Brooke Cundiff’s impressive, two-decade-plus brand-building experience in the retail and fashion space started at Marshall Field’s in Chicago and Saks Fifth Avenue, followed by executive roles in the eCommerce space, including Rue La La and Gilt Groupe.
She co-founded the CoEdition marketplace for women’s plus-size fashion in 2017, and developed innovative proprietary technology zero CapEx to enable a new retail business model based on zero inventory, and negative working capital. City Chic acquired CoEdition in late 2021.
Her most recent venture is Cortina, the pioneering platform “focused on facilitating seamless connections between brands and retailers, enabling them to access an extensive array of products without the burden of capital investment in inventory acquisition, shipping, or warehousing.”
Describe the Cortina Platform and how the American fashion industry can benefit from it.
The Cortina platform, recently acquired by the leading multi-vendor commerce platform in the industry, Logicbroker, gives retailers and brands the ability to rapidly expand their assortment, connect with any supplier, and discover new products through our advanced product & supplier discovery portal.
These three benefits are fundamental in the American fashion industry, and frankly across the eCommerce landscape. Cortina, and Logicbroker by extension, focus heavily on providing the framework necessary to reduce the burdens retailers and brands have when building a dropship or marketplace program. With Logicbroker’s toolset, brands can reduce their owned inventory burden, reduce Full-Time Employee (FTE) requirements, and maximize their control over the entire fulfillment process from supplier connection through shipping.
How has your professional background shaped your vision of fashion and, specifically, to launch Cortina?
Cortina was founded by myself and Keith George. Before that, we also co-founded a retail site called CoEdition. Both of us have decades of expertise in the fashion-retail space from Marshall Field’s, Saks Fifth Avenue, Gap Inc and Gilt Groupe.
Really, the biggest takeaway we had from that experience, other than the incredible friends and contacts we made along the way, was the incredible burden owned inventory has on every brand. The fastest way to lose money is to pay for inventory, photograph it, and then have to warehouse it. When we launched CoEdition, we focused heavily on eliminating that constraint and money-sink. What we realized was every fashion brand needed that level of automation help so we spun off into Cortina, a platform designed by and for this incredible industry.
In short, we discovered that every industry struggles from owned inventory burdens. That shouldn’t have shocked us but it kind of did.
What have been three important lessons you learned in your impressive career?
- The most important lesson is to honor your word. Whether that’s to clients, business partners, friends, or whomever. Every one of us works with pressure, but if you are honest, and treat everyone as you want to be treated, you will gain strong, long-term relationships that stand tall through any circumstance.
- Perhaps the most formative lesson I had to learn was to always be curious. Business everywhere is changing fast. When I was in retail, I looked at the changes happening to the business and decided I wanted to lead and build a solution. We all want to write our own futures, but Keith and I really stepped out into the dark to do it. I am very proud of what we’ve done and it’s an important lesson. Always be curious about what the next adventure is.
- The last lesson is to simply be passionate and have fun with what you do. We spend so many hours working every day, you have to find (even small) enjoyment in it.
What advice do you have for a young brand looking to break into retail with minimal risk?
Honestly, it would be to use Logicbroker. We work with businesses of all sizes to cut out the risk entirely. Why worry about connecting with suppliers, housing exclusively your inventory, or finding new and unique brands to work with when you can do that all through our platform!
What are some of the future avenues for success in fashion?
Fundamentally, fashion succeeds when influencers, brands, and customers have equal access to the unique styles coming every season. Fashion’s future success is dependent on a lot of factors, but the largest one is connecting retailers and brands to the incredible small suppliers that make up every new trend, TikTok viral video, or red-carpet masterpiece we see on our phones. The largest fashion brands have their own connections, but those smaller Shopify & Squarespace creators need an avenue to get their products out there and are clawing at the gate to connect with retailers.
Cortina, and by extension Logicbroker, gives retailers and brands the best opportunity to capitalize on those sales and drive a new and unique assortment solution that delights all customers.
