Under the siege of a large number of international brands, how did Third Love successfully enter the women’s underwear market? What is the consideration behind ThirdLove’s pioneering half size underwear? As a DTC brand, how does ThirdLove capture women’s hearts with details?
Based on women’s needs, solve users’ pain points
According to the survey conducted by Vogue magazine in 2018, because brands cannot provide accurate measurement methods, it is difficult for women to determine their true size, which leads to that more than half of American women buy bras that do not fit.
Heidi Zak, the founder of ThirdLove, was also a user of Victoria’s Secret before, but she has never been able to find a suitable size. She learned that many women also have the same distress as her. Based on this, Heidi Zak founded ThirdLove in 2013.
At the beginning of its establishment, ThirdLove’s growth rate reached 300%. More than 13 million women participated in its underwear test. In 2018, the brand’s sales exceeded 160 million dollars, and Forbes was valued at 750 million dollars.
Glamourinsight learned that ThirdLove has raised nearly $68 million so far, and the latest financing was $55 million led by private equity fund L Catterton in February 2019.
Till now, ThirdLove has become a female lifestyle brand. In 2020, the company will be the first digital underwear brand among the millennials in the United States.
Why can ThirdLove stand out from the crowd of famous brands?
Glamourinsight believes that the most direct reason is that it solves the wearing pain points of women. It not only provides women with a variety of product choices, but also helps women accurately measure the size, making it easy to choose the right underwear.
Heidi Zak said: The Wikimedia show may be very dreamy, but in real life, women wear underwear to work, feed children, and exercise Therefore, with the brand concept of “Designed for All Women’s Bodies”, ThirdLove focuses on underwear with comfort and beauty, highlighting the scenes of daily life.
Third Love has also made great efforts to help users choose their own underwear size. It is reported that ThirdLove has preliminarily obtained a database of core consumer groups by investigating women’s bust size and used it to develop applications for calculating bust size.
At the same time, ThirdLove acquired Indi Custom, a technology-based startup company. At that time, Indi Custom was developing an application for making customized jeans through measurement. ThirdLove applied it to the field of underwear, and developed an APP that can help measure the size of underwear and match the use scene.
It is understood that the user stands in front of the mirror in a private environment and takes photos of front and side wearing underwear or close fitting clothes. After uploading to the APP, the system will automatically generate underwear size and style recommendations.
In addition, the app also provides professional “Fit Stylist” to provide users with online consultants; The new virtual fitting room of ThirdLove also allows users to experience the 3D interactive fit of products. This practice greatly improves the purchase experience of users, not only eliminates the trouble of fitting clothes in physical stores, but also accurately helps users to measure their own size.
At present, more than 18 million women have found their own size and suitable products through this function. AI technology and algorithm are used to help users accurately measure and match. This practice has created a precedent for online measurement and fitting of underwear, and solved the problem that users cannot accurately select products.
If technology is the foundation of ThirdLove’s foothold in the lingerie market, its innovative and open brand concept is the most sincere card for thousands of women.
Introducing half size underwear, advocating body tolerance
As a DTC brand, ThirdLove is not only committed to solving users’ pain points, but also good at telling brand stories, spreading brand concepts and establishing good relations with consumers.
As mentioned above, ThirdLove takes “design for all women’s bodies” as its brand concept. Against the background of previous luxury lingerie brands’ efforts to promote sexiness and beauty, this concept is obviously contrary to it.
However, with the change of consumers’ concept, many women have awakened their self-awareness, and the idea of pleasing themselves has become a trend. The style review and sales volume of lingerie products that focus on sexy style are on the decline.
Like the underwear brand Savage X Fenty, ThirdLove’s products advocate diversity and inclusiveness and are committed to serving women of all shapes, ages and races.
These emerging lingerie brands all believe that women should not be bound by the so-called “perfect figure standard”. Only individuals with differences and personality are independent. No matter what body shape, women should face up to themselves positively.
It is reported that the price of Wimi’s products is in the range of 40-60 dollars, while the average price of ThirdLove is 68 dollars (some products later changed to 45-55 dollars). Although the price is similar, ThirdLove has the advantage of being more inclusive and open, and can embrace many women who cannot find suitable underwear in Wimi.
According to the data, the audience of ThirdLove official website is 24.63% male and 75.37% female. The age group with the largest number of visitors is 25-34 years old, accounting for 28.13%, followed by 18-24 years old, accounting for 20.67%. It can be seen that Third Love is very popular with young women.
According to NPD data in 2019, ThirdLove is the third largest bra e-commerce retailer, second only to Victoria and Aerie in terms of sales.
In 2018, ThirdLove published a full page advertisement in the New York Times, pointing out that Victoria lacks tolerance for the body and conducts excessive sexual orientation marketing. A new brand unexpectedly publicly hates the industry leader. This practice of ThirdLove has caused a great stir in the industry.
However, this big move also brought a lot of traffic to it, which not only made it famous in the circle quickly, but also attracted a large number of fans, with excellent marketing effect.
On the other hand, ThirdLove has also practiced its brand concept in practice, such as holding the “To Each, Her Own” activity, inviting women of different shapes, weights, ages and sexual orientations to wear its products, capturing the strength and weakness of real women, showing the real face and temperament of modern women, so as to abandon the traditional concept of demanding women’s high standard figure.
For another example, ThirdLove pioneered the introduction of half size underwear and continuously expanded the size of its products. By 2019, its product size has reached 78, and the size range has expanded by 30%.
In addition, in order to match the body shape of more women, ThirdLove combined big data to launch a new size series, and increased the selection of product styles and colors.
With the gradual development of the brand, ThirdLove is more like a flag, leading women towards openness and freedom. On the road of serving women, the brand is going further and further.
