As of September 2021, NJAL has partnered with Europe's largest retailer, Zalando, to act as its exclusive designer scout and host a dedicated section for emerging and sustainable brands on their newly launched Zalando Designer luxury section. Each season, NJAL will select emerging brands from diverse backgrounds to Zalando Designer, supporting Zalando’s commitment to represent diverse brands and founders on its platform. We’re now going into our fourth season of the Zalando Partnership. Order values range from $10K to $100K per Designer! You can read more about the NJAL x Zalando partnership here (https://corporate.zalando.com/en/newsroom/news-stories/zalando-doubles-down-designer-proposition-delight-customers)

To be considered, NJAL brands must be an active seller on the NJAL Shop. Your previous and present collections must be visible on your NJAL profile. Brands must be ready to manufacture and fulfill orders that range in value between $10K-100k

This is an opportunity for Brands to be introduced to and potentially secure wholesale orders from large retailers around the world! For each season of a wholesale project, Brands must provide retailers with the current season's line sheet, look book, and collection photos for review and consideration.

NJAL will include you in a digital showroom, inclusive of your present season line sheet, look book, and collection photos. If a retailer places an order with you, you will be notified by receiving a Supplier Sheet (or the retailer's order form). Depending on the retailers Product Safety policy, i.e. Zalando, your brand may have a percentage of your items nominated to go through Product Safety. - This may include presenting fiber analysis reports/certificates for review - Materials lab testing - If you fail product safety, unfortunately, the retailer may have to cancel the order for the failed items. All items will then need to be delivered within the noted delivery dates. The exact delivery dates will depend on the retailer and season of the project

NJAL will charge a 25% commission for each order placed by the retailer. This is to cover the wholesale order facilitation, standard sales agency fee, digital showroom, warehousing, storage, final delivery, marketing efforts and to support overall designer efforts throughout the project.

Exact payment terms will vary depending on the retailer. NJAL requires a security deposit from the retailer to ensure they commit to their orders but designers are paid after delivery. Typically, NJAL receives balance payment from the retailer within 60 days from order acceptance at their warehouse, after which we will make imminent payments to all designers. NJAL is unable to provide any down-payments!

When setting your wholesale price for each SKU, we recommend that you take the following factors into consideration: shipping costs, VAT or tax (when applicable), customs & duty, NJAL commission, EAN subscription (if you don’t operate on an EAN barcode system),and any other factors that affect the cost of the SKUs.

For the delivery of your goods, each SKU variant will need to carry its own barcode. All designers must ensure they have these ready ahead of delivery. There are many companies that provide such barcodes, one of them is GS1: https://www.gs1.org/standards/barcodes/ean-upc

Brands based outside the EU will be responsible for importing the order to the European Union and delivering to Zalando / NJAL under the Delivered Duty Paid (DDP) Incoterm rules, assuming all responsibilities and costs for delivering the goods to the named place of destination. This includes customs & duty.  The customs valuation of the goods must be equal to the Wholesale value of the order minus the 25% NJAL commission.  If the customs value is under-declared, the process of correcting the documentation could delay your payment terms.  Brands based within the EU, will be responsible for delivering to Zalando / NJAL under the Delivered At Place (DAP) Incoterm rules, assuming all responsibilities and costs for delivering the goods to the named place of destination.

As of 2021, the EU will require that for any style that EU-based retailers order you must be able to provide fiber analysis reports to prove that they do not contain any restricted or harmful substances (as shown in the table below). Therefore, any fabric / material you source from your suppliers will require such a report (please see sample reports below). Most fabric suppliers are able to provide you with these certificates when you source from them, stating that the materials contain no harmful chemicals nor heavy metals. Retailers will only place orders if you can provide such reports when submitting your line sheet. Once your orders are submitted, a percentage of your ordered SKUs will be selected for product safety testing. We highly recommend having all certificates in place for your entire collection, as retailers will cancel the orders if the proper documentation cannot be provided.

It is not guaranteed that the retailer will place an order with you each consecutive season. That being said, if your collection sells well on the retailers site they will more likely continue placing orders with you for upcoming seasons. If you continue to receive wholesale orders from the retailer, please note that the order value will fluctuate and is dependent on a variety of factors.

All required assets & line sheets must be uploaded to our online showroom. You will be provided instructions on how to access this. Required assets are: Completed Order Form (pricing must reflect currency of the retailer), lines heet, look book, collection photos, fiber analysis reports/certificates and any further marketing/PR assets.

General Information

• The goods must be packed in a stable way to make sure that both, the boxes and the goods inside, will arrive at their destination without any damage.
• No article packaging is not acceptable
• A non-dust-resistant and non-dirt-resistant packaging is not acceptable
• A too small / too short polybag is not acceptable
• Articles with no EANs on the packaging will not be accepted
• The agreed order quantities must be respected. Over-deliveries are not allowed.
• The NJAL Designer shall deliver every sales unit “retail ready”, meaning with an individual packaging (e.g. box, polybag) suitable for the sales unit to be sold to end consumers.
• A sales unit is defined as a product which Zalando sells at a certain price. A sales unit might be a single item or multiple items belonging (and being sold) together (called “set” or “multi-pack”).
• Polybags need to be clear, transparent and completely closed.
• Boxes have to be fully closed for the article not to fall out. If the article packaging carton consists of two or more parts, the NJAL Designer needs to ensure to stabilize and combine them with sticky dots or plastic stripes.
• The following goods have special article packaging requirements:
  • Polybags of leather goods should be open at the bottom or contain small holes to let the goods breathe.
  • Belts must be delivered rolled up within a fully closed polybag (or within a polybag with small holes for leather belts). Each belt should include a scannable EAN-code facing outwards.
  • Watches need to have a crown stopper.

Labeling

• Please apply a sticker or external label to the poly bag, box or packaging with the following:
  • EAN/GTIN, unique article number, color code or color description, size/ size translation for every country size EU, FR, IT, UK, US.
• Contrast and color: the contrast between EAN/GTIN and background must be at least 40% difference. The color combination black (EAN/GTIN) on white (paper) is optimal;
• Quality of the print: the print needs to be clean (e.g. exact border line, no streaks) in order to not disturb the scanning process;
• Minimum size EAN/GTIN: The height of the EAN/GTIN must be at least 5 mm, and the length at least 30 mm;
• Price indication on an article label is not allowed. Transport Packaging: The Designer must provide a proper packaging to ensure that goods are not damaged:
• Flat packed goods need to be packed in consolidation cartons
• Hanging goods need to be packed in hanging cartons. If the hanging goods are transported on hanging rails, no further transport packaging is required.
• Sales units being delivered on a hanger and belonging to the hanging garment group, should have a polybag around the article and hanger with the hanger hook outside, to store these articles in hanging garment area

We will notify Brands when we are ready to review and process invoices. For this reason, we do not accept invoices that are sent to us before orders are accepted by the retailers warehouse. Invoice must include full bank account details (Account number, routing/sort code/IBAN/SWIFT) and must allow copy/paste. If the Brand name differs from the registered company name, this must be stated on the invoice. Please address the invoice to: NOT JUST A LABEL 48 Dover Street London, W1S 4FF United Kingdom

The better your collection performs with the retailer, the more likely the retailer will continue to place wholesale orders with your brand. Once items are on sale, we encourage participating brands to regularly post content of collection items selling on the retailer’s site and linking back to it!