What’s in Store: Electric Couture
November 16th, 2007, 5:20 pm · Post a Comment · posted by Sam Mittelsteadt
Electric Couture
El Zocallo shopping center, 15435 N. Scottsdale Road, Scottsdale
Hours: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday
Information: (480) 854-4441 or electriccouture.com
(Other East Valley stores at Scottsdale Fashion Square and Chandler Fashion Center.)
“The original concept was just a place to get a great T-shirt and a great pair of jeans,” Penny Long says of Electric Couture,
the store she opened (as Electric Ladyland) five years ago “on a dirt lot” across from Kierland Commons. Today those basics have been mostly shunted aside in favor higher-end pieces. What happened? “I lost my mind?” Long offers with a laugh. “No — it just evolved.” If it’s selling well in the current retail environment “it’s either luxe or it’s Target,” she says, so she rebranded her stores into Electric Couture, which carries mostly higher-dollar womenswear, and Electric Denim, which carries more moderately priced items and menswear.
The core customer: “Women, who as it turns out are spending a lot of money,” Long says. (Also known as: “Every retailer’s dream client.”) Last weekend a customer came in to pick up an garment she had altered and while she was there, she dropped another $2,800 on stuff that caught her eye. “
Plus, she bought 14 pairs of shoes last week,” Long says.
On the mannequin (left): Leopard and sequin dress by Erato, $304. Jet and topaz leopard-print collar by Kenneth Jay Lane, $858. Faux-pearl bracelet with leopard clasp, $213. Quilted gold bracelets, $45 each. Bracelet with elephant clasp, $125.
High price point (right): Fashions by Thomas Wylde, an L.A.-based line by former model and stylist Paula Thomas that incorporates skull prints on everything from $388 bikinis to handbags, which top out at more than $2,000. (Highwire dress by Thomas Wylde, $645. Cross of Roses necklace, $470, and Pop Flowers necklace, $500, both by Erickson Beamon.)
Low price point (left): “I would read blogs where people were bragging about how much jewelry they were stealing from us!” Long says. “So I created inexpensive jewelry that wouldn’t kill us if it was stolen.” The Electric Bling line — necklaces, earrings, pins emblazoned with “God Bless America” (or, for those with different allegiances, “I Love Pugs”) — begins around $10. All jewelry is bold and “trashy in a fun way,” Long says. Customers “don’t come to us for quiet little chains.”
Top-seller: Twisted Heart sweats ($86-$146), embellished with Maltese crosses and flying hearts. “We do $50,000 a month in them,” Long says. “We also carry a similar line, Ankh. People say crystals are ‘out’? We still sell crystals by
the bucket.” (Indeed, between the clothing and the jewelry, the whole store looks like a confectionery shop, if Willy Wonka had made crystals instead of candy.)
Local lines (right): Crystal-embellished Dr. Scholl’s sandals by Scottsdale-based Crystalishious ($275-$1,800) are more than flip-flops: Even the wedges are covered with bling. (Peace and Love sandal, $1,760.)
She’s excited about: “We are the No. 1 retailer of Thomas Wylde in the country,” Long says. “Barney’s is No. 2.” She calls Thomas “the next Chloe, the next Stella McCartney.”
