Lookastic

@Percival you are right about style. Our tagline has "stylist" in it because it's easier for people to understand what we are about. What we actually do is help people dress better. We believe that dressing well is basically knowing what goes with what (items, color, patterns, materials). Right now, when someone decides to start dressing well, they have to invest a lot of time into reading magazines/blogs to learn that stuff (we've done this ourselves). We save people time because we say "Hey, so you have a navy blazer. Here are things that go well with it: ..." A screenshot is worth a thousands words: Under the hood we tag items (navy blazer, khaki chinos) present in fashionable looks. We then analyze the relationships between the items to see what goes with what and calculate that rating of the combination. So if both a navy blazer and khaki chinos are present in a lot of fashionable looks, it means this combination is a good one. Then, if a user has a navy blazer in their wardrobe, we will recommend them khaki chinos (products & inspiration on how to wear it).

@Percival why would you NOT invest in Lookastic? I always found answers to this question very valuable.

@alexandrzaytsev Sure thing, affiliate models are not the greatest revenue stream. Low barrier of entry for others and fluxating margins. Takes lots of work to maintain the traffic flow to make any significant money here. Related: You might need a shit ton more traffic for seed investment on this. We did one similar and I believe they were 2MM monthly UV when they received investment. Fashion/style are tough industries for VC backed startups. I think they have a harder time fundraising and VCs in the valley generally don't get excited about them. Of course there isn't much style here so that's not a huge surprise. :D Markets like LA or NY might be better.

@Percival very helpful, thank you! What would your honest advice be for us regarding monetization? We were also thinking about providing our technology to brands so that they can create personalized experience for their fans. Thanks for your time, much appreciated!

@Percival we don't sell the whole outfits, we have affiliate links to items present in the look. Basically, all looks on Lookastic are shoppable (http://lookastic.com/4174). We have ~80k visitors monthly. We are growing 30% month-to-month. We also have a flexible search engine, allows you to search for looks with certain items (Navy Blazer + Jeans: http://lookastic.com/men/navy-bl...). Ultimately, our goal is to become The Internet Fashion database: we want know what goes with what, where you can buy it and how you can wear it.

@chug2k yes, of course! We don't display the level of accurateness yet, but internally we have this data (it depends on many factors, such as how often two items are present in the look together, how popular said looks are, how often similar items are present in the look, etc).

@alexandrzaytsev I'm just personally curious which types of clothes are the hardest to match. Khakis + Blazer makes sense, but I wonder if it's easier to screw up shoes, etc.

@Percival 25-30% of people who click "Get started" end up creating real accounts later (we create temporary accounts automatically so that they can try us out without the need to create an account).

@Percival Most of all, we'd look forward to tapping into the extensive 500 network and connecting with brands and influencers. We're committed to Lookastic full-time, but are also bootstrapped. Having this money in the bank account would help us focus on the growth 100%. We'd love to be surrounded by like-minded people, it's such a great motivation to improve every day.