Technology >> CEO Interviews >> October 6, 1999
It's hard to believe that BEN NARASIN, founder and majority owner of
fashionmall.com, Inc., the world's leading commercial fashion website,
began his revolutionary endeavor by searching for a better way to sell
shirts. Instead, his concept has become a trailblazing entity that is
transforming both the fashion and Internet industries. Back in the
mid-1980's, Mr. Narasin was a college student in Boston, enjoying
phenomenal success as an up-and-coming fashion designer and businessman.
As founder of the lifestyle clothing label Boston Preparatory Company,
Ben had pioneered the style genre of 'updated traditional' clothing
through his introduction of color-blocked oxford shirts long before
global design houses capitalized on the trend. From his humble fashion
beginnings, he made his first sample of BPC's trademark garment by
sewing together two of his own oxford shirts he saw a need for a
stylish, cutting-edge take on traditional fashion. The sales figures of
BPC's clothing were seeing record numbers, earning BPC a place within
Inc. magazine's 500 Fastest-Growing U.S. Companies. At this time, BPC
was forging a brand identity while extending its reach through a series
of private label license and manufacturing deals for some of the
country's leading clothiers and catalogs, including Macy's, Nordstrom,
Parisian, Jacobson's, Land's End, The Limited, Ann Taylor, Abercrombie &
Fitch, and Structure. By the mid-90's, BPC was beginning to lose some of
its business to the cachet of top design houses who had picked up on the
'updated traditional' trend. The Internet was still in its infancy, and,
as CEO of BPC for ten years, Mr. Narasin had been responsible for all of
the firm's hardware and software, including the creation and maintenance
of the company's LAN and other networking systems, acquiring a
substantial background in technology. He recognized the potential of the
World Wide Web as a global marketing and commerce tool, and, over the
next six months, immersed himself in researching Internet applications
that would help solidify and advance BPC's brand identity. What he found
during these early days of the Internet, was a veritable 'black hole' of
information, as he describes it. He began looking at the Internet as a
whole, its possibilities and the companies who would be his neighbors
and competitors within the World Wide Web. 'At this point, the Internet
was providing a huge amount of information to consumers, with very
little order, and each label or manufacturer was trying to position
themselves on the Web in order to solidify its identity and reach more
customers,' says Narasin. 'With thousands of companies trying to reach
millions of consumers through the same medium, how does one not get lost
in the shuffle? 'That question caused me to take my focus off BPC in
particular, and instead look at forging a true 'destination point' on
the Internet a cooperative concept that provides both content and
commerce, and offers new opportunities for both the consumer and the
vendor.' fashionmall.com, the result of this undertaking, was launched
in December, 1994, and is the most visited and successful Internet
location of its kind. In May of 1999, Mr. Nasarin took his company
public, cementing fashionmall.com's stature in both the fashion and
Internet industries. Mr. Nasarin has previously written about technology
and the Internet for Inc. magazine's 'Technology Quarterly' and for its
online magazine. His personal achievements include an Effie Award for
excellence in advertising, as well as various awards for his
entrepreneurial success. Profile
fashionmall.com, the company's history, activities, customers, those
kinds of things please.
Mr. Narasin: Sure, I'll give you a
