In 2011, Mr Porter, the “man-friendly” version of online fashion store Net-a-Porter was launched with the aim of giving underserved tech-savvy fashionable men a platform.
“Menswear online was relegated to a tab on a womenswear site,” recalls managing director Toby Bateman, who, along with his team, carefully selected 80 brands for the launch.
Five years in and that number has jumped to 400 brands. And mrporter.com is now one of the top destinations for men’s style.
“The mix of content and commerce was vital,” says Bateman, who explains the decision to build stories around products was a winning formula. “We wanted to showcase the best in men’s style. And the content with our weekly magazine The Journal was important to bring it alive.”
Here are five other things Mr Porter has learnt about men’s fashion in the last five years:
- “We quickly learned that men would use our content to learn about brands they had not heard of. And also to find out about the heritage and manufacture of these brands and products. Features such as Behind the Brand proved very popular and provided a wealth of information.”
- “We launched the first ever iPad magazine, The Tux. We were very much pioneers in this way and also repurposing our content into The Mr Porter Post, a bi-monthly newspaper used in marketing and PR activations globally, and distributed in places such as first class lounges.”
- “We were the first to decide that men got inspiration from other men. And we made a conscious decision not to use models in shoots, and instead looked to real men. We’ve featured everyone from artists and designers, through to bankers, gallery owners and chefs, and we saw that this template was adopted by our competitors and by men’s magazines.”
- “Men cannot get enough of sneakers. They are one of our biggest categories on Mr Porter.”
- “Men want a hassle-free way to shop… In their own time, and at their convenience, and I really feel that we have built our business around this. The customer is very much at the heart of everything we do.”
BIRTHDAY SPECIAL
To mark its fifth birthday, Mr Porter has released an 18-piece collection inspired by the brand’s signature black and white colourways. It includes a long-sleeved black and white striped T-shirt by A.P.C., a black Boglioli hopsack blazer, a pair of white Common Projects Achilles sneakers with black insoles and one of black John Lobb leather grain loafers with a white footbed.
