As TV ratings fall and the burden of carriage fees grows, the home shopping industry is accelerating efforts to strengthen fashion, its core category. Fashion, the traditional flagship product group for home shopping, has relatively high margins and can be easily differentiated through in-house and exclusive brands, serving as a bulwark for defending profitability. The fashion focus of home shopping, once centered on women's wear for middle-aged and older shoppers, has recently expanded to men's specialty brands, influencer collaborations, and mobile short-form content.
According to the industry on the 7th, a Hyundai Home Shopping broadcast on Apr. 30 for the USPA Polo brand's spring-summer men's line drew as many as 9,000 customers and logged 900 million won in sales in a single day. Earlier, on Apr. 29, a broadcast for Benetton's spring-summer men's jackets and short-sleeve knits sold out, posting 500 million won in sales in just one hour.
As men's wear gains popularity, Hyundai Home Shopping recently introduced the men's contemporary fashion brand "MADMARIS" exclusively in the industry, moving to strengthen the category. In launching the brand, it collaborated with fashion YouTuber "Kkang Stylist," who has 1.17 million subscribers, receiving advice on planning and producing new products, including fabric, color, and design details. Hyundai Home Shopping plans to expand the men's lineup of its in-house fashion brands (PB) for the fall-winter season this year.
CJ OnStyle is speeding up efforts to strengthen mobile-based fashion content. This year, it plans to expand video content centered on mobile live and short-form, and to produce and distribute more than 5,000 short-form fashion pieces.
At its recent trend preview event "Fashion Showcase," CJ OnStyle found that strengthening its AI (artificial intelligence) style book and short-form content led to fashion video content accounting for about 70% of clicks within the mobile app's curated pages. Accordingly, the company plans to schedule mobile live broadcasts about 60% more than at the previous Fashion Showcase. Powered by growth in the fashion category, CJ OnStyle's mobile live commerce transaction amount in the fourth quarter of last year rose 98.1% from a year earlier.
GS Shop will hold a customer-invited styling class at its headquarters in Yeongdeungpo-gu, Seoul, on the 9th. A show host and a stylist who lead GS Shop's fashion program "The Collection" will participate, sharing styling know-how using GS Shop PB products such as "Core Authentic," "Morgan," and "SJ Wani."
The Collection is a program that began in connection with the offline fashion show "Winter Collection," which GS Shop introduced as an industry first in 2012. Over the past three years, the number of customers who purchased products through the broadcast has reached 1.2 million.
Lotte Home Shopping is also expanding its in-house fashion brands and actively pursuing collaborations with external brands. Its flagship brand LBL marked its 10th anniversary this year by unveiling a collaborative line with Nice Claup, and By Bridget released collaborative products with the casual brand Juicy Judy. In Sept. last year, it also introduced the new premium-material specialty brand "Nemer," strengthening its fashion portfolio.
Home shopping companies are doubling down on fashion because the revenue of their traditional TV-centered business model is deteriorating year after year. According to the Korea TV Home Shopping Association, last year's broadcast sales for seven domestic TV home shopping operators (GS, CJ, Hyundai, Lotte, NS, Home&Shopping, and Gongyoung) totaled 2.618 trillion won. That is the lowest level in 13 years since 3.0286 trillion won in 2012. The seven operators' total transaction amount last year was 18.505 trillion won, down 5.1% from the previous year.
Meanwhile, the ratio of carriage fees to broadcast sales has steadily risen from 59.9% in 2021 to 73.2% last year. Carriage fees are expenses paid by home shopping companies to pay-TV operators for channel usage. While broadcast sales are declining, the burden of carriage fees, which are a fixed cost, is growing, intensifying pressure on profitability.
In this situation, fashion is seen as a category where home shopping companies can more easily secure sales and profitability. Food and household goods are easy to price-compare and have limited room for differentiation, while fashion can enhance product value through materials, design, brand concept, and styling proposals.
In particular, in-house brands allow home shopping companies to directly lead product planning, pricing, and promotions, which is favorable for improving profitability. In fact, CJ OnStyle's flagship women's contemporary brand "CelebShop Edition" posted sales of 100 billion won last year, up more than 20% from a year earlier. GS Shop's flagship brand "Core Authentic" also recorded a cumulative order amount of 95 billion won last year, up 175% year over year. GS Shop's "La Piaf" likewise saw a cumulative order amount of 77.3 billion won last year, up 9% from the previous year.
An industry official said, "Home shopping has an advantage in selling fashion products because show hosts can explain materials, fit, and styling methods in detail and show models wearing the outfits," adding, "Recently, the range of products handled has diversified to men's wear and premium-material items, and there are more attempts to combine short-form content to draw in mobile users."