First Insight Forms New Partnerships with Leading Retailers and Brands

Aéropostale, Helzberg Diamonds, maurices and Things Remembered turn to First Insight to improve sales, margins and inventory turnover 

PITTSBURGH, PA, July 1, 2015 – First Insight, the leading provider of solutions that empower brands to incorporate the voice of the consumer into the design and merchandising of new products, today announced partnership agreements with four leading specialty retail companies.  First Insight’s continued momentum speaks to the significant market opportunity and demand for direct and forward-looking insights delivered by First Insight’s platform, InsightSuite.

New partners include:

  • Aéropostale, a specialty retailer of casual apparel for young women and men
  • Helzberg Diamonds, a retail and online jewelry brand
  • maurices, an omni-channel specialty fashion brand
  • Things Remembered, North America's leading retailer of personalized merchandise and experiences.

These partnership agreements are significant to First Insight as they demonstrate the breadth of capabilities of the InsightSuite platform, as well as its ability to deliver measurable results.

  • Wide product range: From graphic T-shirts to personalized gifts to luxury products and fine jewelry, First Insight’s solution provides actionable feedback across all types of industries and products. “First Insight gives us fast, actionable data across a broad range of products, from baby and home to men’s and women’s jewelry to office and business products,” said Lisa Gavales, Chairman and CEO of Things Remembered.
  • Speed of Decision-making: First Insight’s platform generates results in as little as 24 hours. Marc D. Miller, Chief Operating Officer of Aéropostale, Inc. said: “The quick response time of the First Insight platform allows Aéropostale to make more informed decisions with shorter lead times, improving the efficiency of the merchandising and buying process.”
  • Optimal Design Attributes: First Insight’s platform is now being used by retailers and brands to understand the optimal set of attributes for each targeted consumer profile. Mike Herrick, SVP of Planning & Allocation for maurices, a subsidiary of Ascena Retail Group, Inc., said, “First Insight’s platform is enabling maurices to understand which patterns, colors and silhouettes create the optimal combination for both our core customer and our new, targeted customer.  We can now be much more focused during our new product development process.” 
  • Marketing Applications: Retailers and brands are now using InsightSuite to better understand customer needs and target customers with the right offerings. Lisa Gavales, Chairman and CEO of Things Remembered, continued: “Our business is one where the purchaser is sometimes purchasing for themselves and sometimes as a gift for someone else. That can complicate our ability to understand ‘the customer’ and what they like and do not like.  First Insight’s analytics have enabled us to gain this understanding with speed and scale.”

  • Proven Results: First Insight’s solution consistently generates margin gains for its retail partners by increasing the success rate of new products by as much as 100%. Beryl Raff, CEO of Helzberg Diamonds, a Berkshire Hathaway Company, said: “Through a thorough due-diligence process, we have found that First Insight’s solution has more than doubled our new product success rate.”

“These industry leading companies recognize First Insight’s solution as a critical strategic initiative to move their company forward and ahead of the competition,” said Greg Petro, President and CEO of First Insight. “Our mission is to improve the success rate of new products for all retailers and brands worldwide, and we look forward to continuing to deliver sales and margin gains for our retail and brand partners.”

About First Insight, Inc.

First Insight is the world’s leading provider of solutions that empower brands to incorporate the voice of the consumer in to the design and merchandising of new products. Through the use of online consumer engagement, the First Insight solution gathers real-time consumer data and applies predictive analytic models to create actionable insights, which drive measurable value.  Retailers, manufacturers and brands use the First Insight solution to design, select, price and market the most profitable new products for improved sales, margins and inventory turnover. Customers include some of world’s leading vertically integrated brands, sporting goods companies, department stores, mass merchant retailers and wholesalers. For further information, please visit www.firstinsight.com.

Media Contact:
Gina Giachetti
Highwire PR
(415) 963-4174 ex. 17
gina@highwirepr.com 

Company Contact:
Jim Shea
Chief Marketing Officer
First Insight, Inc.
(724) 759-7141
jim.shea@firstinsight.com

Things Remembered  maurices  Aeropostale  Helzberg Diamonds