Leading Virtual Showroom Provider JOOR Expands Global Event Coverage to Middle East and Japan

NEW YORK, July 01, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Today, JOOR, the world’s industry-standard digital wholesale platform for fashion, announced that it’s partnering with the Arab Fashion Council and Japan Fashion Week Organization to power the upcoming fashion industry events this summer and fall: TOKYO FASHION AWARD, Arab Fashion Week Season 12 and Rakuten Fashion Week TOKYO. All three will leverage JOOR Passport to centralize the trade show and fashion week experience by creating a one-stop-shop for users: one place to upload data, one website to visit, one app to download, and one comprehensive experience. These events are in addition to JOOR’s current partners London Fashion Week, Premium Group and Liberty Fairs, creating the largest curated fashion marketplace and marking JOOR as the leading global provider for digital events.

“JOOR continues to help global brands reimagine their trade show and fashion week models and we’re so excited to add Arab Fashion Week and the Tokyo Fashion Events to the growing list of partners that we will exclusively power,” said Kristin Savilia, CEO of JOOR. “With JOOR Passport, an inclusive and collaborative trade show platform, brands can upload their seasonal lookbooks to unique profile pages and showcase their styles in virtual showrooms and buyers can easily shop global assortments without having to travel. We are enabling the show to go on for brands and retailers, during the current travel restrictions and beyond.”

TOKYO FASHION AWARD and Rakuten Fashion Week TOKYO will select emerging fashion brands from Tokyo and support their international expansion. The brands will leverage JOOR’s platform to showcase their collections via virtual showrooms and connect with buyers in markets in and outside of Japan. With the support of ITOCHU, JOOR is experiencing rapid growth in Japan with Yoshida Kaban (Porter), Sacai, Nepenthes and Yohji Yamamoto recently joining the platform.

“It was quite important that we find a way at Rakuten Fashion Week TOKYO to support our brands in this time when buyers from not only Japan but also overseas are having difficulties to travel to attend the show,” said Kaoru Imajo, Director, Japan Fashion Week Organization. “The partnership that JOOR is providing will allow our brands to recover their business relationships and even have new business with new retailers found on the JOOR platform.”

The Arab Fashion Council and JOOR will work to position the Arab world on the international map of fashion by digitizing the wholesale selling process and providing virtual showrooms to the brands of the 22 countries of the Arab League. Brands will showcase their latest styles in virtual showrooms and these will be shoppable by global retailers.

“In times of constrained travel, it is very fortunate that we are able to continue promoting our brands in the Middle East thanks to an advanced technology such as JOOR,” said Mohammed Aqra, Chief Strategy Officer, Arab Fashion Council. “We are confident that this shift will enable the Arab designers to increase their global network with buyers which is inline with our vision to export Arab creativity worldwide.”

“With the Arab Fashion Week’s transformation into virtual, our focus shifted mainly to connect the Arab designers with buyers from around the world in an omni-channel solution which ensures higher ROAs (Return on Assets) than any existing traditional platform. Today we can promise our designers to benefit from intelligent data analytics that no physical event has access to, which only smart virtual showrooms such as JOOR can make possible,” said Jacob Abrian, Founder & CEO, Arab Fashion Council.

TOKYO FASHION AWARD will occur from on July 25-August 10. Rakuten Fashion Week TOKYO will run from October 12-18, and Arab Fashion Week will be October 21-23.

About JOOR

JOOR is the world’s industry-standard wholesale platform for fashion, that transacts over $1.5Bn in GMV every month. More than 8,600 brands and over 200,000 curated fashion retailers across 144 countries connect on the platform every day. With a commitment to fueling the advancement and growth of both brands and retailers, JOOR provides an ecosystem that combines dynamic virtual showrooms with collaborative tools including JOOR Passport, which centralizes the trade show experience across multiple fashion events.  JOOR users have greater flexibility, visibility, performance and insights into their business. JOOR is headquartered in New York City and has offices in Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Paris, London, Milan, Madrid, Melbourne and Tokyo. For more information visit: JOOR.com. 

About TOKYO FASHION AWARD

This is a new type of fashion prize that will select 6 fashion brands from Tokyo that have potential to grow in the international market and support their overseas expansion. We aim to bring fashion designers from Tokyo into the world by supporting their business continuously.

About Rakuten Fashion Week TOKYO

Out of the world’s fashion weeks, those held in Paris, Milan, London, New York and Tokyo are regarded as having the most potential for disseminating information due to their history and the amount of buzz surrounding them. These five fashion weeks are the most known fashion weeks in the world and have much influence of the fashion world. The fashion week held in Tokyo is the "Rakuten Fashion Week TOKYO". It is hosted by the Japan Fashion Week Organization (JFW Organization) and held twice a year in March and October.

Japan's latest creations are showcased to the world at Shibuya Hikarie and Omotesando Hills as well as other locations in Tokyo.

About Arab Fashion Council

The Arab Fashion Council is the world's largest non-profit fashion council and an INGO for the Arab world, representing the 22 members of the Arab League. Its vision is to build a creative economy in the region with the main goal to promote Arab fashion designers internationally, disseminate fashion culture in the region, and position the Arab world on the international map of fashion. It includes Arab companies and talent within the fashion industry, in particular fashion designers, models, photographers, hair stylists, make-up artists, and art directors. It regulates the schools of fashion registered under the laws of Arab countries. Finally, the Arab Fashion Council is the trademark holder of “Ready Couture” which is expected to exceed a revenue of 368B$ by 2021.

The Arab Fashion Week, founded in 2015 by Jacob Abrian, the Founder and CEO of the Arab Fashion Council, is a biannual fashion event endorsed by the Arab Fashion Council.

Arab Fashion Week (AFW) is hosted in Dubai twice a year and is among the world’s five most important fashion weeks alongside New York, London, Milan and Paris.

The AFW is the only official fashion platform in the Arab Region and the only platform that pioneered the Ready Couture segment which has attracted renowned international designers from across America, China, Europe and Russia to establish their business in Dubai.

Contact Information: Gretchen Miller, [email protected]