (Some examples below):
Through this project, I'm looking to refine this concept and give entrepreneurs a venue to share their stories and what they've learned.
Specific to this campaign, I'll be finding and contacting this year's W14 batches from notable incubators across the country (YC, Techstars, etc.). If you're interested in these stories, please consider supporting my campaign.
Note - I'm not directly affiliated with Beacon other than using their services, But I do think they have a cool concept and platform and hope they find success.
As it is, we're actually under wraps for full disclosure of sourcing, but what we can say is that we don't white label our gowns from stateside manufacturers (common practice in the industry).
At the same time though, we're not the same as the factory owners who create copyhouse/replica websites. (We'll be writing on that too.)
We worked with our factories to create our designs, and ordered everything up front. Final product QA was done in-house. Hope this answers your question!
Hi HN, quick intro here (full details in another thread).
We're a bootstrapped bridal co - we sell online only, offer high quality, and low prices by cutting out traditional retailers. (Think Warby Parker & Everlane for bridal).
Secondary goal is to give brides advice through an insider's perspective. Our aim here isn't to push product, but to empower brides to make educated decisions (and save money/headache) through editorial content.
From explaining manufacturing (and associated markups) to how to get a custom $200 gown made overseas, we want to break open the industry and cover subjects that no else will, since bridal is traditionally heavy on selling brand & image to justify markups.
I think you guys have found a niche that's ripe for innovation and a shakeup of the establishment. Wedding dress shopping has to be the most ridiculous endeavor I've witnessed.
How does Something New solve the inability to try on designer dresses? You offer a dozen dresses, but no designers are listed. If I wanted say, a 2014 Vera Wang dress and knew exactly which one, could you help me?
Part of our company ethos is to not carry other designers. By sourcing our gowns directly and having our own brand, we can essentially offer similar styling and comparable quality, but for a much lower price.
If we were to buy and sell Vera Wang's pieces, we'd operate as one of their retailers and would be subject to their pricing and selling policies - (which for most designers means no online sales and no price breaks).
It'll be a while for us to build our product reputation and brand, but that's one of the long-term goals - to have brides realize that 'designer brands' are a subjective experience and a quality gown can be had without needing to buy into that.
JT & Daehee, really love the concept and approach to this idea and we're actually trying to chase a very similar concept (transparent retail, cutting out the middleman and outrageous markups), but in the bridal space. http://somethingnewbridal.com
Would love to follow up with you guys specifically to chat sometime if you have the time. Thanks for the inspiration!
