Client Spotlight: Pivoting to E-Commerce With Brooklyn Bleu
With Californian roots, and a true Brooklyn spirit, the black-owned vintage jewelry boutique, Brooklyn Bleu, had a prime location at the Oculus World Trade in Lower Manhattan pre-pandemic.
Once the pandemic hit, the complications of the Oculus also being a main transportation hub for the Tri-State area meant that the store would not open in the foreseeable future. However, owner and vintage jewelry extraordinaire Tenisha Light-Caba didn’t let that stop her. In April 2020, she connected with Kielo Digital to begin working on the e-commerce switch of the unique vintage boutique, carrying hundreds of incredible pieces.
What was the biggest shift in your business due to the pandemic, and how did you solve it?
Our biggest shift was from retail to e-commerce! It was incredibly challenging, but Kielo helped guide us through this transition and process. We went from depending on foot traffic in our stores to creating foot traffic, and developing our organic customer base online.
Brooklyn Bleu’s previous site design
Kielo Digital revamped the BrooklynBleu.com site early May 2020, to reflect the fierce, fun and fabulous personality of the brand that Tenisha had built at the Oculus, hosting clientele from around the globe.
The new homepage design for Brooklyn Bleu.
Having a physical product that requires vintage expertise and rare vintage pieces: How are you now sourcing vintage items, and how did it change in the past year?
We personally hand select each item from private collectors who are knowledgeable, and passionate about the business. Those personable relationships only grew stronger during the pandemic. With the country shutdown, we were able to call up our contacts to keep fresh inventory coming in. This was due to relationships we’ve built over the past 5-7 years.
From the new site: A dedicated space for weekly drops of new items in the e-commerce store.
Tell us about the stylist program, and what your vision is for it in 2021-2022?
Our stylist program identifies exclusive one-of-a-kind rare vintage pieces we offer as rentals to stylists, fashion editors, artists, and creatives. Our plan is to expand this program and share the lifestyle, beauty, history and exclusivity of vintage jewelry.
What was the biggest learnings about yourself as a business owner, and your business, that you learned in the last year?
I learned how to pick up the pieces and reinvent myself during a time it felt like everything was falling apart.
If you had a magic wand, what would you want to do to amplify Brooklyn Bleu's message on- and off-line?
I want people to know Black brands matter, female run brands matter, & independently-funded businesses need support! Brooklyn Bleu is also an advocate and voice for environmental and social causes that affect the lives of our supporters.
Brooklyn Bleu’s vintage Chanel pieces featured in Vogue Mexico.
Not only did Tenisha pivot to elevate the brand with a rebrand and new e-commerce site, but she also ramped up digital advertising efforts, landed multiple international fashion magazine covers through the stylist program, and discovered a gold mine: ShopShop, where vintage jewelry experts sell upscale pieces to Chinese audiences during live shopping events.
We are incredibly proud to see the evolution of this fierce, pivoting business leader, and the growth of Brooklyn Bleu’s lines of business, as Tenisha will be equipped with a structured e-commerce store and Instagram shop, in addition to a DePop and Etsy, ahead of a re-opening of a physical store one day in the future.