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I have never heard of bonobos before. Also, Walmart is trying to get more into online business and Amazon is getting into brick and mortar stores to marginaliz

I have never heard of bonobos before. Also, Walmart is trying to get more into online business and Amazon is getting into brick and mortar stores to marginalize walmart and target even more. Interesting.

hourislate 9y ago
Bonobos is super expensive. I don't know how folks can afford to shop there. It would kill me to spend $300 on 3 dress shirts when I can get the Kirkland Brand for a fraction of the price. Even their sweat shorts are $80 and the Nikes I have were $15 on sale. The cheapest you can get a pair of jeans for is $100, Eddie Bauer has really nice jeans for half of that when they are on sale. I get the feeling Walmart is desperate to compete and will buy anything these days when all they really need to do is build a Web site that is easily navigable and works. You think a company with their resources could afford the talent required to build a site like AMZN has.
- wtf_is_up 9y ago
  I buy the Bonobos pants on eBay from time to time, when I can find my size available. The pants are really nice, but not worth retail price.
- toomuchtodo 9y ago
  > I get the feeling Walmart is desperate to compete and will buy anything these days when all they really need to do is build a Web site that is easily navigable and works. You think a company with their resources could afford the talent required to build a site like AMZN has. They have Walmart Labs [1], which to your point, doesn't seem to have the ability for whatever reason (don't discount the talent, its entirely possible that the bureaucracy in Bentonville, AR is holding them back). [1] http://www.walmartlabs.com/ http://www.walmartlabs.com/
  - pembrook 9y ago
    I suspect talent is a huge issue for them. How many designers and engineers who have the choice between Apple, Google, Facebook, Airbnb, Uber, Lyft....or literally any other company...would choose Walmart? The company known for using the United States welfare program as supplemental income for their hordes of low-wage employees? Their brand image is a big turn-off for the upper-middle class yuppies who make up the majority of tech talent. They would be smart to lean much heavier on the jet.com brand in the future when it comes to recruiting.
    - mmmpop 9y ago
      > Their brand image is a big turn-off for the upper-middle class yuppies who make up the majority of tech talent. I like to think that too, but a lot of it is all talk. I used to work with this dude in Boulder who was really into virtue signaling. Did all the right Boulder things, shopped at the right Boulder places, drove the Boulder car that showed you "cared", but just couldn't give up that cheap Walmart cell phone coverage. His attitude was "well it's a dirty secret no one has to know", which coincidentally(?) sums up Boulder fairly tidily.
      - tricolon 9y ago
        Is Walmart a cell phone provider? Is Boulder known to have dirty secrets?
        mmmpop 9y ago
        > Is Walmart a cell phone provider? Straight Talk > Is Boulder known to have dirty secrets? Yes, the best kept one being that it's overblown with NIMBYism. It's residents like to think it's on par with places like Seattle in terms of social progress, but it's all talk and no one seems willing to write the checks. It's very pretty though!
        WaxProlix 9y ago
        It's funny because Seattle has and has been having a serious problem with NIMBYism for a while now. We're headed towards being the next SF and nobody's willing to give up their sweet single family housing designation to save the place. Same issue for our abysmal mass transit - a hyper-wealthy island community between Seattle and Bellevue is raising taxes to fund a law suit against WSDOT to stop light rail from going through their area because it would cost them dedicated single occupancy use of the HOV lanes. Can't make this shit up.
- gk1 9y ago
  > Bonobos is super expensive. I don't know how folks can afford to shop there. Is it really so difficult to imagine that the value of clothes is relative?
- crucifiction 9y ago
  talent is only ever one ingredient. why doesnt google dominate the cloud? why couldnt microsoft pull off a smartphone?
- mmmpop 9y ago
