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I

t was an otherwise unremarkably drab

Friday in late January, but fans of Beyon-

cé and of streetwear were in a panic. Af-

ter weeks of anticipation, the singer’s

clothing label, Ivy Park, launched its latest

limited-edition collaboration with Adidas

online. Fans hit refresh-refresh-refresh so

as not to miss out on the latest fashion from

the star.

A top retail trend for 2019, “the drop,” as

limited-quantity and timed product releas-

es are known, was once reserved for sneak-

er culture and streetwear brands such as

Supreme and OVO, but has evolved to in-

clude international brands such as Gucci

and Burberry.

One could imagine that the concept

might have lost its edge when Amazon

launched its influencer fashion concept

the Drop last summer, both named for and

built around that principle of immediacy

and urgency, with a countdown clock rein-

forcing that the items from each limited-

edition range were available to buy for only

30 hours, but the merchandising conceit is

stronger than ever.

When the commercial strategy began –

inducing scarcity in order to spur consum-

er excitement – it was good for business.

But as it turns out, it’s also a boon for foster-

ing creative change in the life cycle of the

fashion system.

Toronto-based retail expert Janice Rud-

kowski dubs drops as “orchestrated hyste-

ria” and says they are proving useful for

thoughtful small businesses and designers

who operate on a more personal scale. “It

ticks off so many of the retailer boxes, when

you think about it,” says the assistant pro-

fessor with Ryerson University’s Ted Rogers

School of Retail Management. “It’s actually

a better way of managing your inventory, a

much more predictable way. It also pro-

vides a regular base of revenue.”

As independent Canadian fashion labels

increasingly move to a direct-to-consumer

model, they too are finding drops essential

to an effective retail game. “It started out a

very niche and special thing that happened

with streetwear, and in trying to drive the

scarcity and exclusivity, it built the brand

base,” Rudkowski says. “Now it’s part of any

brand’s experiential retail toolkit, both in

terms of building the brand and helping

with the supply chain.”

Eliza Faulkner, who designs an epony-

mous contemporary women’s label in

Montreal, for example, now builds drops

into her schedule.

She initially experimented with drops in

a haphazard way. “It was a creative thing,

I’d get really bored between seasons and

wanted to be making something new, to re-

lease something now,” Faulkner says. But a

couple years ago, after one collection didn’t

sell to stores as well as she’d hoped, she

worked them into her business strategy.

“We had a lot of leftover fabric from our pre-

vious seasons and decided to use up what

we had,” she says. “That’s also when my In-

stagram started ramping up and I had the

power to put a picture up and sell it out. We

started noticing it was really working for

us.”

Rudkowski likens social media’s role in

the drop to the way postrecession real es-

tate markets helped normalize the pop-up.

“Drop culture is following a similar life cy-

cle, where, once used sparingly, they’re

now part of a regular strategy,” she says.

“Whether it’s a big retailer or a small brand,

it’s a strategy that’s very accessible for

many brands, at every level. But I do think

it would have been challenging to orches-

trate all of that without social media. It’s

been the perfect storm of timing and tech-

nology.”

The consumer psychology of the drop

also cultivates a collector mindset when it

comes to shopping, Rudkowski points out.

“And then there are the people who

want to be part of the lineups or part of a

community, who shop like amateur

sleuths,” she adds. “Connoisseurs. Wheth-

er in the real world or online, they’re going

to recognize each other and become part of

the same exclusive community.”

Turns out even a veteran retail reporter

can be susceptible to that lure of belonging:

It’s how I found myself with a red-letter day

in my calendar. Reminders and device

alarms went off one Saturday morning, just

in case I forgot my appointment with Col-

lingwood-based Red Sky’s online shop. My

quarry? The scheduled 10 a.m. drop of their

signature baggy boiler suit in a limited-edi-

tion leopard print. It had been teased for

weeks on the brand’s Instagram feed. Once

I got it, spotting it out in the wild on others

and via hashtags on Instagram stories

made me feel, I will admit, smuglyau cou-

rant.

Beyond a boost in sales, executing a drop

also has environmental benefits. “Being

sustainable is very important to everyone

these days and we’re trying to find our way

through that,” says Jade Cooling, studio

manager at the Toronto label Boneset Stu-

dio. “Ultimately, if the bolt of fabric is gone

that’s great for us. We don’t want it to be left

over – want it to live out there in the world.”

Reducing garment waste is a goal shared by

other indie label darlings such as Rachel

Comey, which recently released as a drop

what it called “archival reproductions,”

customer favourite previous styles in limit-

ed editions, cut from fabric left over from

past seasons.

Boneset Studio recently launched a

yarn-dyed Irish linen dress, in pink ging-

ham and priced at $365, as a preorder drop.

It sold out almost instantly – before they’d

even sewn it together. It was announced

and promoted through Instagram stories

and posts, and suits the company’s hand-

made-to-order business model as it transi-

tions from being a custom design house in-

to offering off-the-rack garments. The size

of the drop – just five units – wasn’t to man-

ufacture excitement; it was dictated by the

small supply of fabric sourced from a heri-

tage mill. But the buzz of urgency neverthe-

less helped the post and stories get shared

and raised awareness about the growing

brand. Of the five dresses sold, two were to

repeat customers and three were pur-

chased by people new to the brand.

Drops suit Boneset’s production capac-

ity – everything is designed, cut and sewn

in-house. “In my perfect world, we will con-

tinue to [have] these little drops of special

groups, maybe 25 a month, in a style we

know you love,” says creative director Ste-

fanie Ayoub, with different fabrics. “And

then it’s gone.”

In this evolved approach to the supply

chain, when it’s judiciously deployed by in-

dependent labels, drop culture isn’t just a

marketing ploy for hype. It’s part of an

evolved approach to that can shift atti-

tudes about the things we buy, to value

them all the more.

SpecialtoTheGlobeandMail

Going,going,gone

Thedrop–thereleaseoflimited-edition,limited-quantityfashion–isheretostay

TorontolabelBonesetStudioisamongthemanyexperimentingwithdrops.Thefiveunitsthatmadeupthedropforthis

yarn-dyedIrishlinendressinpinkginghamsoldoutalmostinstantly–andbeforethegarmentsthemselveshadbeensewn.

NATHALIE

ATKINSON

STYLE