Hi, and welcome back to Line Sheet. I’m in London for a short while to see the Schiaparelli exhibition at the V&A, and some other things. I hope to run into you.

West London fixture and former YNAP C.E.O. Alison Loehnis is the subject of Sarah Shapiro’s fascination today. When Loehnis exited YNAP after Mytheresa’s acquisition of the retailer, many expected that she would quietly consult until the next big thing came along. (And probably not in multibrand retail, since there are almost zero options left.) Instead, Loehnis has taken to Instagram, using her product knowledge to become something of an influencer, driving significant sales on affiliate platforms. It might not be the move that people expected, but it’s certainly revealing about the state of retail.

Up top, some news about the fate of The Face, a bit of exposition regarding the exit of Nicolas Di Felice at Courrèges, and thoughts on Nike’s forthcoming Moon Shoe relaunch.

Also mentioned in this issue: Ciara, Russell Wilson, Solange Knowles, Law Roach, Sara Moonves, Stefan Larsson, the Pinault family office, David Simon, Gabriella Karefa-Johnson, Tina Brown’s newsletter, Casey Cadwallader, Ben Reardon, Jerry Perkins, Adrien Da Maia, Brendan Dunne, Marie Leblanc, Eli Simon, and more…

Three Things You Should Know…

Messed-up (The) Face: Several staffers at legendary British indie publication The Face were fired yesterday in the middle of closing an issue, I’m told. Speculation among the booted is that former i-D magazine editor-in-chief Ben Reardon is joining as E.I.C. of the Wasted Talent–owned publication. But I also hear that Wasted Talent C.E.O. and co-founder Jerry Perkins plans to close the magazine. The reality is that Wasted Talent, which also owns something called Mixmag, has been shopping its properties around for years. (At one point, Sara Moonves and W were in talks to buy The Face.)

The sticking point for many acquirers is that Wasted Talent wants to sell its whole portfolio. (Which… no.) The big value here is in The Face’s archives, if Wasted Talent even owns them, and whatever email list it has gathered over the years. Anyway, just because The Face may be closing doesn’t mean it’s actually dead. This is an intellectual property play and someone will eventually buy it, and probably sooner than later. (The company has not filed its accounts with the British registrar, Companies House, since 2024, by the way. It did not respond to a request for comment.)
The Courrèges question: It’s not like anyone was surprised when Nicolas Di Felice announced he was leaving Courrèges this morning. The invitation for his last show was a clock, clearly indicating that time was up. First, let’s acknowledge all that Di Felice and his executive team—first Adrien Da Maia, then Marie Leblanc—accomplished during his five-year run. They created a hit piece of branded clothing (the little turtleneck) that helped define the look of the early 2020s. Di Felice’s runway shows were provocative, and brought a frozen-in-time heritage brand back into the fashion conversation. None of that is easy to pull off within a system that rewards access to capital above all else.

Of course, Courrèges is better positioned than most pseudo-independent brands, thanks to its backing from Artémis, the Pinault family office. But while Courrèges has fared better than Giambattista Valli, another fashion brand owned by Artémis, it is actually limited by its adjacency to the Kering machine. (Kering stopped investing in tiny brands years ago to focus on Big Luxury.) We know that Artémis wants to sell Giambattista Valli, but Courrèges has far more momentum. So it’s no surprise they’ve already communicated that a new creative director will be named next week.

If I find out who it is, I will let you know. But it would be nice if it were Casey Cadwallader, who is very talented, commercially minded, and got the shaft at Mugler, at least in my opinion. Di Felice said in a statement that he is leaving to work on personal projects. Could one of those projects start and end with an “A”? It doesn’t sound like he is exiting for a particular job. Sometimes a person outgrows a set of circumstances, or a set of circumstances outgrows him. Best of luck to Di Felice, who is sharp.

Sarah Shapiro

Nike’s Moon Shoe shot: After a successful drop in the fall, Nike expanded its Moon Shoe collab with Jacquemus earlier this month, with three new colorways and a campaign fronted by Solange Knowles. Could the company have moved more quickly? The Beaverton brain trust followed its usual test-and-see strategy with fashion collabs while designer Simon Porte Jacquemus, a product and merchandising savant, identified an au courant silhouette in the low-profile, Prefontaine-era track shoes. And the demand is still there: On the secondary market, according to StockX, the shoes sold more than 4,500 units across both collaborations at an average resale price of $279. And yet, it seems like Nike could be deploying its playbook slightly faster. It’s hard not to see all those Onitsuka Tiger and Adidas variations flooding the sidewalks and wonder about the possibility.

Now, on to the main event...

The C.E.O.-to-Influencer Pipeline

Alison Loehnis spent a career as a retail and luxury executive. Lately, she’s stumbled into a side hustle as an honest-to-god, affiliate-link-slinging fashion influencer. Who said there’s no future in multichannel?

