One of the coolest things about the time that we live in is that the barrier to starting a business is essentially nonexistent. You can test your ideas on someone else’s platform, and if it works, then you build your own. Nasty Gal is a perfect example of this. The Los Angeles, CA based company began in 2006 when Sophia Amoruso “started an eBay store selling a highly curated selection of vintage pieces.” After finding success on eBay and validating the business, she started her own site where she could control the entire customer experience (and not pay eBay’s crazy fees). A lot of Nasty Gal’s stuff is pretty far out there–their home page has a huge picture of studded platforms that look like a medieval torture device–but it’s hard to argue with a brand that has nearly a quarter million Facebook likes.
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Are you on Google+? We are… reluctantly, so make it better for us by giving us a +1.
Usually we associate with brands based on our experiences with their products. After a while we know what brands we like and use brand names as a heuristic to make purchasing decisions easier. Occasionally when a brand has an exceptional story, the brand actually becomes the product. That seems to be the case with Holstee, a New York, NY based company that focuses on “lifestyle design with a conscience.” The only reason I had heard about them is that they’re often on Fab.com, yet there are a ton of people who have bought a printed version of the Holstee manifesto to put on their walls (see the manifesto here). The brand has literally become the product. Some may write off Holstee as an online store for “hipsters,” but the “People, Planet, Product” approach has a lot of meaning for a lot of people, and it’s enabled Holstee to grow their business.
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I’ve always wanted to see a mountain lion in the wild–as long as it’s not stalking and about to eat me. They’re amazingly strong, athletic animals, and they have a serious mythology surrounding them. That’s why they’re called by so many names including panther, catamount, ghost cat, painter, and PUMA. It’s an appropriate name for a “sportlifestyle” company that “designs and develops footwear, apparel and accessories.” By bringing together sports and fashion, they’ve built an iconic brand that is known all over the world. What I find odd about PUMA is that they were founded in Germany in 1948 and are based in Herzogenaurach, Germany (with their USA headquarters is in Westford, MA). I find that strange because pumas are very much American cats, but I guess plenty of American companies use foreign animals in their branding.
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Kembrel is members-only, but you can get in using this link. They’ll even give you a VIP Card for free (worth $20) and $5 in store credit to get you started.
There’s a battle going on between traditional retailers and e-commerce companies. The former offers the opportunity to get your hands on the merchandise, but the latter usually offers better prices, better selection, and more convenience. This leads to a lot of people using retailers to check stuff out and then buying online. I want to see companies start merging those two business models, and that’s exactly what Kembrel is doing. hey’re a Philadelphia, PA based “online club” that allows “students to access their favorite fashion, food, and fun for a fraction of the retail price.” The online flash sale strategy is being combined with retail stores (they recently opened their first in Philly) to build the brand and offer members the opportunity to actually interact with products.
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I’m a strong believer in the theory of hipster relativity. If someone has more interesting facial hair than you, wears more plaid than you, or has thicker rimmed glasses than you, then he’s probably a hipster… at least to you. I’m pretty far up the chain (though I do have an affinity for plaid), which means that a whole lot of 20-somethings look like hipsters to me. The only thing I don’t get is where they get all of their cool hipster gear. I often walk by Urban Outfitters, and occasionally step inside. The store is packed with people and filled with what I consider to be hipster merchandise. This confuses me, because I know that no true hipster would shop somewhere so mainstream. I mean, Urban Outfitters, which is based in Philadelphia, PA, is publicly traded, has nearly 200 locations, and also owns Anthropologie, Free People, BHLDN, and Terrain. I guess the only loophole for a hipster shopping at Urban Outfitters is if you liked corporations before they were cool.
