In the wake of Rent the Runway's recent issues regarding their membership platform, DTC Daily speaks to Ambika Singh, founder, RTR's competitor Armoire, about how she has sought to build a proactive business by honing in on customer service, and why the feedback loop is a key component of the product and technology roadmap for Armoire. 

Can you explain how Armoire works?

We give our members a practical way to have an impractical closet. Simply sign up, share your style preferences and our unique combination of AI and human stylists curates a selection of high-end clothing options. Instead of scrolling through endless pages of clothes, members see a personalized closet based on their own preferences. Members can rent any item for however long they like, and exchange when ready for new clothes. We take care of shipping and dry cleaning to make the process streamlined for busy professional women.

How does your offering compare to the likes of Rent the Runway? 

Armoire caters to the busy professional woman providing her a wardrobe to telegraph her sense of power and self, in a minimal amount of time. We save our members time by curating a selection of clothing options to fit their preferences so they can focus on what is important, rather than spending time sourcing countless web pages.

Our technology and human stylists enables us to personalise the experience so our members are shown high-end items that we know they will like, as well as those that will push them outside their comfort zone a bit.

How do you ensure customers continue to return to Armoire? 

Our business is built around the customer. She drives our purchasing decisions, product roadmap, and messaging. We listen to her feedback and created a private Facebook group for our members to let us know what they love and what they need and want from the service. Over 15% of our member base is active on our private Facebook group.

You guys have seen strong growth rates recently - what’s been behind these, and how do you plan on continuing this trend? 

We have been very efficient with targeting and finding our customers on traditional paid and organic marketing channels like Facebook, Google and Pinterest. Our retail locations have also been great for acquisition and creating a space for community events. We have also been very fortunate to receive great press from national outlets without a PR agency.

Our goal is to expand retail outside of Seattle next year and continue to expand our performance and organic marketing initiatives.

What’s next for Armoire?

We just opened our second retail location and are excited to continue our retail expansion net year.  Our boutique enables members to “shop” without worrying about the price tag. Tagless shopping removes standard retail stressors and lets our members truly find (and go home with) the item they love and feel most excited in. There’s no commitment to what members bring home, so women are able to try things they normally wouldn’t pick out, or can indulge in things they know they’ll only wear once.