Sandpoint, ID—Women’s apparel cataloger/retailer Coldwater Creek test-mailed a footwear and accessories spin-off, Footnotes, this spring. The company sent 500,000-800,000 catalogs to a portion of its house file, including footwear buyers and best customers, in April.
In the 48-page, 7″ x 7″ catalog, Coldwater Creek is testing new products, primarily footwear, handbags, and jewelry. The success of those items will help the cataloger decide which product categories to expand, says CEO Georgia Shonk-Simmons. The Footnotes merchandise is also available on its Coldwater Creek Website.
So far, the average Footnotes order size is $100-$120; the average price point is less than $100. Although Shonk-Simmons won’t comment on response rate, she says early indications are that the title is performing well. Coldwater Creek will mail a fall edition of Footnotes in September, again using only house file names. This second edition “offers a true fall/holiday assortment,” Shonk-Simmons says. Next year Coldwater plans a full rollout of the book.
In other Coldwater news, Shonk-Simmons notes that the cataloger is tweaking its merchandising strategy. Beginning with the fall books, it will sell apparel suitable for the immediate season, rather than selling fall clothing in the summer or spring apparel in January. “Our customer is the busy professional female baby boomer who wants to ‘buy now, wear now,’” Shonk-Simmons says.