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In case you haven’t noticed, I love using holidays themes to pick companies. Sometimes I get a little silly with companies or organizations that would never actually have jobs, but it’s really all about getting you to have a little fun and start thinking more creatively. Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays to use for idea generation because you can take it in so many directions. In past years I’ve looked at Jennie-O, Plimoth Plantation and Colonial Williamsburg, Pilgrim’s Pride, Macy’s, Williams-Sonoma, National Wild Turkey Federation, and Food Bank for New York City. I’ve exhausted a lot of options, so I started racking my brain–I even looked up Thanksgiving bingo cards for ideas. Then I realized that Thanksgiving is nothing without a good carving knife. No matter how well you cook that turkey, if you can’t piece it out properly, you’ve failed. And who makes a top rated (by America’s Test Kitchen) kitchen knives? Victorinox Swiss Army does–and super affordable ones at that. You probably think of the Monroe, CT based company for the little red pocket knives that have a whole bunch of tools, but they make all kinds of cutlery in addition to watches, travel gear, and clothing.
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Want to try Proper Cloth? Use this link to get $25 off your first shirt. It’d probably help to have a shirt that fits when you’re interviewing.
I’m a big guy at 6’3. I typically enjoy the benefits of being tall, but there are disadvantages like having to knee myself in the face on airplanes and not being able to hear a single word that anyone under 5’8 says in a loud room. I’m not so tall that I need to shop at specialty stores for clothes, but I’m just at the point where clothes off the rack don’t fit all that well. I fixed my pants problem with Bonobos, but I have a ton of shirts (button downs, t-shirts, sweaters, and more) that fit beautifully until I start actually moving around–then they somehow bare my midriff like I’m a teenage girl. Nobody needs to see that, which is why I should probably start buying custom shirts from a place like Proper Cloth. They’re a New York, NY based company that makes it “super easy to buy stylish, quality dress shirts that fit.” I haven’t tried them yet, but it’s probably about time that I go custom.
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So far our survey says that you find the internship search frustrating. Tell us more so that we can help.
Back in June we told you about Birchbox, a company that offers a subscription to customized beauty product samples for $10 a month. It’s an interesting model, and it seems to be working out extremely well for them. BeachMint is a “social commerce” startup with a similar subscription model, but a very different approach. They’re a Santa Monica, CA based company with four brands: JewelMint.com, BeautyMint.com, StyleMint.com, and ShoeMint.com. I think you can guess what each offers a subscription to. When you sign up they give you a quiz to get a sense of what you like and what you don’t like, and then they start making new recommendations for you every month. It’s a little weird in that it’s structured like a subscription, but you don’t have to buy every month (but it sounds like it’s more of a monthly opt-out than opt-in). I kind of wish they stayed true to their name and would send me to a different beach every month.
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Keeping up with fashion isn’t a priority for me, but I still like to dress well. That’s why I trust Bonobos and Gilt Groupe to do the curation for me, and then I just buy what I like from them (it also helps that I’ve accrued a lot of credits from both of them). I know that a lot of people are far more active in keeping up with fashion, which is probably why Refinery29 is growing so quickly. The New York, NY based company is aiming to be “the cornerstone of fashion, beauty, and shopping for a new generation” as they offer “the only 360-degree source for shopping, exclusive deals, trends, beauty news, local hot-spots, and at-home sneak-peeks of fashion’s finest.” That’s ridiculously ambitious, but the results so far indicate that they’re pretty much killing it.
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Apparently wearing glasses is cool again, especially if they’re what used to be considered dorky. I don’t get it. I’m a contact lens kind of guy. I wear my glasses right after I wake up and before I go to bed, but other than that I relish in the fact that we’ve developed tiny pieces of plastic that can make us see perfectly. You’d think technological breakthroughs like contact lenses and Lasik would be bad news for a businesses that was founded in 1949 to distribute fashionable eyewear, but you’d be wrong. ClearVision Optical was started by a Navy veteran to “serve the independent optometrist community” in Long Island, and it has grown into a “global enterprise, serving optical professionals throughout the U.S. and in 40 countries around the globe.” The Hauppauge, New York based company has been able to grow like this because of its devotion to strong customer service that is centered around helping clients build stronger practices.
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Want to check out Fab.com and get daily design deals up to 70% off? Get your free invite here, and hurry. If you sign up before 11:45 AM EDT on 10/18/2011, you’ll get $10 in your account as soon as you sign up.