  > Bonobos is super expensive. > I can get the Kirkland Brand for a fraction of the price. > Eddie Bauer has really nice jeans Bonobos sells itself as an affordable yet fashion-forward brand, so perhaps you're just not the target consumer?
  - jschwartzi 9y ago
    Yeah, $100 a shirt is fairly competitive with other fashionable brands. I end up buying more expensive shirts just because I don't feel as bad about having to have them altered. My arms are really long and my neck/shoulders are really broad relative to my height, so even slim or "extreme slim" dress shirts have a tendency to billow out of my pants unless I have them taken in, and I always have to have the arms slimmed significantly as well. When you spend that kind of money to have the clothing altered, you might as well spend a little extra to alter nicer clothing.
    - diegoprzl 9y ago
      Take a look at TMLewin and CTShirts. I think they offer the best value in shirts. Spending more than 60$ on a shirt is not necessary. I don't know about US, but in Spain you can get a tailor made shirt for 100$.
      - jschwartzi 9y ago
        Actually, you're right. Most of my shirts were on sale, and ended up being about $100 after alterations.
      - huac 9y ago
        CT definitely offers some of the best deals. Kamakura offers extremely high quality shirts for $89, though. Bonobos is just not high enough quality to support the hundo price point.
- jimmywanger 9y ago
  For the niche, bonobos is not super expensive. You are obviously not the target market. A lot of the time, clothes really do make the man. If you don't see the value in clothes I don't see why you're making value judgements. A similar analogy would be "Chipotles is super expensive, you can get the same thing for much cheaper at Applebees with a coupon", missing the point that Chipotle is competing with restaurants that are far more expensive.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > A similar analogy would be "Chipotles is super expensive, you can get the same thing for much cheaper at Applebees with a coupon", missing the point that Chipotle is competing with restaurants that are far more expensive. Tangential to your point, but you seem to have reversed “Chipotle” and “Applebees” here.
- rokhayakebe 9y ago
  There are some people who just won't buy an average brand, won't wear shirts that cost less than $100, or shoes that cost less than $300 because they relate price with quality. And they have the ability.
biztos 9y ago
Bonobos started out selling decent-looking business-casual type pants for "normal-sized" guys, i.e. those of us who would not fit in the skinny pants that were becoming the rage. They had show- and fitting-rooms, but you had to then order the stuff (could be done in the showroom) and wait for delivery... in the US only. They said they were barred from shipping to the EU because someone else had the trademark there. Not sure what became of their quality but I bought two pair about five years ago, loved one and the other was meh... and then they discontinued the style of the one I liked before I could order another pair. :-( Walmart was definitely not the image they were going for originally, IIRC the founders were Stanford kids.
- bogomipz 9y ago
  >"Walmart was definitely not the image they were going for originally, ..." This was my thought too, you could go into the brick and mortar Bonobos store(Guideshops) and get a fitting, a consultation and they would offer you local craft beer. This seems like the antithesis of "one stop shopping."
- jowiar 9y ago
  I think you have their original style promise a bit off -- They were effectively marketing as "not your father's Dockers". Their cuts were well on the slim side -- maybe not Armani slim, but they fit a whole lot slimmer than generic non-designer department store khakis. http://business.time.com/2010/05/18/bonobos-very-fit-to-lead/ http://business.time.com/2010/05/18/bonobos-very-fit-to-lead...
  - cvwright 9y ago
    According to the Time article, these guys are paying college-educated sales staff ("ninjas") to constantly phone and tweet with their customers, in order to sell pants that are basically Dockers with slightly different tailoring for $195 per pair. Who can read that article and tell me we're not in a bubble? The whole piece reads like a parody from Silicon Valley.
leemailll 9y ago
If I remember correctly the first time bonobos got its hype is because they sell $100 pants

