The lovely ladies at The Budget Fashionista posted about SAKS FASHIONfix, the new flash sale site brought to you by (shock) Saks Fifth Ave. I don’t shop there very often (I don’t really have the money to), but who am I to resist signing up for yet another online sample sale service? I figured that at the very least, as someone trying to break into the realm of being fashionable, I should check it out. So I did.
For the time being, I’m not impressed. It has potential, but there are a bunch of things I think need to be fixed before it becomes a destination I go to every day, like Gilt or HauteLook:
- They have two sales going on right now. One is a general shoe event, the other is Elizabeth and James (Mary-Kate and Ashley’s line). They have some impressive brands, but even today they’re only putting up one more. I feel like a fourth or fifth sale would round it out nicely.
- There is no way to sort or filter the results. At all. As you can see from the screenshot, they list what is sold out first, which is counter-intuitive. There isn’t a way to sort by size or popularity either. And in terms of filtering, the inability to filter by size is a major flaw. I don’t want to click through four or five items I really like only to find that none of them are available in my size anymore.
FASHIONfix does have some good things going for it though, and I wouldn’t be me if I didn’t focus at least a little bit on the positives:
- It’s visually appealing. Lots of white space, it shows off the products well.
- When you hover over an item, the picture flashes from the front/standard view to the back. It’s an easy way to get a quick look at all angles without having to make any extra clicks.
- If a model is wearing more than one item, they link to both from the same picture.
Overall, I think they have to work on a few things before it’s a go-to destination for flash sales. I haven’t gotten my first email from them yet (besides the “thanks for registering”), nor am I really sure if I signed up for email notifications. It’s been more than 24 hours so I’ll say I didn’t. Either way, I think I’ll give it a few weeks before I head back. I haven’t seen Elizabeth and James on any other flash-sites though, so if they keep up with brands like that (and being Saks, I’m sure they will), I will begrudgingly return sooner than my resistance would like to allow.
CINGRIA 