If my parents had to pinpoint the time when they hated me the most, it was probably one of the times they took my sister and me furniture shopping. It was always an unmitigated disaster. When I’m in a furniture store, it’s like I’m wearing a Horcrux (Harry Potter reference for those who have no idea what I’m talking about) around my neck. My irritability and immaturity increase at an exponential rate over time. My girlfriend, having had heard the stories, came up with a smart solution when we were buying stuff for our new place. Instead of dragging me along from store to store, she did some pre-shopping and then only showed me the stuff she absolutely loved. It worked perfectly, as I was in and out of the stores before I even had the chance to start acting like a hungry, tired three-year old. Now we’ve come up with an even better solution–she just sends me links to Fab.com. It’s a New York, NY based site and company that offers “daily design for everyone.” They’re relatively new on the scene, but they’ve been getting a ton of positive attention by offering amazing deals of up to 70% on all kinds of cool stuff for your home.
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It’s moving day for me. I’m staying in the same neighborhood, but I still had to pack up my entire apartment and load it into a moving truck. It was kind of a pain, but hiring good movers is one of the best investments you can make. If only I had a travel vest from SCOTTEVEST–I could have stuffed everything in there, walked down the street, and done it all myself. That’s a bit of an exaggeration, but you really can fit a ton of stuff in SCOTTEVEST products. The company is based in Ketchum, ID and was started by Scott Jordan to create gadget-holding alternatives for man-purses–or even worse, fanny packs. It all started with vests, but now SCOTTEVEST offers a wide line of clothing that makes traveling with lots of stuff easy.
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Yesterday we looked at Niner Bikes and how they’ve carved out a really nice niche in the outdoor action sports market by building mountain bikes with bigger wheel bases. Today we’re going to look at a company that has built a much bigger business in the same market by offering products that you may not initially associate with the market. Skullcandy is a Park City, UT based company that “markets high-end headphones, earphones, hands free devices, audio backpacks, MP3 players and other audio enabled lifestyle products.” They target consumers who associate with sports like skateboarding, snowboarding, surfing, and mountain biking, so they’ve been able to build a really strong brand identity that has fueled some serious growth. Skullcandy was founded in 2003, and they made the Inc. 5000 this year with 354% three-year growth to $160.6 million in annual revenue. In fact, the growth has been so great that Skullcandy had an IPO earlier this year.
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I’ve repeatedly tried to thin down my wallet, but I keep ending up like George Costanza and sitting with a tilt (and it’s not because of all the money). I can’t wait for the day when my phone entirely replaces my wallet, but until then I’ll need to find another solution. I may have found it with the Mighty Wallet from Dynomighty Design (though I’m not sure that I’m ready for another wallet transition). The company was “established in 2002” in New York, NY and “seeks to create a vibrant array of products to complement and accentuate the modern urban lifestyle with the designs of Terrence Kelleman.” It started with magnetic bracelets, but it seems that the Mighty Wallet has really caused the company to explode. Dynomighty Design was named to the Inc. 5000 with 416% three-year growth to $2.2 million in revenue.
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The thing that I love most about the Inc. 5000 is the diversity of the companies. While there are definitely some strong themes throughout the list, there are companies doing all kinds of things in all kinds of places–and succeeding. One of the biggest themes on the list is that online marketing is offering massive opportunity to new companies. One Click Ventures is a Greenwood, IN based company that is big on Internet marketing. Unlike many of the other companies on the list, they do the marketing for themselves, not for clients. One Click Ventures runs a number of e-commerce properties including ABC Neckties, Affordable Scarves, Handbag Heaven, Inexpensive Watches, Reading Glasses Shopper, TravelProducts.com, Socks4Life, and Sunglass Warehouse. Each of these sites is in a very competitive niche, so it should be no surprise that One Click Ventures claims to have a distinct competitive advantage with their “marketing engine” that “consists of a diverse team of subject matter experts, including SEO, PPC, email marketing, social media, affiliate marketing, conversion optimization and content development.”
