Sam Blumenthal

In December, a fashion startup called Scarce started selling used luxury clothing in the form of mystery boxes, following in the footsteps of a British startup, Heat, which launched with the same concept in late 2019. Both companies claim they have managed to avoid a high return rate — one of the biggest potential pitfalls of a mystery box sales... See more

Decentralized execution changes the game. Where centralized execution creates existential capture risk, decentralized execution acts as a strong backstop to other forms of capture. As long as executive power in a network remains distributed across a wide portion of the agents, the network has flexibility to experiment with various forms of... See more

With inflation beginning to rise, retailers and consumer-packaged-goods (CPG) companies may need to raise prices to cover their costs. Simultaneously, they face increased competition from start-ups and from companies with relatively inexpensive offerings. But, if consumer reviews of a company’s products are less positive than those of competitors,... See more

Instagram’s livestream shopping feature is now over a year old, and beauty brand adoption has become widespread.  On September 19, Instagram concluded its “10+ Days of Live Shopping” campaign featuring a range of consumer brands, including many in the beauty and fashion categories. Beauty participants included one of the first Instagram livestream... See more

While this motivation may be latent—even subconscious, for most—in the U.S., it’s an economic driver that’s well understood in China, fueling a thriving video ecommerce market. In Asia, the powerful force of video entertainment shopping has spawned a livestream ecommerce industry akin to professional movie production. It’s more than a place where... See more