Fashion Connected: Meetup Lunch and Learn, Social Product Development pt. 1

A week ago today, was the inaugural lunch and learn MeetUp, hosted by Fashion Connected, for a brand new initiative called, Social Product Development. Although it was just an hour and a half, we had industry leaders in top international and national retailers, design, color and trend executives, vertical lifestyle and active wear brand, ecom companies and freelance designers.

The focus of the event was to have lunch and learn, but also to also socialize. The discussion of the day was to expound on social product development as a 3 part series, of which this was the first part.

One of the best moments for me during the event, happened very early during introductions. As we were going around the room getting to know who our neighbors are, it was soon time for a young man to take his turn. He politely said, " Hi, I'm Noah, I'm 14 and I'm here to learn more about the fashion industry". Everyone smiled and warmly welcomed Noah.  Next to Noah was an executive and leader in the industry who quipped "Hi I'm not 14" and the entire room broke into laughter.

The retail, apparel, footwear and accessories industry are facing pretty big challenges today in how they commercialize their brand and products. The main topic in this section, was to begin to identify what those are and begin to learn how social product development can be a clever platform to bringing tools together in solving them.

Another highlight was when we discussed mobile integration for inspiration in textile surface design creation- a concept we like to call "design in motion". The goal here was to demonstrate the ability to be fast, accurate and collaborative with Pointcarre and BeProduct together. In an earlier discussion, this topic was referred to as "transformational". The ability to see a creative thought all the way through its completion virtually without interference or obstacles. Showing that collaborative tools and people can cheerfully visualize a shirt in multiple fabrics and prints in minutes via virtual prototyping through to ecom.

The meeting went very well and we will be posting some of the highlights on both the StycheCo, Pointcarre and BeProduct websites and YouTube.

Personally I tried to ask everyone after the event if they felt they in fact learned something from this event and most did.

I wanted to personally thank everyone from Fashion Connected meetup who joined and a special thanks to BeProduct and Pointcarre who did a great job and who also be at the 2nd installment of social product development.

Finally I wanted to thank Noah, who I had the fortune of bringing to this meetup. Not only did he actively participate but in fact, I learned much from him. Although he likes some designers that personally I did not know, we both have our top designer choice as Alexander McQueen … Ironic is it not … That this young man who joined our meetup, actually knew the motto for fashion connected and stycheco inc., which is inspired from McQueen - "respect the tradition but break the rules"

Hope to see you at the next event September 9th at 12:30pm. See the link provided on the RSVP .

to learn more about Pointcarre go to www.pointcarre.com and BeProduct. Enjoy the recap below and look forward to the next event. Transformational change begins with you!