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A lot of people hate all of the advertising in sports. They get irritated by NASCAR cars, billboards in center field, and logos on jerseys. I kind of think it’s cool that sports teams are maximizing their revenue potential. But if I ever saw ads on the Yankees’ uniforms… well that will never happen… right? Advertising on sports apparel has actually been happening for a long time. Local businesses have been sponsoring teams and plastering their names on jerseys forever. Apparel Media is a Chicago, IL based company that is working to forever change the custom apparel and sports marketing industries at the same time. By working out deals with national advertisers and local custom apparel print shops, Apparel Media is able to give teams access to significantly discounted (20-80% off) merchandise.
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I’m not big on shoes during the summer. I try to wear flip flops as much as I can, and most of the exercise that I get is from beach volleyball where wearing shoes looks about as dorky as you can get. When I do go to the gym, I typically wear my Vibram Five Fingers (which you may also consider dorky looking). So I have no idea why New Balance popped into my head–I don’t even own a pair of New Balance shoes. In case you don’t know, New Balance is a Boston, MA based company that “began as an arch support company in the early 1900’s, developed into a specialized shoe manufacturer in the 1970’s, and has grown to become a leading global athletic products company.” They also own some other brands that you may be familiar with including Aravon, Brine, Dunham, PF Flyers, and Warrior.
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I like to consider myself an “influential 20-something male consumer,” but maybe I’m wrong. I don’t read Complex.com or visit any of the sites in the Complex Media Network, and they say that they are “the premier online destination for the most influential 20-something male consumers.” They’re getting nearly a million unique visitors a day across their network, so they’re certainly influential, and I have to think their audience is too. Complex, which is based in New York, NY caters to an audience that is “driven by style, sports, music, games, gear and girls,” and they’re experts at creating content for and delivering advertising to this audience. Complex.com is their main property, but the network extends to dozens of sites that zero in on niches within the niches.
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An internship is all about getting yourself ready for imminent adulthood. Hopefully you aren’t looking to provide for your essential needs yet (because there aren’t nearly enough paid internships out there), but you know that experience now will put you in a much better position when you’re out in the real world on your own. And hopefully by then you’ll be doing well enough to actually get some enjoyment out of your food, shelter, and clothing. If you’re all about that, then you should be reading the blogs from Curbed Network. They provide essential reads on how to get maximum enjoyment out of your essential needs. They’re based in New York, NY, and they run the blogs Curbed (real estate), Eater (food), Racked (clothes, style, and fashion), and the completely non-essential Gridskipper (travel). They don’t have a blog about air yet, but I hear that’s coming. The Curbed Network properties are very clearly built for yuppies with disposable incomes (what we all aspire to be, right?). 87% of the Curbed Network audience has a college degree, and 46% of them have a household income over $100k. Those are great stats for selling ads, which is what a business like Curbed Network is built on.
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I love salmon (especially fly fishing for them). I also love Cornell Hockey. And I can get pretty excited about clothing if it matches my style. That’s why I was extremely interested when I heard about a clothing line called Salmon Cove that was launched by two former Cornell hockey players (Ryan Vesce and Ben Wallace) in 2008. I never ended up buying anything, but I occasionally checked back in to see how they were doing. Recently I noticed that I was seeing a lot of Salmon Cove ads targeted to me on Facebook, so I visited their website to see what was new. The company is now based in Chicago, IL (just around the corner from me), and it has relaunched with new owner/leadership. The brand and style are still the same–preppy–but they’ve certainly added a Midwestern flair with shirt names like The Macinac Button Down and The Harbor Springs Button Down. If I had to compare them to anything, it’d probably be Vineyard Vines, but Salmon Cove definitely has their own style (and an awesome fish logo on all of their clothing).
