Nuuly Wants to Be the ‘Nu’ Way to Shop Denim
Is Nuuly the millennials’ answer to renting denim? The numbers would argue in favor.
Subscriptions to the Urban Outfitters-owned apparel rental platform run $98 a month for six items across 15 categories, including maternity, athleisure, vintage and plus-size. A monthly subscription on Nuuly cost $88 until April, when it increased the price for the first time since its launch in 2019.
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Subscribers have the option to purchase their favorite items as well.
As of this month, there are more than 400 brands to choose from outside of the URBN umbrella of private labels, including popular denim brands like BlankNYC, Good American and DL1961. Of all its offerings—over 17,000 garments—approximately 9-10 percent are denim.
“In our assortment, about 8 percent of the choices are true denim like jeans and then when you look at denim as a total fabrication, so across other categories like dresses and jackets, it’s about 9-10 percent,” Sky Pollard, head of product at Nuuly, said. “That growth has really come in the last 18 months or so as denim dressing, like full denim outfitting, is really trending out in the world and also with our customer.”
To put that number in perspective, the entire category of dresses is, on average, 20-30 percent of Nuuly’s business.
Customers purchase denim pieces from their Nuuly box at a rate of 10-11 percent higher than average (4-5 percent). This is significant, considering that fit with denim is a challenge and jeans are a product that notoriously requires a try-on before purchase. For Nuuly, addressing sizing challenges is predominantly outsourced to its more than 190,000 active subscribers through reviews.
“Customers find their best fit through the community, crowdsourcing and really understanding how the jeans fit different body types and different lifestyles,” Pollard said. “From a community point of view, we can take a picture on a million different size models. We can put a million different bullet points in the copy of each item, but that sort of gravitas that comes with the customer reviews, and the fact that every member of the community really appreciates those views, I think that is the best way to ensure you’re getting the best fit.”
The platform also allows consumers to filter by height, body type and, most recently, inseam.
Pollard said adding the opportunity to filter by inseam “felt like another extra step that would help people, just because we do offer so many brands, so many different fits.”
Of those brands, Agolde has been “a great partner from the beginning” and is a “tried-and-true” customer favorite. The brand’s Riley high-rise cropped straight jeans have 400 reviews. Pilcro, Anthropologie’s denim brand, does “fantastic” for Nuuly, she added. The Kit high-rise wide-leg utility trousers raked up nearly 600 reviews and has a 4.5-star rating. Australian label Rolla’s is another fan favorite with a “cult Sailor jean that does really well,” Pollard said.
“The great thing about Levi’s is that people know them, they’re familiar with them, they know what size they are, and they know it’s going to be good quality,” she continued.
Four years into the business Pollard said Nuuly is “picky” about which brands it chooses to partner with, utilizing customer feedback and search bar inquiries to inform what brand would make a good fit.
“Customers will search on the site; Madewell, for example, was a brand that was always in our top-two searched brands,” Pollard said. “It took a few years of convincing them to get them to come on the platform, but I just knew that customers would react to it immediately and love it; lo and behold, they do.”
And Nuulyers are searching for more than just jeans in the denim offerings from these brands.
“This year, we’re seeing customers reach for more relaxed fits, wider leg shapes, flares and barrel leg is another trend we’re seeing really take off—kind of that wide leg shape that tapers a little bit at the bottom—that’s something we’re chasing across denim and other fabrications,” Pollard said.
“We’re seeing [customers] reach for denim in other areas…I think folks are finding denim is a part of their wardrobe in many different cases and not just on the bottom anymore. It’s such a nice staple, to have a piece or two in your Nuuly to kind of pare back to all the things in your fall wardrobe.”
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