Lilly For Target: What I Think Happened
Wow. Just wow.
I’ve been watching this Lilly for Target line with a measure of amusement ever since it was announced. So many sorority girls took to Twitter with a wailing and gnashing of their teeth. How dare their beloved elitist fashion line sell out to the masses!
I, personally, thought it was a brilliant move. Lilly was the daughter of a Standard Oil heiress, and her first husband made his living by owning several Florida orange groves. Lilly herself started the line when she made the dresses as a way to have cute wears while picking oranges in Florida, because making juice stained her clothes. As a female entrepreneur, I imagined that she would have approved of this move.
I did reach out to Lilly Pulitzer initially for comment and did not receive a response. A little disappointing for me, as a Lilly fan. And without the comment I tabled my initial snarky blog post about these silly little girls and their angry tweets.
But now we have a larger debacle. Target and Lilly only had a limited amount of clothing and wares for customers. Plus sizes were only available online.
Perhaps Target grossly underestimated the draw of another Southern Bon Vivant’s brand- I like to envision Lilly Pulitzer herself as a southern Bon Vivant. I suppose this is evident now, as the lines were stormed early in the morning and their website quickly crashed.
I think this was also, partly, a PR move that went horribly wrong. Here’s how I imagine those back room conversations went:
Target: Hi, Lilly Pulitzer! We want to feature your brand as a collaboration with Target. It’s a great way to reach a much larger demographic and expose your brand to people who have forgotten about you and perhaps never heard of you. What do you say?!
Lilly Pulizter: Great idea! But how do we do this without totally alienating our loyal customers and current retailers- without also compromising out brand?
Target or LP: I know! We will make it a limited release- that way only a select few people will get those items, quality doesn’t have to be sacrificed, and current customers will be happy! Win win!
Except…. Not. Yes, this was a success in the sense that it got a lot of people talking about LP who probably hadn’t before. Yes this was a success in getting people in Target’s doors that had probably abandoned them as of late.
But it was a massive failure in that people on all sides were left feeling without. And the salt is being sown deeper by those who are driven by consumerism to sell those items on eBay for triple their original value…. And by those willing to pay.
I think Target and LP have a PR failure of epic proportions on their hands, and if they are going to come out of this in tact they need to act quickly. If they under estimated the drive of a Southern Belle for her favorite brand- let me make them aware of this now: that same fervor turned to anger is not something you wish to cross.
Love to all y’all,
Molly
Note: It appears Lilly Pulitzer is attempting via Twitter to handle this the best they can:
Thank you thank you thank you for being you and always supporting us xx #lillygirlsarethebest
— Lilly Pulitzer (@LillyPulitzer) April 19, 2015