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The last century or so has been all about mass produced goods. Everybody wants what everyone else has. If all your friends had a Chinpokomon, then you’d want one too. That’s starting to change. More and more people are interested in handcrafted, bespoke goods. Consumerism is changing, albeit slowly. Additionally, more and more people are looking to do good when they make purchases. Whether it’s wearing a Livestrong bracelet or TOMS Shoes, people like showing off their inner “do gooder.” Ahkun is a New York, NY based non-profit that serves the intersection of these two consumer trends. They “work with entrepreneurs who have received microloans” by connecting “them to the global marketplace–creating sustainable businesses and closing the gap between microfinance lenders and borrowers, consumers and producers.” In other words, Ahkun allows you to buy handmade goods from people who are doing their part to grow developing economies.
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I think I went almost 3 years after graduating from college without buying any new clothes. I had a decent enough wardrobe, I didn’t need work clothes because I started my own company, and I wanted to save as much money as I could so that I could keep my company going. Then I featured Gilt Groupe and Bonobos , which both had some exciting internship opportunities. After looking at their career options, I discovered their referral programs which allowed me to score a bunch of clothing for free. I’ve certainly become more fashion conscious as I’ve spent my referral credits, but I still have trouble deciding what looks good on me. I know there are plenty of other guys who have this problem whether they’re looking for something to wear to an interview or a night out on the town. Trunk Club is a Chicago, IL based company (their office is two blocks from mine) that aims to solve this problem by making style decisions for their customers. You tell them a little about yourself (or come in for a fitting session), and they’ll send you a “trunk” full of clothes that they’ve picked out for you. It works kind of like a hotel mini-bar, you keep what you want and send back what you don’t (with free shipping both ways). You obviously only get charged for what you keep.
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There’s a long history of poking fun at Martha Stewart, and it started well before she went to prison. There’s just something funny about someone who takes perfection in domesticity as seriously as she does. My family even played an integral role in the satire of Martha with my little sister’s appearance in the parody magazine Martha Stuart’s Better Than You at Entertaining
, which was a follow up to Is Martha Stuart Living?
(here’s a picture my sister as young Martha Stewart in the parody). We can keep laughing at Martha Stewart, but she’ll always get the last laugh. She has an amazing track record of reaching the top in nearly everything that she has done–from babysitting for Mickey Mantle’s kids to starting a successful catering company in her basement to building a New York, NY based media empire in Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia. Martha Stewart is apparently now worth well over half a billion dollars, and has used her personal brand to build amazing print, television, online, and merchandise properties.
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When I was growing up, getting glasses was a death sentence–a one way ticket to nerd-dom. Every kid dreaded the day that the school nurse conducted eye tests. Luckily, my eyes didn’t go bad until my Junior year of high school, so I pretty much went straight to contact lenses. Now it seems that people want eyeglasses, even if they have perfect eyesight. Instead of trying to downplay the fact that they’re wearing glasses, people are buying stylish frames that make a statement. The problem is that glasses are expensive and kind of a pain in the butt to buy. Warby Parker is a New York, NY based company that is trying to change that. As they put it, “by circumventing traditional channels and engaging with our customers directly through our website, Warby Parker is able to provide higher-quality, better looking prescription eyewear for under $100.”
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If you’re like me and wear t-shirts sometimes, then you know the value of a good one. Despite the fact that I have dozens of t-shirts in my dresser drawers, I wear the same few over and over again. My favorite is a Cornell Athletics t-shirt that has seen better days, but for many of you it might be a shirt from Threadless. They’re a brand/company of skinnyCorp that uses community-inspired designs to make awesome t-shirts. It’s hard to explain exactly what skinnyCorp is, but they’re all about using technology to facilitate collaboration within creative communities. Threadless is by far skinnyCorp’s most successful project (others include Threadless Kids, Naked & Angry, I Park Like An Idiot, and ExtraTasty). The company was founded in 2000 in Chicago, IL, and they also have an office in Boulder, CO. They’ve done a lot in that time, including being named “the most innovative small company in America” by Inc. Magazine.
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Need an invite for One Kings Lane? Just click here.