Committed to public welfare activities and improved shopping experience
In addition to conveying the concept of body freedom and female independence, ThirdLove also does a very good job in caring for women and serving women.
On its official website, ThirdLove claims that it is the largest underwear donor in the United States. The brand cooperates with I Support the Girls, Soles4Souls, Good360, St. Anthony’s and other organizations to donate products to help women change their lives. To date, ThirdLove has donated more than $50 million in products.
At the same time, ThirdLove also launched TL’s internal acceleration program to support, promote and invest in the early female founders of colored people, providing them with guidance, fund-raising support, grants and brand exposure.
ThirdLove is also a brand that practices DTC mode. In order to shorten the distance with users, ThirdLove also holds the details in the service experience.
- Humanized setting of official website
Similarweb data shows that in July this year, the number of visitors to the official website of ThirdLove was 2.3 million. On its official website, we can also find many humanized setting details. For example, the concept of “women should wear appropriate underwear”, “clearly understand your body”, “every woman deserves comfort and confidence” and other concepts are promoted in multiple pages to enhance users’ self-awareness.
On its website, ThirdLove has also set up a “virtual modeling” service. Users can enjoy the size and style recommendation service of stylists by simply booking service time and filling in personal information. In addition, users can also choose online chat, telephone, e-mail and other ways to contact the brand.
At the same time, ThirdLove also added a column to show the buyer’s show on the official website. It not only uploaded a large number of photos of women wearing intimate underwear, but also appealed to consumers to show their body confidently and have better products.
- 30 day free trial service
It is reported that ThirdLove also provides free fitting service. After purchasing the product, users can cut the label and try it on for 30 days. If they have any dissatisfaction during this period, they can send the product back.
Free return and replacement services are common, but for underwear products, cutting off the label means that they cannot be sold or used again, which will greatly improve the return rate and sales cost of the brand and increase operational risk.
However, ThirdLove still adheres to this practice. This service also eliminates the worries of users and helps to increase their purchase desire.
- VIP Loyalty Program
In order to deepen the contact with users, ThirdLove has established a VIP loyalty program, which classifies users according to their consumption level, and attaches exclusive functions and benefits to them, so that each order of users can generate value, which helps to improve user stickiness, and enable them to continue to pay attention to brand dynamics and recommend brands.
It is reported that the number of accounts created by ThirdLove users has increased by 400% within three months of the launch of the plan. Moreover, the spontaneous recommendation of users continues to increase, and ThirdLove has more and more repeat customers.
- Offline experience store
In July 2019, ThirdLove opened a physical flash store in New York. The store is also equipped with an application for women to measure size. At the same time, 60% of the area is divided for consumers to measure and try on, so as to protect users’ privacy and improve the wearing experience.
In the physical store, users can experience and learn about choosing the right underwear by combining with ThirdLove’s online purchase platform.
However, in 2020, due to the spread of the epidemic, Third Love closed its flash stores and physical stores in New York and laid off 10 store employees. In May of the same year, Third Love laid off another 65 employees in its headquarters in San Francisco, accounting for 30%~35% of its total employees.
Like other DTC brands, ThirdLove has also been hit hard by the epidemic. Its offline business has been closed down repeatedly, but the brand has not retreated. Today, ThirdLove is re expanding offline and continues to develop new categories and brands.
In February 2022, Third Love opened its first West Coast store and opened a store in California. The brand is expected to open 6 to 10 stores by the end of this year.
In April 2022, ThirdLove acquired the “Most Popular Underwear Brand” Kit Underground founded by celebrity stylists. A spokesman for ThirdLove said, “We want to create a sub brand for young people. The new brand is called Kit Understandings for ThirdLove.”
In addition, ThirdLove has also carried out brand transformation focusing on comfort, sexy and fit, and entered the field of sportswear through selected sports bras. A spokesman said that sportswear is the focus of the company in the future. It can be seen from this that the slogan of Third Love’s restructuring is not just a statement. It has always been taking Weimi as its competitor, hoping to become the leading brand in the underwear market. Even after the severe impact of the epidemic, ThirdLove has been adjusting and innovating, demonstrating the vitality and creativity of DTC brand.
The reason why ThirdLove can survive in the underwear market is closely related to its strong brand strength and advanced brand values. Approaching, caring for and caring for women is what Third Love has always advocated and practiced. Rather than saying that modern women need such products, it is ThirdLove that guides women towards independence and self embrace.
FAQ
- How does Third Love’s underwear fit? Third Love panties are designed to provide a comfortable and personalized fit. They offer half sizes and a wide range of sizes to ensure a perfect fit for every body type. The company also provides a Fit Finder quiz on their website to help customers find their size and style recommendations. Read more Third Love Panties Reviews.
- What is Third Love’s return policy for underwear? Third Love offers a 60-day return policy for their underwear products. If you’re unsatisfied with your purchase, you can contact their customer support team to initiate a return or exchange. However, for hygiene reasons, Third Love only accepts returns for underwear in new and unworn condition.
- Is Third Love’s underwear only available online? Third Love primarily operates as an online retailer, and their panties can be purchased through their official website. They do not have physical stores, allowing them to offer convenience and a wider range of sizes and styles online.
- Can I find different colors and patterns in Third Love Panties? Yes, Third Love offers a variety of colors and patterns in their panty collection. From classic neutrals to vibrant shades and playful prints, you can find options that suit your style and preferences.
- Are Third Love Panties worth the price? Third Love panties are generally regarded as a good investment due to their quality, comfort, and longevity. While they may be slightly higher in price compared to some other brands, many customers find the value to be well worth it.
- Can I return or exchange Third Love panties if they don’t fit? Yes, Third Love has a generous return and exchange policy. If you’re not satisfied with the fit or style of your panties, you can initiate a return or exchange within a specific timeframe, ensuring you find the perfect pair for you.
