Who needs fashion ads when you have Gigi and Bella Hadid?
While the sisters — 23 and 22, respectively — are no strangers to starring in major campaigns, even an off-duty endorsement from the duo can be enough to send a brand’s sales skyrocketing.
Just ask Australian shoe label Senso. When the sisters wore two different designs from the company within the same week — Gigi a stretchy red bootie ($156), Bella a satin mule ($134) — sales of both styles saw unprecedented spikes.
“We had a huge amount of visitors that week — like, quadruple the normal,” Senso’s general manager Imogen Meller, one of three sisters who works for the family business, told Page Six. “We had 100 pairs in stock of those boots, and [even] if we had 1,000 pairs we could have sold them in a day.”
To that end, Senso is currently on its fourth round of restocks for both Gigi and Bella’s styles. “We’ll keep continuing to fill the pre-orders until the hype dies down, but I don’t see that happening any time soon,” she added. “Hopefully!”
The first step to getting that coveted Hadid seal of approval? Sending eye-catching designs to the sisters’ stylist, Mimi Cuttrell — although an actual placement is never guaranteed, since Senso (unlike many fashion brands) does not pay influencers to wear its products.
And for a brand like Senso that’s not particularly well known in the US, that celebrity support is crucial, since social media can only do so much to boost exposure for a smaller label.
“It’s become harder [to get noticed] lately since Instagram’s changed [their algorithm], but that’s where I think these girls are sort of stepping in now,” Meller explained. “I feel like they’re sort of taking over in that respect, and they have this power to just put a spotlight on a brand.”
That’s putting it lightly: Gigi’s support boosted Senso’s US sales by 350 percent and its Canadian sales by 150 percent. Meanwhile, Bella — who wore the brand’s bow-topped heels during Milan Fashion Week — helped reel in international shoppers.
“We had new customers in Mexico, the Netherlands, Russia [and] Asia,” Meller said. “People follow them all around the world.”
The Hadids are so good at selling stuff, in fact, that not even Meller herself is immune: She wound up purchasing the same pair of Tommy Hilfiger jeans Gigi wore with her red Senso boots.
“I did the same thing all our customers do!” Meller said with a laugh.
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