You have to give me credit for being so far ahead of the game. I told you about internships at Gilt Groupe back in 2008 (I still get most of my non Bonobos clothes from Gilt Man). When I wrote that post, it was still unclear whether online sample sales would be successful, but now it’s not even a question. Daily deals are as hot as can be, and One Kings Lane was founded in 2009 to offer the “world’s top home decor brands and designers at up to 70% off retail.” They’re headquartered in San Francisco, CA, but they also have large presences in New York, NY and Los Angeles, CA. They’ve found an extremely lucrative niche, and now they’re focused on growing their user base and continuing to deliver amazing deals on high-end products. The business model is proven, but One Kings Lane is facing stiff competition–especially from Gilt Home.
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I can’t remember the last time that I bought a greeting card, but I can remember the last time that I was part of the purchasing process. A good friend of mine was getting married, and he needed a card for his soon to be wife. Because of the dearth of cards for brides from their grooms, I made it my job to suggest alternatives. Trying to convince a stressed out groom to give his new wife a condolences card probably isn’t the nicest thing to do, but it’s certainly entertaining. Yes, greeting cards can be funny, but there’s more to them than that. That’s why American Greetings calls themselves the “leading manufacturer of innovative social expression products that assist consumers in enhancing their relationships.” The Cleveland, OH based company is the largest publicly-traded greeting card company in the world, and their brands include American Greetings, Carlton Cards, Gibson, Recycled Paper Greetings, and Papyrus along with a number of other paper products and online brands.
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The Washington Media Scholars Program has been sponsoring One Day, One Internship for the past week (and will be for the next week) because they want you to know about their case competition. It’s great preparation for a career in Strategic Media Research, Planning and Management, and you can even win a $3,000 scholarship.
Fast Company’s list of The 2011 Most Innovative Companies has a great mix of familiar and unfamiliar names. One of the companies on the list that I’m only recently familiar with is Opening Ceremony. They call themselves “a multifaceted retail environment comprised of shops, showroom, and private label collection that establishes a new, international creative forum in downtown Manhattan.” I first heard about Opening Ceremony because they’ve been collaborating on a line with Pendleton (a brand that I love). As I’d put it, Opening Ceremony is a New York, NY based fashion retailer/designer/curator. They’re all about bringing together things that are different—new and old, exotic and local. It’s based on the premise behind the original Olympics in 1896—”creatively merging sports, business, and global participation.” But it’s fashion instead of sports.
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buyer,
California,
copywriting,
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fashion,
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international,
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The world of publishing is a pretty crazy place right now. We hear about prestigious brand names struggling to stay afloat, while relative newcomers like Demand Media are IPO-ing. One of the key takeaways from all of the turmoil is that advertisers want results. That means that publishers need to be able to deliver targeted audiences that will respond to ads, whether it be through traditional outlets like magazines and newspapers or online. The Taunton Press is a publisher that has understood this for a long time. They’re based in Newtown, CT (a lovely town where I’ve done a lot of fishing), and they publish magazines, websites, and books for people who have a passion for creative activities. Their titles include Fine Woodworking, Fine Homebuilding, Fine Cooking, Fine Gardening, Threads, and more. Most of the publications come in both magazine form and an online version, so readers can consume the content however they feel comfortable.
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arts,
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Connecticut,
construction,
crafts,
editing,
editorial,
fashion,
food,
gardening,
Internships,
magazines,
media,
online media,
publishing,
social media,
social networking,
unpaid,
writing
I’m a big fan of buying stuff online, so I’m shocked when some of my friends tell me that they still buy everything at real brick and mortar stores. It’s so old fashioned. It used to be just books and electronics, but over the past years I’ve even started buying clothes and even shoes online. Companies like Bonobos and Gilt Groupe make online clothes shopping super easy, but they’re relative newcomers compared to Bluefly, which was was founded in 1998 in New York City. They’ve made a name for themselves by offering high end fashion brands at great values, and they’re as much a fashion company as they are an e-commerce company. Bluefly is pretty small—under 100 employees—considering that the company’s stock is publicly traded on the NASDAQ, but that’s not surprising considering that they made it through the late 90s and early 2000s.
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apparel,
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fashion,
inventory control,
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New York,
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software development,
style,
web development,
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