While Gilt and Groupon may be top of mind in their categories, here’s another reminder that some very profitable things are happening with brands who have marketshare, even if they don’t lead in mindshare: Hautelook, the flash sales site which launched in December 2007, was just acuiqred by Nordstrom for $270 million. {TechCrunch}

This is mostly a stock deal – $180 million in Nordstrom stock, with a $90 million potential earn-out over the next three years. It’s a smart move for Nordstrom though, and one that we suggested more department stores look into on a guest post at the Business of Fashion last year.

Well, not specifically an acquisition, but certainly a focus on developing the type of online sales websites that are popular with wealthy online shoppers. In this case, an acquisition is likely a better choice than being trying to develop a competing online presence around Nordstrom Rack. Neiman Marcus recently took that route with it’s Last Call brand, but  other department stores like Saks and Barneys continue to keep their discount brands limited to suburban outlets.

While there are sure signs that the luxury market is coming back, the revival is coming from younger, less wealthy shoppers who may be introduced to luxury brands through sites like Hautelook or Gilt that offer items at lower prices. The flash sale sites have often said that consumers introduced to brands through their sites often go on to make additional brand purchases after the sale ends.

For department stores looking to grow revenues, it increasingly just makes good business sense to throw out old thinking that bargain shoppers aren’t as valuable as those who buy at full price. By developing or acquiring online properties that capture a significant part of that audience, they’ll likely find themselves increasing sales at every place in the shopping cycle.

Which stores and websites are we likely to see on future acquisition or partnership press releases? Gilt Group is valued somewhere between $400 million and $500 million making it a more likely candidate for an IPO, RueLaLa was already acquired by GSI commerce for $350 million, which leaves Ideeli and Beyond the Rack as the next largest and most likely targets.

As far as retailers, Saks, Barneys or Macy’s (who owns Bloomingdale’s) are most likely. Macy’s has the money and the traffic to try to develop their own presence, so we’ll take them out of the potential buyer pool; Saks cut a lot of underperforming stores and has decided not to open many more, so developing their own online property is probably not going to happen, but acquiring an already successful one could make sense; finally there’s Barneys, which has had several well publicized staff changes aimed at increasing sales, and online sales have been designated an area of particular importance.

When it comes to models though, how exactly do clients calculate what a model is worth?

Elena Greenwell, a model for online retailer Shopbop

Earlier this week, Jezebel published documents from an ongoing lawsuit involving models who claim their former agency was withholding payments. the most interesting part are earning statements where it’s discovered that for all of the prestige that comes with a Vogue editorial, the H&M ad running next to it was probably worth much more for the model. Specifically, it’s revealed that Vogue‘s day rate for models (at least in this case) is a paltry $250, and French Vogue‘s is $125. Don’t feel too bad – campaigns for H&M pay $60,000, J.Crew pays $15,000 for catalog appearances and booking campaigns for luxury brand ad campaigns can range from $35,000 to $172,500 – we’re asusming for more than one campaign.

While the money is obviously in ads, the editorial appearances are seen as a catalyst for launching commercial careers. The assumption being that the models in the commercial campaigns bring in at least as much as they’re paid in sales.

Today, the New York Times claims that online retailers see more value in more “relatable” looking models. While you may be able to relate to Karlie Kloss or Freja Beha Erichsen just fine, online retailers think they’ll influence a wider audience with slightly larger models (size 4, rather than size 0) who is good looking, but not in the “gorgeous, but I’d never be able to look like that” way that runway models can be.

There are enough photoshop disasters from fashion ad campaigns to remind us that the definition of relatable is still incredibly subjective, but Shopbop and Gilt both voice opinions that shoppers don’t want to see impossibly flawless models when shopping.

“We donâ€t want a model to appear intimidating in a way they do in a fashion show,” Gilt’s Alexandra Wilkis Wilson tells the Times.

Steven Reider, a manager at Elite Model Management says online  appearances haven’t “ever made anyone a star on the global playing field of models,” but if the money is made on the more commercial campaigns, does that matter? Bluefly, the only retailer mentioned in the Times’ piece to test the difference between using models and using headless mannequins noticed only a very small increase in sales when using people to promote the items. Customers, they found, placed far more value on being able to zoom in on details and view more detailed photos.

Does this, in fact, support the position of using models as clothes hangers rather than personalities? After all, if an actual clothes hanger brings in the same amount in sales, why bother with the more costly model? We actually think it points more to the need for the return of the 90’s style supermodel who was as much of a draw as the clothes. Beauty companies – perfume makers especially- have found celebrity endorsed products can equal big sales, so there’s obviously some real value in name or face recognition. Magazines – Vogue included, have seen increases in circulation by pushing models off the cover in favor of actresses, musicians and other celebrities. They may not have the recognition of  J.Lo or Beyonce, but wouldn’t models become more relatable if they were allowed to become celebrities in their own right again? Victoria’s Secret has done pretty well business-wise with that line of thought, in spite of the fact that most women buying underwear will probably never be able to relate to walking around wearing a million dollar bra (or contract, for that matter).

All of the styles are under $50, and while there are definite design similarities to the classic Mulberry line, the studded heart purse trick gives these purses a distinctly younger feel. For fans attached to the main Mulberry line who were hoping for a lower priced iteration of the line rather than something related but different, that might be something of a disappointment.

Faux patent-leather can be tricky to pull off: if the PVC is too heavy, it can often look cheap. It’s not always easy to judge from images alone, but the quilted denim seems to offer a good contrast that gives the dark blue purses a slightly more polished look than the all patent bags. For a bag under $50 though, the hardware on all of the bags looks pretty solid. At the very least, worth a second look come October.

