Industry Summary Articles

Fashion technology house BeProduct announces the successful implementation of its collaborative Product Lifecycle Management (“PLM”) platform at the Manhattan headquarters of UNTUCKit, and throughout the company’s international supply chain – lead by digital innovation firm STYCHECO (‘Stitch-Co’).

Founded in 2011, UNTUCKit was born out of frustration with button-down men’s shirts that looked sloppy when they were worn untucked. In contrast, an UNTUCKit shirt is closely-fitted, with a contoured hemline designed to be kept unfurled. The UNTUCKit philosophy is no longer exclusive to the ‘untucked man’; today the company’s product range covers a full suite of menswear, womenswear, accessories, and boys’ clothing and uniforms.

From a single brick and mortar store in 2011, UNTUCKit will grow to almost 50 retail locations in the USA by the end of 2018, and its ecommerce channel now caters for Canadian and UK customers. To support this exponential growth, the company sought out a PLM solution that could match its own levels of agility and responsiveness, as Björn Bengtsson, UNTUCKit’s Chief Merchandising Officer, explains.

“To fit into that fast-paced environment, we needed a system that was capable, agile, and easy to use. We looked at a lot of different solutions, but we chose BeProduct because it was the only one nimble enough in its design, technology, and deployment to meet our needs.” Deepshika Rao, managing the implementation of BeProduct at Untuckit, reinforces the company’s need for flexibility, “We work very close to our consumer, so our feedback loop is much shorter than a traditional retailer. That affects every aspect of product design, development, and merchandising; at any given time, we might have 200 SKUs being worked on, alongside reorders and iterative updates."

UNTUCKit also had another key consideration in mind when approaching the competitive PLM market: creating a collaborative culture that extended throughout the global supply chain. As part of a broader project spearheaded by STYCHECO - who also managed the selection and implementation of BeProduct – key overseas suppliers were quickly brought onboard.

“As a direct to consumer brand, without a lot of legacy process and technology, UNTUCKit and its manufacturing partners, were free to leapfrog to the latest generation of truly collaborative product development processes and platform,” says Darioush Nikpour, President and Founder of STYCHECO. “We onboarded all of UNTUCKit’s core agents and vendors, and after initial training, they were collaborating and even generating their own Excel-based tech packs within hours.”

This kind of collaboration is one of the cornerstones of BeProduct’s approach to product design and development. “Collaboration is about more than just eliminating email, it’s a matter of having dialogue that concerns a product take place right alongside the key information about that product,” says Daniel Pak, Founder of BeProduct. “We were thrilled to be able to deliver what UNTUCKit needed: a place where their internal teams and key vendors could communicate on an equal and democratic basis, cutting time to market in the process.”

For UNTUCKit, the initial implementation is just the beginning, with various potential integrations to follow. “As a manager, BeProduct already gives me a global view of our processes, and full accountability for changes, but as the economy moves forward, I see so many different ways to make the system a part of our larger ecosystem, with STYCHECO’s guidance and support,” concludes Bengtsson. “In the future, I see BeProduct being one of the core platforms we use to incorporate all the different elements of the digital transformation of the industry.”

To view the original press release, please click here.

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