For most women, an evening dress that is worth 1000 dollars only exist in the fashion magazines or stars on the TV programs but not appear in their own wardrobe. But an emerging website named “Rent the Runway” has made it possible to rent an evening dress online as simple as renting a movie from Netflix.

This web site has just completed operation test for mail-order service and began to open to the public. Customers can rent clothes made by the famous designer and only need to pay $50-200 for 4 days, one over ten of price. The Clothes will be directly sent to the customer’s doorstep. When the customer finishes using the cloth, they will mail them back in a prepared pouch. And the rent includes the cleaning fee but not includes the damage insurance of $5.
It is obvious that the website, founded by Jennifer Hyman and Jennifer Carter, two graduates of Harvard Business School, is the product of the economic downturn, Hyman explains that the inspiration of site comes from last year when she see her sister worried about whether to buy an expensive dress to attend the wedding. The original funds are provided by the Bain investment company to purchase the inventory of 160 sets of haute couture of various styles. She also said that there had more than 20000 women that signed rental service so far.
Jennifer Hyman said Rent the Runaway had at least 1 million active users at present, covering all kinds of women whose age ranging from 15 to 45 years old. “There is a little surprise,” she said. “At first we thought we would only have women users who were in their 20s.”
Rent the Runway will contact renting business by E-mail. They take the form of invitation now, which means providing service to customer invited only. In addition, they also adopted a series of measures to prevent the failure of leasing service.
First, they use the reservations in advance to ensure that customers can get dress in need of wearing. In addition, the website provides consultation service of style division to provide customers with advice such as fabrics, style. Besides, the web site provides service to return within 24 hours no reason, etc.
If you want a second set of clothing as backup option, you need to add 5 dollars. All clothes will be supported with a custom clothing bag and a “proper toolkit”, within which there are double side adhesive tape, bra straps regulator and deodorant stain cleaner.
Although there are a lot of advantages, it also faces many risks. Compared with the DVDS, fashion changes fast, it is difficult to make up for the cost of it is out of fashion.
“A true test of the service is the quality of the collection,” said Samantha Durbin, editor of a fashion blog FabSugar.com, “no one wants to rent clothes that are out-of-season.”
If you are going to a party, but it is too expensive for you to buy one beautiful evening dress, you can consider renting one online.