Make your customers your constituents - BetaBrand

Heard of BetaBrand? Neither. But they have some interesting ideas such as crowdsourcing garment concepts - like these crossover yoga pants that do double duty as dress trousers for work. So you can salute the sun or downward dog at your desk. The brand also engages it community with Model Citizen - offering a discount if customers take a picture of themselves wearing BB kit and it appears on their home page. 

I like the Think Tank "This is the place to purchase upcoming products, help us develop new prototypes, and even submit ideas of your own. At Betabrand, you create the future of fashion."

Seems the whole brand is about engaging its customers in a conversation not only about what they sell but also what they should sell. 

Obviously their constituents (a term I've been using for many years now - because 'consumers' is to narrow a definition and implies a passive grazing - like sheep), their constituents are active in all dimensions of their daily lives. Who would have thought there would be a category of clothing for people who cycle to work? I like the idea of a blazer with reflective details when you flip the collar or lean over the handlebars.

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The Takeaway:

1. Don't make/sell the same shit as your competitors. The world has too much same/same already. 
2. Don't just 'listen' to customers - engage with them, conversations are two-way - especially if your brand is in a particular niche and its all 'us', rather than 'us and them'.
3. Have some fun with it - disrupting convention (cycling and yoga work wear?) see where things that seem nutty will spill.

Do they ship to New Zealand? - Looks like they do.
There's an interesting profile of BetaBrand here on The Verge
As a footnote: Here's a video about production progress of the crowdsourced yogapants - if you have been thinking of developing video for your business - don't over think it - just get going.

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Have you encountered BetaBrand? What do you think? Leave a comment.