How to Change The Fashion Industry in a Few Clicks

Feature Story by: Between Conscious Program

Read the original story here.

Bsamply is an innovative b2b platform born to connect fashion brands with raw material suppliers from across the globe, while at the same time, providing a more efficient and sustainable solution to the inefficiencies of the traditionally offline processes found within the fashion industry.

We had a chat with the founder of Bsamply, Andrea Fiume.

Would you please introduce yourself?

I was born in Como, Italy, from a family which had worked within the textile industry and the fashion industry for more than 4 generations. I decided to walk in the same path, so I started my career as a Product Manager for LifeGate Eco Jeans: an innovative denim made using bio-cotton, natural dyeing techniques and renewable energy sources. I worked as a Product Manager for 8 years and later worked for some of Europe’s leading fashion brands as a consultant and COO. My expertise in the industry led me to think of a system to easily connect raw materials suppliers, which I wanted to be more sustainable and efficient than the traditional offline processes. That is how I founded Bsamply in 2017, in Los Angeles.

Bsamply now has about 7k buyers registered all around the world, and 120 suppliers. Most of them are based in Italy, but there also are some based in other countries such as Australia and Japan.

How does Bsamply work?

The best definition for Bsamply is “a B2B collaboration platform”. We started our journey as more of a traditional marketplace for fashion buyers and raw material suppliers, quickly evolving into what we are now, a Collaboration platform and hub. Buyers and suppliers can access a curated range of services allowing them to work together, communicate and manage their entire workflow from the design stage to the final order, using one shared system and tool.

This also means that small companies with a low digitization rate can easily upgrade their efficiency, keep all members in the team connected and up to date with the progress of an order, work more easily and quicky with the customers. Going off of this, its important to share Bsamply can also be integrated into the ERPs of brands and suppliers to maximize productivity.

This step brings us beyond a traditional digital marketplace but to a collaboration platform and comes with our recent announcement that we were acquired by the Italian group and leading luxury fashion brand ERP solution, Dedagroup Stealth. An exciting step that will allow Bsamply to increase its product offering and at the same time continue to grow the marketplace. We are looking forward to growing together with the Stealth Family.

What are the platform’s most remarkable functionalities?

We call it a “collaboration platform” for a reason, but it really allows different entities to come together, work together and improve the sustainability of the industry, together.Suppliers can upload their catalogs in a digital form, including videos and 3D maps, but more importantly product and company certifications. This allows buyers registered on Bsamply to browse through them, understand and download those sources before making a choice and actually requesting samples. Since the process takes place completely online, that allows optimisation of production by avoiding waste of material from distributing samples. Starting from a digital showroom, a buyer can also schedule a video appointment with a supplier or contact them using an in-platform messaging tool. This feature alone speeds up the work reducing the need for meetings and business trips.

Brands also have the ability to create a company tree, assigning specific roles to each of their team members associated with different degrees of permit to view actions performed on the platform and to track communication, documentation, and orders between the brand and the supplier in one shared place.

In this way, Bsamply does not just increase the efficiency for a brand, but also for a supplier, as the supplier only needs to upload its digital catalog and certifications once, and at the same time, manage all work processes with many brands, both existing and new using one unique platform.

Where should companies in the industry invest more to promote sustainable development?

We can customise our service to meet the needs of the client and find the best digital solution for them. When we work with suppliers, we typically work with the IT department and the operations department: we have to present and explain the functionalities to them because they are the ones who need to understand how Bsamply can improve their workflow and be integrated into their existing management software.

Although Bsamply has pre-curated packages for suppliers, our team always works 1:1 with companies to best understand their needs and can always create a more personalised package. A challenge for us is introducing this more digital concept to more traditional raw material suppliers, many of which do not have digitalized catalogs, or familiarity with online platforms but still work using traditional offline processes.

So the best investment would probably be in training. I definitely think it could be a great asset for a company to have dedicated team members focused on technological innovation as it could mean not only increasing their efficiency but also their sustainability performances. Brands on the other hand seem to be more ready to talk about and implement more digital processes into their existing workflow.

How else can Bsamply help to make the fashion industry more circular?

There are 5 main ways through which Bsamply services help reduce the environmental effects: reduced need for travel, smaller shipment sizes, visible and traceable product and company certifications, the ability for brands and suppliers to use 3D maps, and a dedicated space for stock service, reuse stock and leftover stock.Bsamply has a dedicated section for deadstock, leftover stock and reuse stock. When a supplier uploads new products to their catalog, they have the ability to choose which product section they apply to and can tag them with a green icon, facilitating the product search for buyers on the platform.

This feature is not only interesting from the sustainability point of view, but from that of smaller brands often looking to buy smaller quantities at a reduced price.

The sustainability model is fluid and the Bsamply team is committed to being on the constant search for new, improved and more green solutions for our buyers, suppliers and for the overall well-being of our planet.