Posted on Monday, March 16th, 2015 by Will Hagle
Inspired by the shopping experience found on Main Streets across America, 11 Main is a new online destination for specialty shops and boutiques.
11 Main is a new site offering multiple shops and boutiques that carry a wide selection of products. The site, which is owned by Alibaba, and it marks their most significant foray into the U.S. market. The intention of the site is to replicate the experience of shopping on the Main Streets of towns across America. These streets are typically filled with small shops and boutiques offering unique products at an affordable cost. 11 Main successfully mirrors this experience, hosting several different shops that sell their own items. It’s a similar approach as the one taken by Etsy (another company that, like Alibaba, just launched a high-profile IPO).
In addition to its specific stores, 11 Main offers products across nine categories: Fashion, Home, Jewelry, Baby, Collecting, Tech, Sporting Goods, Toys and Entertainment. Within each of these categories are more specific subcategories that lead people to specific products. Click on “Car Seats” under the Baby category, for instance, and you’ll be redirected to a search result featuring 8 different shops and 344 items. Browsing different stores within one site is an interesting way to conduct online shopping – it’s almost like 11 Main has created a digital mall. The lack of major stores and brands within that mall may disappoint some shoppers, but for the boutique and small-shop items that 11 Main advertises, the site can’t be beat.