In fashion the private sale space is pretty crowded, with companies like Gilt, Rue La La, Hautelook and Ideeli among many others prompting questions about the sustainability of the luxury sample sale model past a certain point. Even though most of the sites have offered household items and other non-fashion sales, Gilt was one of the first to establish separate destination sites for different markets. Gilt Fuse offered a destination for mass market brands, Gilt Man split off the guy focused offerings and Jetsetter became the first site to apply the online private sale model solely to travel.

The move was seen as a smart one for a way to increase revenue amid concerns over limited quantities of unsold designer goods. Vacationist only marks the second site to focus on the travel market – compare that to more than 10 sites who battle it out for unsold apparel, but we have to wonder if the same issues will come into play.

The recession hit almost every consumer sector, and hotel bookings sank in line with consumer demand, so many hoteliers were willing to offer discounts to fill empty rooms. Though the economy is still not completely out of the woods, there have been signs of spending in some areas picking up. Starwood Hotels, the group that operates 4 and 5 star hotel chains like W, Sheraton, Le Meridien and St. Regis, reports a pickup in occupancy rates for the first quarter of the year and rates beginning to rise this month. {Reuters}

Expedia has also reported an increase in worldwide hotel revenue, even though the per room rates are down 5%. {WSJ} Though bookings may have been helped by discounts, special promotions and other offers to fill more rooms, once occupancy begins to increase it’s not a stretch to assume that hotels will offer less substantial discounts as they try to return to more solid growth.

Unlike clothing, where a designer can use lower cost fabrics and less costly detailing to bring prices down for discount collections, hotels don’t have the same options. Sure, they can take away the continental breakfast that comes with a rack rate or charge extra for amenities based on the rate type, but the person who cleans the rooms are paid the same regardless of if you’ve booked at full price or a discount and many other operating expenses stay the same.

So while the discounts on sites like Jetsetter, Vacationist, or even old favorites like Priceline and Hotwire will still be there, as things get back to normal don’t count on them being as deep or available as often.

Apparently, we’re not the only ones who noticed.

A screenshot of a wine tasting deal on Gilt City

As of a few days ago, Gilt is now offering Gilt City, a New York specific section of the popular site dedicated to deals on local experiences ranging from a 3-course meal for two at Rouge Tomate, to frozen yogurt at 16 Handles and discounts on salon services at Vartali Salon.

There are notable differences from Groupon: offers are updated weekly rather than daily, but there are multiple deals rather than a single one and merchants can offer multiple options. {TechCrunch}

Vartali Salon, for example, offered two haircut deals, a Keratin/Brazillian straightening offer, and a 3-step processs. Both of the haircut offers have sold out, as has the 3-course meal at Rouge Tomate, and orchestra seats at the musical A Little Night Music starring Catherine Zeta-Jones.

Gilt’s significant existing user-base means that unlike other Groupon competitors, they’ll be able to launch with built-in demand in enough cities to pose a solid offense. With many people questioning how long the excess merchandise will last, and what will happen when there are no longer enough true clearance items to satisfy growing demand, this seems like a good way to increase overall sales when growth in the discount designer fashion segment hits the predicted wall.

One company that seems like a natural fit for the model is Daily Candy. After their acquisition by Comcast, the newsletter that offers daily snapshots of fashion, food and fun added sample sales to compete with Gilt, but the Groupon model would certainly make even more sense for the locally-focused company. We’d be surprised if there isn’t some kind of announcement from Daily Candy before the end of this year.

In addition to the existing shopping sites, newspapers like the San Diego Union Tribune have been eyeing Groupon style business models as a way to offset declining classified advertising revenue. So in addition to Gilt and Groupon (and Daily Candy, if they move quickly), we wouldn’t be surprised if New Yorkers could soon have the option of deals from New York Magazine, the New York Times, the New York Post… There’s certainly no shortage of print publishers who are looking for ways to make more money from their online operations, and with Groupon’s revenue growing almost as quickly as the number of competing sites, their model makes an attractive target.

Want to know where the wealthy shop online in the UK? Visit Signature9 UK for a look at the UK shopping sites popular with high earners.

It’s impossible to break out apparel shoppers for department store sites (many of which also sell home and garden items), so it should be noted than not every visitor browsing macys.com is there for clothing, beauty or jewelry items. But even if half of the visitors are there for dresses instead of dishes, Macy’s is attracting one of the largest (and richest) online shopping audiences.

Our data is from Google’s Ad Planner, which only offers visitor and demographic information going back one year. We can’t say if the economy has played a role in shifting online shopping preferences, but presently, wealthy online shoppers aren’t visiting luxury destinations in the same volume as they visit e-commerce sites with mid-level pricing. A possible silver lining for sites specializing in luxury sales: while they may not get the same volume of traffic, it’s quite possible that high end e-commerce sites earn more per sale and visitor.

Of the top 20 apparel e-commerce sites attracting the largest number of wealthy online shoppers, 6 (30%) are sites specializing in discount sales. Gilt and Rue La La are neck and neck for the title of the invitation sale site with the wealthiest visitors. Allowing for a small sampling error, the two sites could even reach the same number of wealthy visitors. The advantage, however, goes to Gilt Groupe, who attracts a combined 1.2 million visitors across the main Gilt site, and recently launched sister (and brother) sites Gilt Fuse and Gilt Man. Combined, Gilt Groupe attracts more visitors earning $100,000 or more than any other online only e-commerce apparel site besides Zappos. Pretty impressive for a company that’s not even 3 years old.

When it comes to visitors earning $100k or more per year, invitation sale sites may not have as many visitors as department stores, but as a percentage of visitors, a sizable portion are in this desirable online shopper demographic.

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Need an invitation? http://www.gilt.com/invite/signature9 will get you in on the designer discounts.