Chanel Launching E-commerce

Chanel, long a holdout in the rush to offer shopping by device, will soon launch e-commerce. The move could come as early as fourth-quarter 2016, according to Bruno Pavlovsky, Chanel’s president of fashion. In addition, three of the Métiers d’Art companies, owned by Chanel under its Paraffection subsidiary, will launch e-commerce by the end of this year. In New York for tonight’s Métiers d’Art show at the Park Avenue Armory, a redo of the one presented in Salzburg in December, Pavlovsky declined to elaborate on plans for the Chanel brand’s foray into e-commerce. Asked if the house will start with a single-category or a tight product offering across multiple categories, he said “we are testing the approach,” but that it’s “much too early” to discuss specifics. The move should come, “probably the end of next year, September. But everything that we are doing has to be linked with some brick-and-mortar boutiques.” Chanel is looking to develop the businesses of the Métiers d’Art companies, all of which are profitable, Pavlovsky said. To that end, separate e-commerce sites are in the works for glove-maker Causse, milliner Maison Michel and cashmere house Barrie Knitwear. “Because we don’t have a lot of point of sales, we

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