Happy Nice Mall

It would probably be an exaggeration to say that Ty Haney has changed the way we work. The boutique didn’t start a fitness frenzy; she’s not Jane Fonda. But the track and field company he founded in 2014, Outdoor Voices, helped popularize a paradigm of fitness that is more about everyday movement than body-stressing athletics that brands like Nike are promoting.

Outdoor Sounds builds an audience with color-blocked compression leggings and all-in-ones workout clothes can easily transition from the gym to brunch. On social media, fans boasted about purchasing all shades and posted photos of #DoingThings in natural places wearing matching sets. They also provided feedback on new styles and colorways on online forums. It was a customer loyalty tale.

While Ms. Haney, 33, is no longer at Outdoor Voices, she hopes to take the principles of community building and consumer engagement into a new realm: the blockchain-based future of the internet, known as web3. She’s betting that in the next phase of online retail, “printing things” will become new “making things”.

His latest attempt is a platform called try your bestwill allow brands to collect input from customers in exchange for digital collectibles (NFTs) and rewards such as bragging rights or brand coins that can be redeemed for purchases. Ms Haney said these are assets that can potentially have lasting value, unlike the one-time discount codes and temporary benefits that most companies offer to loyal customers.

“The idea is for brands and fans to come together and the concept is to share value with those who created it,” Ms Haney said in an interview.

Direct-to-consumer brands often relied on different sources to get feedback from their most relevant customers: Google Docs, Space bases, DMs. Try The Best aims to streamline this process and move marketing spend away from Facebook and Instagram. Here, Ms. Haney said that rising costs are making it difficult for emerging brands to grow.

The company says 10 brands have signed up for the Try Your Best pilot program so far. “confectionery dresses” The pandemic has become the pinnacle of homewear and Vada, a jewelry and eyewear company. But initially, the only brand on the platform runningA new brand led by Ms. Haney that sells products containing CBD and THCV.

He said Try The Best is hoping to reach “Parade customer, JuneShine customer, Glossier customer—those millennial, Gen Z-type audiences.”

Sean Judge, general partner at Castle Island Ventures, which specializes in blockchain-related investments and put $2 million into Try Your Best, said target users are “people who buy a brand because they like it and share it on Instagram.” — A modest number compared to Outdoor Voices’ fundraising. “It’s a way to connect with others in the community and engage directly with brands to provide real-time feedback on new product ideas and where the brand needs to go.”

Ms. Haney said that involving consumers in design decisions has helped drive the success behind some of Outdoor Voices’ most popular products. “The way to get people to buy every color of the workout suit — 25 colors — was to bring them upstream in the product creation process,” he said, “but there wasn’t really a central vehicle for that kind of interaction.”

Casey Lewis, a trend researcher who writes about youth culture in the Substack newsletter, After schoolHe was intrigued by the idea that brands should rethink customer loyalty but be wary of the attractiveness of digital assets.

“Any time a brand can build a successful community, it’s a huge win for them. But it is very, very difficult to achieve or force that success,” said Ms. Lewis. “The big question is: Do people care about NFTs and will that be enough to get them involved and excited?”

Web3 Billed in often vague and utopian terms as an online ecosystem where users will draw power from Web 2.0, the tech giants that dominate the current phase of the internet.

Kevin Werbach, a professor at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and author of “The Blockchain and the New Architecture of Trust,” said that “granting powerful property rights directly to users” could potentially shift the balance of power, but none of it. web3’s promises are guaranteed.

“There’s a web3 out there that’s great and trying to make the world a better place, but labeling something as web3 doesn’t mean that the power dynamics will magically reverse,” said Professor Werbach.

Ms. Haney is particularly interested in involving women on web3. “We see a predominantly male demo on Reddit and Discords, and we’re telling each other about all these opportunities,” she said. “By bringing brands with a broad female audience to crypto, this is a really big opportunity.”

Try Best on the Avalanche blockchain, which Ms Haney says she partially prefers, her transactions consume significantly less energy than, say: Bitcoin or Ethereum. (But even so-called “green” mining operations are much more energy-intensive than other financial operations.)

Try Your Best Plans to earn money by collecting monthly fees from brands and potentially sharing revenue when tokens are used to increase sales.

Mr. Judge, an investor, has previously worked with a number of direct-to-consumer companies and has been consistently disappointed by the rising costs of advertising to customers on Facebook and Instagram. Ms Haney said she “experienced these pain points first hand.”

Outdoor Sounds was a huge success. Ms. Haney and company were the subject of a glowing feature. New Yorker Compared Outdoor Sounds to Lululemon and raised more than $50 million in venture capital. It also caught the attention of retail legend Mickey Drexler, who led transformations at Gap and J. Crew. He became chairman of the board and attracted investors to the brand.

But just before the pandemic hit the United States, Ms. Haney’s successful work on Outdoor Voices stopped in screams as investors questioned her leadership. A rift broke out between the young founder and Mr. Drexler, costly store openings were delayed and a number of veteran retail executives left the company struggling with a relocation from New York to Austin, Texas. Internal troubles are detailed in the articles. New York Times and BuzzFeed News.

Ms. Haney recalled thinking at the time, “My life is going to end.”

But as the news cycle progressed, it continued. “It was disgusting, but it didn’t kill me, and it gave me a lot more energy to rebuild and show that I can set a vision and execute against it,” he said. “It feels good to take full responsibility.”

Ms Haney resigned from the brand amid investor turmoil in February 2020, and then rejoined with the title founder two months later. She left the company and its board of directors in January 2021 to pursue projects including Try Your Best. He still owns a stake in Outdoor Voices.

Mr. Judge was not interested in Ms. Haney’s fight with investors at Outdoor Voices and saw it as a vote of confidence that several former employees of the company joined her in Try the Best.

“Every type of job has its challenges, and some are more general than others,” said Mr. “I think Ty has learned something amazing about starting a business.”

Ms Haney said her venture came at a time when the traditional direct-consumer model of building businesses like Warby Parker, Everlane and Glossier was “broken” after years of over-reliance on social marketing.

At one point, Outdoor Voices said it had set aside about 30 percent of its total funding to acquire clients on Facebook and Instagram. He hopes Try The Best can help brands cut those costs.

Also, as young people may be less willing to give their thoughts and time for free, Try Best offers an answer to the question of how to get them paid back.

“One thing about generation Z is that they want to be rewarded for their input and advice,” Ms Lewis said. “This is not the generation that is willing to do something just for that.”