With celebs at the helm, 8wood challenges Indonesia’s big fashion estores

Alice Norin (left) and Alvin Yodhapatria (right), co-founders of 8wood

The fashion ecommerce space is quickly filling up in Indonesia. Local entrepreneurs and investors alike know that to succeed in women’s fashion, startups will have to find new ways to differentiate themselves.

Back in May, 8wood, a clothing estore aimed at women in Indonesia, pocketed seed funding of an undisclosed amount from local VC firm Ideosource. At first glance it may not be obvious why this store is unique up against the likes of Paraplou, Rocket Internet’s Zalora, Berrybenka, or Moxy, all of whom have also been showered with cash.

But while other fashion ecommerce sites have blossomed into larger enterprises that spend big on things like ads and marketing, 8wood is taking a lean approach and relying on social media. Some of the reasoning for this may stem from the co-founders’ status in Indonesia’s entertainment industry.

Spinnin’ records to pay bills

If you’re familiar with Indonesian celebrities, you may recognize Alvin Yodhapatria’s name. He’s perhaps best-known for his career as a DJ and his marriage to local model and actress Alice Norin, who is also the co-founder of 8wood. Yodhapatria’s claim to fame is from awards he got from Ravelex, one of the nation’s most popular electronic dance music communities.

Before he was on the radar, Yodhapatria says he had fallen on hard times. “In 2002, my family went through a financial crisis, which led me to a difficult decision: continue my studies or work and earn money,” explains Yodhapatria. “Because I was the only male in the family with a sister who was still very young, I chose to work and focus on helping my family’s income.”

See: Behind the scenes of Christian Sugiono’s MBDC MediaAt the time, Yodhapatria worked as a DJ by night and an events organizer by day. He grew his career as a performer for the next seven years and was able to ultimately pull his family out of economic hardship. “Then it hit me and I realized that this is not the type of career I could keep doing for a long time,” recalls Yodhapatria. “Everything was so seasonal. I decided to stop and do business in another industry.”

Road to the garage

As Yodhapatria ventured out of the limelight, he once again found it was not so easy to earn a buck. He tried his hand in several spaces, including an advertising agency and a brief foray into the telco business. Yodhapatria sums the whole time period up as a failure. He explains:

To make a long story short, our last business led us to bankruptcy because our partners stole all the money we invested […] With the cash we had left, which was less than US$6,000, we started 8wood from our garage. The reason we chose to do ecommerce at the time was because we were able to take advantage of social media as our marketing channel.

Prior to the seed round of funding from Ideosource, Yodhapatria and Norin were able to run the business for about two years by bootstrapping it. According to Yodhapatria, the goal of 8wood, which is a business-to-consumer marketplace for clothing brands, has always been to simply help young women find fashionable stuff at reasonable prices.

Secret weapon