• by Sarah Mahoney , Staff Writer @mahoney_sarah, October 23, 2023

While it’s been a year of change for Zulily, with Qurate Retail Group selling off the underperforming ecommerce site, one thing remains the same: Shopping for the holidays stresses women out. So this year, the Seattle-based company is selling a talking “Slay” button, which offers helpful words of encouragement, voiced by Jonathan Van Ness, the “Queer Eye” star known for his special “give yourself a hug” kind of compassion. Denise Jaeschke, Zulily’s vice chief marketing officer, tells D2C Insider about JVN joining the hype squad.

D2C Insider: Your new “Slay” button, on sale for $17, is meant to be a stress-busting gift for women who are having a rough time. And your research is kind of scary -- 61% of customers estimate they spend more than 75 hours on holiday tasks each year. Is your sense that these chief holiday officers are more stressed this year?

Denise Jaeschke: The holidays are always stressful. Mom always tries to make sure everyone in her family is super-happy. We've seen in the last year that she’s having more budgetary pressures. There's more uncertainty. So, in addition to everything she has to do through her holiday list and all her planning, she's also being more conscious about spending. We’re always trying to find a way to give joy to our customers, especially this year, and this button seemed like a good fit between our customers and our brand.

D2C Insider: Why Jonathan Van Ness?

Jaeschke: How could we not pick him? He's devoted to self-love and spreading positivity by giving people a reason to smile. He has an amazing ability to instill confidence in others, which made him the perfect partner for our button.

Together, we can help bring a little bit of positivity, just a smiling moment for moms during the day, especially during the holiday season. You can have the button on your desk, push it and hear one of these five positive affirmations. The beauty is its simplicity and ease -- that’s what made us so excited. We’re promoting the gift through social and internal channels.

D2C Insider: Not long ago, you did an interview with MediaPost and talked about mixing up your flash-sale model. Are we going to see more of that variety this holiday?

Jaeschke: We'll continue to rely heavily on our flash sales and daily deals because customers love that -- they come to us for that sense of discovery and anticipation. And we'll still have our non-flash sale items. We've learned that customers like those, too, and they're adding them to their basket. So, the flash sales are bringing them to our site, and they start checking out the everyday items. They work together.

D2C Insider: Qurate Retail Group, the parent company of QVC and HSN, sold Zulily to Regent, a Los Angeles-based investment firm, in May. Have there been any changes to the business model since then?

Jaeschke: No. It has not changed.

D2C Insider: Will there be a Zulily holiday campaign this year?

Jaeschke: Our shoppers are planners. So, we announced our annual toy list in July. And we’ve been giving them early inspiration and savings, up to 65%. That’s our value proposition. And we have already launched our holiday shop and post new deals every day. We'll continue promoting those, integrating marketing communications across all paid and owned channels.