Sarah Shapiro

Last fall, Alison Loehnis posted an Instagram Reel from inside her closet, trying on her favorite jeans, along with a voiceover explaining her attachment to each pair. The former Yoox Net-a-Porter Group C.E.O., who stepped down in June 2025, followed with similar videos covering makeup, jewelry, shirts, and shoes. The comments section quickly filled with the common vernacular of the shoppies-afflicted: “adds to cart,” “links please,” etcetera. Soon enough, Loehnis’s Instagram bio linked to a ShopMy storefront featuring her recommendations. Seemingly overnight, the London-based executive with a decades-long career in luxury had, in effect, become a fashion influencer—complete with professional representation from London-based talent manager Lucy Owen.

In a world where former C.E.O.s so often become corporate homily-toting LinkedIn refugees, Loehnis’s emergence as an affiliate-link slinger has been a pleasant surprise. Loehnis had been with Net-a-Porter for 17 years, working on the launches of sub-brands (Mr Porter, The Outnet) and overseeing its merger with Yoox. She became a generally well-regarded industry figure along the way. Unsurprisingly, her sudden appearance on ShopMy was a reliable topic of conversation at the shows in Paris earlier this month.

It was also apparently quite lucrative. A little more than four months after joining ShopMy, Loehnis is generating more than $100,000 in monthly order volume through her storefront, with an average order value exceeding $600, according to a source with access to ShopMy data. She has more than 100,000 followers, 80,000 of which she gained in the past year, according to Social Blade, a platform that tracks social metrics. (ShopMy and Loehnis both declined to comment on these figures.)

Loehnis also isn’t the only executive using ShopMy. Of course, many founders religiously (and occasionally insufferably) post about their own brands. But the data suggests she’s moving significantly more merchandise through unusually high engagement: She posts about twice a week and rarely includes direct links, yet the products still sell. Compared with another well-known retail executive who has half as many Instagram followers, according to sources wired in this world, Loehnis is moving three and a half times the product. Notably, her audience comes specifically to shop—94 percent of her engagement comes from her ShopMy storefront, as opposed to single items.

ShopMy, which positions itself as the affiliate platform offering deeper analytics and partnerships with brands and retailers at a more considered price point, appears well-suited to Loehnis. She told me that she has no formal advisory or investor relationship with the company. I spoke with Loehnis about this new phase of her career and her experience as a creator. Our conversation has been lightly edited.

Shop Girl

Sarah Shapiro: You’ve spent your career on the retail side. What made you want to step in front of the camera?

Alison Loehnis: For years people have been asking me, whether I’m wearing my professional hat or my off-duty hat, What do I buy? What do I wear for X? I’ve always had strong views on these things. What struck me is that consumers are spoiled for choice but also barraged by it. I do have a point of view, so I thought, let’s just play around with it.

How did the monetization piece with ShopMy enter the picture?

The natural follow-up question to, “Here are things every wardrobe needs,” is, “Where do I get it?” It made sense to link up and remove some of the pain points from sourcing. What ShopMy does really well is make it simple, both for the person curating and the person shopping. Rather than saying Go here, go there, etcetera, I’ve put it all here.

What surprised you?

At the beginning, I thought the lower the ticket price, the more interest there’d be—a spontaneous purchase. That’s not really the case. People will buy a considered purchase just as readily, sometimes more so. And there’s no clear pattern to what hits. A denim style will resonate at a high price point and you can’t always explain why.

How do you think about this relative to your career?

I started on the shop floor and I remain spiritually on the shop floor. What I love is that engagement. Someone says, “Oh my gosh, I just got those loafers and I love them.” You helped someone choose a thing. I love that. And the way I see it, at a moment when people are thinking harder about where they want to spend their money—really wanting things to last, to be the best cut they can find—curation matters. Having a peer-to-peer recommendation, or just a take on it, can be helpful in making decisions. If not? Swipe!

What We’re Reading…

How the royal family should really be handling Harry and Meghan. [Tina Brown’s Substack]

The Fashion Scholarship Fund staged its annual gala last night, hosted by Gabriella Karefa-Johnson and honoring Law Roach, Ciara, Russell Wilson, and Stefan Larsson. The organization gave close to $2 million to college students studying fashion. Seemed like a really nice event. [Fashionista]

David Simon, the C.E.O. of Simon Property Group, the biggest mall developer in America, has died. Eli Simon, his son, will take over the company. [WWD]

Until tomorrow,
Lauren

P.S.: We use affiliate links because we are a business. We may make a couple bucks off them.

Puck fashion correspondent Lauren Sherman and a rotating cast of industry insiders take you deep behind the scenes of this multitrillion-dollar biz, from creative director switcheroos to M&A drama, D.T.C. downfalls, and magazine mishaps. Fashion People is an extension of Line Sheet, Lauren’s private email for Puck, where she tracks what’s happening beyond the press releases in fashion, beauty, and media. New episodes publish every Tuesday and Friday.

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