Shopping Online in Canada Sucks
At Wantering we’ve been focused on making shopping online better for the last 18 months. What Canadians would call luxuries—free shipping and returns, next day delivery, and duty-free purchases—our American counterparts enjoy from almost every major online fashion retailer. No wonder we’d rather wait for our next trip across the border to buy clothes.
Having seen first hand the exponential growth of e-commerce in the US, we were excited to hear about the recent news regarding HBC’s $2.4 billion US acquisition of New York-based luxury retailer Saks Inc.
Between Saks.com and Nordstrom.com opening up their online stores to Canadian shoppers duty-free in the near future, we’ll see a transformation of the online retail space over the next year. Imagine having access to that limited edition collaboration sold only by a specific retailer delivered to your door tomorrow. Even better, if it doesn’t fit, send it back for free and get a full refund. Now that’s a big deal.
The e-commerce industry is ripe for disruption by technology. Wantering is focused on making product search a better experience. When you think of where to go online to search for a pair of oxford shoes, a dress for a wedding you’re attending, or to see what’s on sale from your favorite brand, where’s the first place you look?
Instead of opening up multiple e-commerce sites in your browser or trying to do a search on Google Shopping (or worse, Nextag or Shopzilla), you can actually search and shop for fashion across a curated list of boutiques, flash sales sites, and major retailers all in one place on Wantering.
Other Canadian companies have been working on e-commerce innovation in their own space. Montreal’s Frank and Oak is showing us that it’s possible to create a vertically integrated fashion business based on the thrill of getting your hand-picked box of clothes every month. Vancouver-based Indochino has also created a vertically integrated business by proving that custom-fitted suits are accessible to everyone.
What we’re all working on is changing the way you shop for clothes by focusing on solving already existing shopping problems. Whether you hate shopping or can’t seem to find a suit that fits your body perfectly, there’s a way to use technology to save time, shop stress-free, and look good all at the same time.
Creating an exciting, engaging and simplified online shopping experience is what shoppers demand and deserve. Let’s step up our game and make shopping online in Canada suck less.
