What The Coronavirus Means For DTC Brands

In the past several weeks, over 100 retailers — both legacy and DTC — have temporarily shuttered their doors or reduced hours to help stop the spread of the coronavirus. For digitally native brands, which operate few stores relative to more traditional players, the move to operating exclusively online, in theory, should have come with little disruption to business. But that hasn’t been the case. Online spending at ThirdLove during the week of March 16 fell 39% week over week, while Poshmark fell 30% and StitchFix fell 9% during that same period, according to Edison Trends data shared with Retail Dive. As a whole, direct-to-consumer brand week-over-week spending fell 7% on average between March 2 and March 22. Comparatively, the average week-over-week increase for these brands from Jan. 6 to March 1 was 1%, according to the data. Read more at Retail Dive.