hourislate 9y ago

Bonobos is super expensive. I don't know how folks can afford to shop there. It would kill me to spend $300 on 3 dress shirts when I can get the Kirkland Brand for a fraction of the price. Even their sweat shorts are $80 and the Nikes I have were $15 on sale. The cheapest you can get a pair of jeans for is $100, Eddie Bauer has really nice jeans for half of that when they are on sale. I get the feeling Walmart is desperate to compete and will buy anything these days when all they really need to do is build a Web site that is easily navigable and works. You think a company with their resources could afford the talent required to build a site like AMZN has.

wtf_is_up 9y ago
I buy the Bonobos pants on eBay from time to time, when I can find my size available. The pants are really nice, but not worth retail price.
toomuchtodo 9y ago
> I get the feeling Walmart is desperate to compete and will buy anything these days when all they really need to do is build a Web site that is easily navigable and works. You think a company with their resources could afford the talent required to build a site like AMZN has. They have Walmart Labs [1], which to your point, doesn't seem to have the ability for whatever reason (don't discount the talent, its entirely possible that the bureaucracy in Bentonville, AR is holding them back). [1] http://www.walmartlabs.com/ http://www.walmartlabs.com/
- pembrook 9y ago
  I suspect talent is a huge issue for them. How many designers and engineers who have the choice between Apple, Google, Facebook, Airbnb, Uber, Lyft....or literally any other company...would choose Walmart? The company known for using the United States welfare program as supplemental income for their hordes of low-wage employees? Their brand image is a big turn-off for the upper-middle class yuppies who make up the majority of tech talent. They would be smart to lean much heavier on the jet.com brand in the future when it comes to recruiting.
  - mmmpop 9y ago
    > Their brand image is a big turn-off for the upper-middle class yuppies who make up the majority of tech talent. I like to think that too, but a lot of it is all talk. I used to work with this dude in Boulder who was really into virtue signaling. Did all the right Boulder things, shopped at the right Boulder places, drove the Boulder car that showed you "cared", but just couldn't give up that cheap Walmart cell phone coverage. His attitude was "well it's a dirty secret no one has to know", which coincidentally(?) sums up Boulder fairly tidily.
    - tricolon 9y ago
      Is Walmart a cell phone provider? Is Boulder known to have dirty secrets?
      - mmmpop 9y ago
        > Is Walmart a cell phone provider? Straight Talk > Is Boulder known to have dirty secrets? Yes, the best kept one being that it's overblown with NIMBYism. It's residents like to think it's on par with places like Seattle in terms of social progress, but it's all talk and no one seems willing to write the checks. It's very pretty though!
        WaxProlix 9y ago
        It's funny because Seattle has and has been having a serious problem with NIMBYism for a while now. We're headed towards being the next SF and nobody's willing to give up their sweet single family housing designation to save the place. Same issue for our abysmal mass transit - a hyper-wealthy island community between Seattle and Bellevue is raising taxes to fund a law suit against WSDOT to stop light rail from going through their area because it would cost them dedicated single occupancy use of the HOV lanes. Can't make this shit up.
gk1 9y ago
> Bonobos is super expensive. I don't know how folks can afford to shop there. Is it really so difficult to imagine that the value of clothes is relative?
crucifiction 9y ago
talent is only ever one ingredient. why doesnt google dominate the cloud? why couldnt microsoft pull off a smartphone?
mmmpop 9y ago
> Bonobos is super expensive. > I can get the Kirkland Brand for a fraction of the price. > Eddie Bauer has really nice jeans Bonobos sells itself as an affordable yet fashion-forward brand, so perhaps you're just not the target consumer?
- jschwartzi 9y ago
  Yeah, $100 a shirt is fairly competitive with other fashionable brands. I end up buying more expensive shirts just because I don't feel as bad about having to have them altered. My arms are really long and my neck/shoulders are really broad relative to my height, so even slim or "extreme slim" dress shirts have a tendency to billow out of my pants unless I have them taken in, and I always have to have the arms slimmed significantly as well. When you spend that kind of money to have the clothing altered, you might as well spend a little extra to alter nicer clothing.
  - diegoprzl 9y ago
    Take a look at TMLewin and CTShirts. I think they offer the best value in shirts. Spending more than 60$ on a shirt is not necessary. I don't know about US, but in Spain you can get a tailor made shirt for 100$.
    - jschwartzi 9y ago
      Actually, you're right. Most of my shirts were on sale, and ended up being about $100 after alterations.
    - huac 9y ago
      CT definitely offers some of the best deals. Kamakura offers extremely high quality shirts for $89, though. Bonobos is just not high enough quality to support the hundo price point.
jimmywanger 9y ago
For the niche, bonobos is not super expensive. You are obviously not the target market. A lot of the time, clothes really do make the man. If you don't see the value in clothes I don't see why you're making value judgements. A similar analogy would be "Chipotles is super expensive, you can get the same thing for much cheaper at Applebees with a coupon", missing the point that Chipotle is competing with restaurants that are far more expensive.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > A similar analogy would be "Chipotles is super expensive, you can get the same thing for much cheaper at Applebees with a coupon", missing the point that Chipotle is competing with restaurants that are far more expensive. Tangential to your point, but you seem to have reversed “Chipotle” and “Applebees” here.
rokhayakebe 9y ago
There are some people who just won't buy an average brand, won't wear shirts that cost less than $100, or shoes that cost less than $300 because they relate price with quality. And they have the ability.

biztos 9y ago

Bonobos started out selling decent-looking business-casual type pants for "normal-sized" guys, i.e. those of us who would not fit in the skinny pants that were becoming the rage. They had show- and fitting-rooms, but you had to then order the stuff (could be done in the showroom) and wait for delivery... in the US only. They said they were barred from shipping to the EU because someone else had the trademark there. Not sure what became of their quality but I bought two pair about five years ago, loved one and the other was meh... and then they discontinued the style of the one I liked before I could order another pair. :-( Walmart was definitely not the image they were going for originally, IIRC the founders were Stanford kids.

bogomipz 9y ago
>"Walmart was definitely not the image they were going for originally, ..." This was my thought too, you could go into the brick and mortar Bonobos store(Guideshops) and get a fitting, a consultation and they would offer you local craft beer. This seems like the antithesis of "one stop shopping."
jowiar 9y ago
I think you have their original style promise a bit off -- They were effectively marketing as "not your father's Dockers". Their cuts were well on the slim side -- maybe not Armani slim, but they fit a whole lot slimmer than generic non-designer department store khakis. http://business.time.com/2010/05/18/bonobos-very-fit-to-lead/ http://business.time.com/2010/05/18/bonobos-very-fit-to-lead...
- cvwright 9y ago
  According to the Time article, these guys are paying college-educated sales staff ("ninjas") to constantly phone and tweet with their customers, in order to sell pants that are basically Dockers with slightly different tailoring for $195 per pair. Who can read that article and tell me we're not in a bubble? The whole piece reads like a parody from Silicon Valley.

leemailll 9y ago

If I remember correctly the first time bonobos got its hype is because they sell $100 pants