Luxury fashion with a conscience
An Australian company is using AI to make high-end labels more sustainable. By Helen Hawkes
In a world where a growing number of luxury consumers demand sustainability, the fashion industry is under pressure to commit to making meaningful change. It’s responsible for 1.2 billion tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions annually, and the need to change has never been more urgent.
A tech-driven Australian business is redefining the luxury fashion landscape by taking the guilt out of luxury consumption, not only for customers but for some of the world’s most prestigious brands. Azura Fashion Group harnesses state-of-the-art AI to tackle one of the industry’s most daunting challenges — waste. By promoting a circular economy, it ensures that high-end labels such as Gucci, Chanel, Louis Vuitton and Prada reach discerning customers across the globe while also minimising their environmental impact.
Whether it’s through platforms like David Jones, Net-a-Porter and The Iconic or Bluefly, Poshmark and Farfetch, Azura’s innovative approach delivers luxury with a conscience.
The company also curates an extensive selection of excess and preloved fashion through its dedicated platforms, Azura Runway, Azura Reborn and Azura Reborn Resell. These portals offer everything from end-of-season designer apparel and accessories from more than 1,200 top brands to one of the world’s largest catalogues of preloved luxury fashion from renowned designers.
“With Azura Reborn Resell we also provide a streamlined service for customers to resell their luxury items in partnership with Luxclusif,” says Azura co-founder Sam Wood.
A father of three, with a background in e-commerce, Wood started Azura with colleague Tim Bloore after discovering the value of stock being disposed of annually by top-tier labels.
In 2018, Burberry’s annual report had shown the company burned about $55 million in excess stock in the previous year (it has since stopped the practice and in 2020 launched the ReBurberry Fabric program to donate leftover fabrics to fashion students). In 2023, the world’s largest luxury goods company, LVMH, wrote down about $5.2 billion in stock, while Kering, which owns Gucci, had about $2.9 billion in excess inventory.
While both LVMH and Kering are donating, upcycling and selling off more in outlet stores, as well as introducing AI for smarter inventory management, Azura is at the forefront of this revolution. Primarily a tech business, it profits by facilitating the sale of luxury goods using a virtual aggregator/distributor model and a global logistics network.
“We leverage advanced AI and machine learning algorithms that automate data ingestion and processing to allow suppliers and retailers to significantly improve inventory management and meet the ever-evolving demands of the global market,” says Wood.
“Dolce & Gabbana, for example, may have excess stock sitting in their warehouse in Europe and, with a simple CSV file, our system can recreate the original listing from the brand’s website as well as map out different markets, currencies and retailers in 30 different countries around the world.”
Azura’s AI capabilities have recently been further enhanced to refine product curation, image processing and language translation by a collaboration with Google Cloud, Google Cloud Vision and Google Translate.
Since its inception, Azura has expanded its reach far beyond Australia, forging significant partnerships across the US, Asia and Europe. As the business continues to grow, Wood, who was recognised as 2021 and 2022 Sydney Young Entrepreneur of the Year in Fashion and Design, and as a finalist for the Australian Entrepreneur of the Year 2021 and 2022, sees no limit to the company’s potential. “By integrating cutting-edge AI with our circular fashion platforms, we’re able to create a meaningful impact on both the environment and the industry,” he says. “Sustainability is more than a trend. It’s our commitment to a responsible future in fashion.”
This is an extract from an article that appears in print in our thirteenth edition, Page 46 of Winning Magazine with the headline: “Luxury fashion with a conscience”. Subscribe to Winning Magazine today.
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