Fashion’s Night Out 2011 – a call to action!

Fashion’s Night Out (FNO) is an unprecedented global initiative originally created in 2009 through the collaboration between American Vogue, the Council of Fashion Designers of America, NYC & Company, and the City of New York, to celebrate fashion, restore consumer confidence, and boost the industry’s economy during the recession. Tomorrow, September 8, in response to overwhelming demand, Fashion’s Night Out will return to New York City and over 250 cities nationwide to highlight fashion and support retail with exciting events that include designer appearances, celebrity guests, fashion shows and musical performances. Clearly, the event has been a huge success and it’s time for Indianapolis to get on the bandwagon!

Unfortunately, Indianapolis retailers have been a bit slow on the uptake, but the FNO movement IS growing locally. And let’s be honest, our city needs this initiative to boost sales and improve the bottom line, probably much more so than NYC or Atlanta or Milan. From the construction-ridden Fountain Square to the possibly declining Circle Center which recently lost what some consider to be its biggest draw of moneyed consumers – Nordstrom, to the struggling indie boutiques, Indianapolis is ready for a bit of hoopla in clothing retail.

Thankfully, Fashion Mall is stepping up to the plate! This year, the mall as a whole is endorsing FNO and several retailers, including BCBG, Lucky Brand, Cache, Brooks Brothers and BEBE are all registered participants listed on FNO’s official website. Also, Saks Fifth Ave is hosting FNO for the second year running and a couple of stores in Clay Terrace are involved as well. But what about downtown? Talk about a missed opportunity! Circle Center has a just THREE retailers participating and worse yet, NOT. A. SINGLE. local Indie boutique seems to be trying to harness the money-making potential of this event. Yes, it does cost $250 to register your location with FNO in NYC to be considered official and be listed on the FNO website, but is that really too much to spend to be involved in something that already has a massive marketing machine behind it?

And so the hope is that FNO 2012, while it is not guaranteed to take place (NYC organizers decide every year whether to put it on or not), will in fact happen and that as many as possible local retailers, no matter if they are in Carmel, Greenwood, Downtown, Plainfield or anywhere else in the greater Indianapolis area, will fully embrace Fashion’s Night Out and make it an evening to remember!

Retailers! Pattern will be more than happy to spearhead the event, promote it AND tie all the lose ends together, but we need YOU to take that first step! So how about it?

And. If you are lover of fashion and want to see Indianapolis continue to expand its offerings, please go out tomorrow night and shop, will you? Even if you don’t end up buying anything, your presence will show support and interest. Indianapolis retailers need your help!

Visit the FNO website to view all the local participating stores and for details of each stores “special” offerings.

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