Fat Anna Wintour’s Fashion Squeeze: Jeff Bezos is Trying to be A Fashion Girly
Words: Anastasia Vartanian
Make it stand out
You can criticise fashion for a lot of things right now, but being boring isn’t one of them. Rather than the clothes, however, it’s the industry headlines that have been stealing the spotlight. Each news announcement feels more unhinged than the last. Donatella left Versace (kind of.) Creative directors Demna Gvasalia, Alessandro Michele and Pierpaolo Piccioli simply switched places.
Then, in what felt like the grand finale, Anna Wintour stepped down from her role as editor in chief of Vogue. It was a title she’d held for 37 years. The sudden end of Nuclear Wintour, announced on a random Thursday. Surely, no news could top that. Until rumours started swirling around that billionaire Jeff Bezos might be buying Condé Nast — Vogue’s parent company — for his new wife Lauren Sánchez as a wedding gift. Right… What the hell is going on?
Mind you, this is totally unconfirmed. In fact, the Newhouse family, owners of Condé Nast since 1959, sent a statement to The Daily Mail saying that their titles were not for sale. But you can see why there is so much chatter. Bezos is no stranger to buying media titles, having acquired the Washington Post in 2013. Sánchez, who is herself a former journalist, appeared on the recent cover of US Vogue in a wedding gown supposedly picked by Wintour. It was coincidentally Wintour’s last cover, coming the day after news broke about her departure. (Dame Wintour is staying on at Vogue as global editorial director and at Condé Nast as chief content officer, meaning she will still have a say in the direction of the publisher.)
Lately, it feels like the industry has really been trying to make Bezos and Sánchez happen, and you have to ask why. In 2023, Sánchez’s editorial with Vogue effectively launched the couple into pop culture notoriety. She made her Met Gala debut last year, and was at Demna’s final Balenciaga show mere days after the wedding. Plus, there was news just recently that Bezos has apparently invested in actress Sydney Sweeney’s lingerie company indirectly (he’s backed Ben Schwerin — partner at private equity firm Coatue, the company invested in Sweeney — with a billion dollars.)
But the billionaire has been cosying up to fashion for ages now. Amazon started selling clothes in 2002, before acquiring Shopbop in 2006 and Zappos in 2009. In 2011, it launched MyHabit, a membership-only online store which specialised in flash sales of designer items. (It would close 5 years later to focus efforts on Amazon Fashion.) In 2012, it sponsored the Met Gala, the annual Costume Institute fundraiser organised by Wintour. In 2020, it launched Common Threads, a marketplace for young designers, in partnership with Vogue and the Council of Fashion Designers of America. The initiative was framed as Bezos ‘coming to the rescue’ of young brands during the pandemic. That same year, Amazon aired its answer to Project Runway (complete with Tim Gunn and Heidi Klum as hosts!) It was called Making The Cut, and the show made it possible to buy contestants’ designs on the website as you watched. Bezos stepped down as CEO of Amazon in 2021, but remains the largest individual shareholder and the executive chairman.
From sponsoring fashion weeks to hiring industry professionals, Amazon’s forays into fashion over the past two decades are so numerous, it’s difficult to name them all. But the point is, Bezos has been in pursuit for a long time. If you look at the Amazon Fashion storefront now, you can see that they stock brands like Calvin Klein, Diesel, Puma and Savage x Fenty. There’s also a section for luxury clothing, although many pieces are “pre-loved” rather than an actual deal with the brand. Still, some labels, like Giuseppe Zanotti and Altuzarra, do actually sell on the site. (So you can buy the “Monster Giuseppe heels" that Nicki raps about on Amazon.)
“Why do all this, though? What’s the point, when you’re already one of the richest men in the world?”
In the 2013 book The Everything Store: Jeff Bezos and the Age of Amazon, Bezos is quoted as saying: “In order to be a two-hundred-billion-dollar company, we’ve got to learn how to sell clothes and food.” Amazon has since surpassed this goal, but if there’s one thing we know about the ultra-rich, it's their love for expansion. As Bernard Arnault, CEO of LVMH and another one of the richest men in the world, said: “Luxury goods are the only area in which it is possible to make luxury margins.”
But despite all these efforts, Bezos hasn’t quite managed to make Amazon Fashion happen. When you think luxury fashion, you don’t think Amazon. Sorry, Jeff, but you know it too. Which is why you’ve been trying so hard to rub shoulders with the industry. Much of luxury is about emotion. Why should bags which were produced for 50 euros be sold for 3000? (That’s real, Valentino Bags and Dior faced scandals for such things.) When you’re paying exorbitant prices for a product, you want the experience. You want to feel like it’s worth it, even though you know in your heart it isn’t. A perfumed store with architectural furniture or plush carpets gives you that experience. Amazon, The Everything Store, doesn’t.
But, having a hand in fashion myth-making would certainly solve that problem, wouldn’t it? It’s already happening: for Amazon’s Prime day, articles popped up in Condé Nast-owned titles like Vogue and GQ, as well as other publications like New York Magazine and The Independent. It looks like Amazon is already paying for coverage, but imagine if Bezos owned fashion titles outright. Public perception would take some time to change, but Jeff is playing the long game.
Plus, it’s no secret that fashion media is not in a good place, much like a lot of legacy media companies. Titles shuttering, laying off their staff, or being bought out is a sadly common occurrence these days. Perhaps, fashion media can no longer afford its high and mighty attitude. So, maybe this is the perfect time for Bezos to swoop in. He’s been knocking at fashion’s door for years, and they finally have no choice but to let him in.
Is the devil really about to wear Amazon? (That’s a line from NSS Magazine that I desperately wish I’d come up with myself.) Even if these rumours about Bezos buying Condé Nast are complete bullshit, keep your eye on his moves in fashion. He’s up to something.
