Garmz, a 6-month-old startup from London, is among a growing list of websites banking on the internet to make pre-orders easier, reduce risk when it comes to mass production and excess inventory.

A design up for votes on Garmz

Burberry and Proenza Schouler are two established brands who’ve taken a similar approach, allowing customers to order items immediately after they appear on runways, so the idea of allowing demand to create supply is recent, but not totally new. Neither is the desire to allow emerging designers a platform to have their work seen – and eventually produced. “Democratize fashion,” is the popular tagline, and dozens of companies have tried in at least two dozen ways to put their spin on it with varying degrees of success and failure.

What then, is Garmz’s approach? Part community, part commerce, designers submit sketches to the Garmz website where users vote on their favorites. Once a design achieves popularity, the Garmz team reviews it to ensure it would be suitable for production (we’re guessing that means you won’t be able to order any Lady Gaga style meat dresses) and the designer is contacted to work through details for creating a prototype. Garmz then photographs the item, calculates the production price and puts it online for pre-orders. depending on the number of pre-orders, the piece moves into larger batch production where Garmz takes on the role of a traditional online retailer.

A Garmz produced jacket up for discounted pre-order

Designers receive 5% of the revenue on each piece sold. 5% doesn’t seem like much, but co-founder Andreas Klinger feels that Garmz still offers a unique advantage over other options that would give designers a larger cut. Etsy, for example, charges $0.20 for each item listed, and a 3.5% fee when an item sells. While that leaves a would-be designer with 95%+ of the sale, Klinger explains that Garmz is adding a layer of professional services in addition to a marketplace.

When a design on Garmz goes into production, the company handles everything from sourcing fabrics and textiles to mass production in Eastern Europe. Designers don’t have to learn about pattern making, finding production facilities or any of the things that are typically needed to move from individual items to commercial collection, and typically not covered in design schools.

Additionally there’s quality. Looking at some of the finished garments on display, there’s a consistency in fabrics and construction that can be elusive for designers starting out. The clothes aren’t couture, but wouldn’t be out of place among well-made secondary designer lines.

Our Thoughts

There are many creative talents who are never able to succeed in fashion because they never find the right business guidance to support their creativity. Threadless has shown that people will back up votes and social intent with purchases, and if Garmz can do something similar for designer fashion they could be a viable area of support for emerging talents who typically rely on grants, awards, and prizes to afford fabric, fashion shows and publicity.

Finding the funding to produce a label is a problem lots of would be designers face, but if Garmz wants to attract top-tier talent, an option that gives designers a larger share of sales (even if it also gives them a larger share of the risk) will probably become necessary.

Partnering with design schools could also be a good option. While Central Saint Martin’s, FIT and Parsons are renowned for their alumni, the number of design jobs at top fashion houses are limited and the economics behind building a successful business aren’t covered often enough. Retail and knowing how to sell are often the jobs that are available. Even if it doesn’t make them rich, a platform where designers could learn about marketing, manufacturing and other aspects could benefit the school, and give Garmz a continuous, high level of new talent which will be necessary to keep community interest high.

French startup SuperMarmite took home the LeWeb startup prize for originality. First, some linguistic disambiguation before we continue. In French, a marmite (pronounced mahr-meet) is a large pot used for cooking. If you frequent the UK, Australia or New Zealand, it’s a brown sandwich spread that you might find on the menu at a vegetarian takeout spot.

SuperMarmite is all about the first version, though co-founder Olivier Desmoulin acknowledged during his presentation that the name would probably have to change when they look at expanding beyond France. Or, they could try to get support from the people in the UK, Australia and New Zealand who make the sandwich spread, but that might be a bit more difficult.

So now that we’ve established that you shouldn’t go to SuperMarmite looking for deals on sandwich spread, why should you visit? First, the service is only available in France for the moment so there’s probably not much a reason if you don’t live in France or aren’t planning to visit. If you do (live in France) or are (planning to visit) there are a few reasons.

1. You want to try French cooking but can’t seem to get a dinner invitation, and don’t have enough to make up for that at a Michelin star restaurant. SuperMarmite is a location based network of people who like to cook. You give them your location, and they show you who’s cooking what around you. For the price of a burger, you can instead pick up a portion of confit de canard (or any other homemade dish is cooking).

2. You like to cook, but always have leftovers. If you live alone, you probably know how difficult it is to cook for one person. Aside from TV dinners, it’s difficult to find things proportioned for one. Sure, you can cook a small portion of pasta, but good luck finding a container of sauce that doesn’t leave you with more to pack away. SuperMarmite hopes that by connecting you with hungry people in search of home cooking you can make some extra money and keep your refrigerator clear.

Our Thoughts

SuperMarmite is original, but we’re not sure how feasible it would be outside of France and perhaps other European countries. Paris may officially be the City of Lights, but unofficially it’s renowned as the city of fine food. It’s not that good cooks don’t exist outside of France, but is the cultural significance of food strong enough to create a palpable demand in other places?

Also, there’s food safety and the safety of the cooks. As far as food safety goes, anecdotally it’s an area that doesn’t seem to be as heavily regulated as in the US. Which isn’t to say that’s a problem. In years of traveling between the US and France, my bouts with food poisoning all happened in the heavily regulated US. In spite of the lack of hairnets and plastic gloves, I’ve (fortunately) never run into problems in French restaurants large or small. The founders reliance on the community rating system to flag dangerous dishes isn’t a bad idea, but in countries like the US where more regulations are in place for restaurants, we’re not sure if that will be enough to satisfy consumers or local regulators.

Then there’s the safety of the people making the meals. We’ve covered a few cases of problems created by oversharing on social media. What’s to stop a popular chef from becoming the target of a criminal? Their address is there, how much they’re charging for food, and how much of it they have available for sale.

Finally, if neither issue becomes a concern, there’s still the issue of professional chefs. Ridesharing apps and websites have come under local government scrutiny when they became popular enough to challenge public transportation. for restaurant owners, how much success would home cooks be permitted before they too would become a target?