NATIONAL: Online shopping club brandsExclusive has formed international alliances which will see its Australian brands sold across the world.
International investment group Trayas has become a shareholder in the Australian-owned company. This association has facilitated connections with online shopping clubs in a number of other countries. These include Brazilian website brandsclub.com.br, Swiss site fashionfriends.ch and Indian site fashionandyou.com. It has also enabled associations with sites in Russia, Mexico and Dubai.
Behind Trayas is entrepreneur Klaus Hommels, who was an original investor in Facebook and Skype. Fellow investor Oliver Jung will bring experience from his involvement in various online shopping portals.
brandsExclusive co-founder and director Daniel Jarosch said customers will not notice any obvious changes to the appearance of the site, but will benefit from an increased array of international brands available at discount prices.
One-year-old, brandsExclusive reports it is growing by more than 10,000 members each week. It features a portfolio of more than 250 local and international fashion and accessory brands and runs daily discount sales.
Jarosch said the new initiative will open the site up to 4.5 million new customers, with a new member joining every five seconds. He said the company had created 35 jobs and expected to have a staff of 60 by the end of the year.
brandsExclusive was listed by online tracking service Hitwise as the second most visited Australian website in February, in the ‘Shopping and Classifieds – Apparel and Accessories’ category. It followed Ozsale and was ahead of EziBuy, BuyInvite, Just Jeans Just-Shop and Rebel Sport.
