Farfetch Unveils Brand Refresh & Ad Campaign

Farfetch, whose digital marketplace has experienced continued growth during the global pandemic due to increased demand for at-home shopping, has unveiled a fresh brand identity and a new global ad campaign. With plans to become a world leader of the luxury e-commerce market, the brand’s new campaign will run in Out of Home (OOH), print, social, online, and on television, which is a first for the company.

The campaign entitled “Open Doors to a World of Fashion,” was created in collaboration with British photographer and artist Harley Weir, Chinese photographer Leslie Zhang, French filmmaker Simon Cahn, and Russian stylist Lotta Volkova who is known for her work at the design collective Vetements. The cast of talent which the company enlisted is evocative. These include acclaimed Broadway playwright and actor Jeremy O. Harris, fashion muse Veronika Kunz, musical artist Kindness, London-based model and poet Sonny Hall, Chinese actress Angelababy, environmentalist Wilson Oryema, Vogue cover girl Kesewa Aboah, as well as some “new faces to watch” from China, Nigeria, and India.

This campaign brings a sense of optimism and ‘togetherness’. In a world where perhaps we can’t physically be together right now, where we can’t travel to our favourite boutiques or shopping destinations we wanted to express how we can bring the world of fashion to people everywhere now and in the future. Farfetch lives at the intersection of two worlds – fashion and technology. These worlds were already merging before the global pandemic, but the move to online is accelerating.
— Holli Rogers, Chief Brand Officer of Farfetch

The new campaign also makes the first time the company will unveil its new brand identity and design system, which includes the introduction of its ‘Fuse’ monogram. The rebranded website boasts more white space along with a new typographic palette which includes a bespoke typeface ‘Farfetch Basis’(designed in partnership with Colophon Foundry’) alongside the more graphic font family, Nimbus.

The ‘Fuse’ monogram represents an effort to connect the traditional fashion world with the needs of a dynamic digital company. According to the brand’s marketing team, it will works as a seal of approval for Farfetch’s curated product range; ‘The Fuse’ is a fusion between a capital ‘F’ and lower case ‘f’ to represent the brand’s dichotomy between the classic and the modern, established and experimental, romantic and revolutionary.

Not only is the monogram a motif born from our new logotype, it’s also essential for small-size context such as an app icon. Immediacy is expected in digital mediums and this flexibility in our brand toolkit allows us to communicate our brand in all mediums from giant billboards to mobile home screens across the globe.
— Louise Robertson, Creative Director of Product of Farfetch

Many of Farfetch’s competitors such as Net-a-Porter and Matchesfashion have already established themselves as curated retailers, and their seasonal buys are and extension and expression of their brand identities. They manage their product offerings and brand assortment with care, which has increased their own brand equity and customer loyalty. Farfetch on the other hand has operated primarily as a platform, with a business model in which other brands and individual boutiques decide what is sold on the Farfetch website. Subsequently, promotions and discounts continue to be key drivers for the platform’s success.

Overall luxury sales are expected to suffer this year due to the pandemic. However the shift to purchasing luxury online will most likely continue to accelerate. Therefore Farfetch’s business strategy of relying on discounts and high customer acquisition spending in order to lure shoppers and fuel growth is poised for a dramatic shift.

With our new brand identity, we wanted to introduce a forward-looking vision for the brand while honouring the Farfetch identity as a single and singular destination, powered by innovative technology, through which to access the greatest designers – established and emergent – fashion curators and most discerning boutique owners across the globe. Farfetch is now in its second chapter as a company, partnering with the world’s best designers and stores and we need an identity that reflects that. It marks a new era of expression, ambition and evolution.
— Holli Rogers, Chief Brand Officer of Farfetch

The end goal is to achieve household-name status like other successful platforms such as Netflix, Spotify, and Airbnb, but with a distinctly luxurious edge. In order to set themselves apart from their competitors, Farfetch has begun to leverage their existing partners with whom they have already been working with for quite some time. This includes exclusive collections with brands like Gucci and Burberry, and utilizing acquisitions such as the New Guards Group and Stadium Goods to launch exclusive, limited-edition drops. It is also the only online retailer to stock Rihanna’s label Fenty, except for the brand’s own website.

Launching in New York, Shanghai, London, and in key markets in the Middle East variously across addressable TV, OOH, print, social and online, the ‘Open Doors to a World of Fashion’ campaign will also include a multi-layered international content journey for customers. It will include an innovative Snapchat Portal Lens, where people can ‘visit’ iconic boutiques around the world from wherever they are, a TikTok challenge, conversations with inspiring fashion voices across Instagram and a new YouTube channel, and unique content partnerships with Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, Highsnobiety, More Or Less, and the newly relaunched AnOther Magazine.