Wild West Social House co-founders Max Feldmann and Kyle Julian Skye want to change the way people build wardrobes. That is to say, they don’t want people to build them at all — at least not in their own closets.
In August 2023, they launched Wild West, a luxury fashion proposition that is part members’ club, part clothing rental. Based originally in a temporary bricks-and-mortar location in Los Angeles, in September 2024 Wild West took over the old Hollywood Foreign Press Association building for its first permanent flagship. The clubhouse carries about 4,500 luxury garments, shoes and accessories (the goal is to hit 10,000 by next summer), and there are fitting rooms, tailoring services and a parlour for members with food and drink. It also has a gallery space.
Wild West closed its first investment round of $500,000 in August 2024, led by Bungalow Capital, with further investment from 14W and Torr Capital. (The latter is a new fund; Wild West is its first investment.) By next summer, Feldmann and Skye plan to have opened a distribution centre in New York to speed up shipping, as well as laid the groundwork for a flagship-slash-club. In the meantime, Wild West is launching e-commerce to cater to customers around the US. Will it be able to translate its clubhouse charm online?
Rental has proven a difficult model to get right, as incumbents have struggled with backend and reverse logistics (restocking, cleaning, delivery), finessing the pricing model and convincing consumers that it’s a desirable way to consume clothes. With a tiered membership-based model, propped up by stylists who pay top dollar (and focus on high luxury), Wild West is convinced it can crack the rental model. “We’re trying to make it aspirational,” Skye says.
Wild West began over a double Jack Daniel’s at a Barney’s Beanery. Skye, who ran his own showroom, laid out a business proposition to Feldmann, a former Fred Segal buyer: a white-glove, luxury rental service with all the comforts of an LA members’ club. They got the fashion crowd — many of whom weren’t interested in rental — on board by tapping their own network. “Kyle and I have a very large Rolodex of friends and peers who we’ve worked with in the industry,” Feldmann explains. From there, the founders invited early members to refer their friends and colleagues. The contacts got them in the door, but the clothes kept them coming back.
Today, at any given time, there are 2,500 to 3,000 items on the club floor, around 600 to 700 out with members, and 250 minimum at the dry cleaners. The founders add 500 to 600 new SKUs per month, sourced from archive store vendors as well as individuals. About 75 per cent of pieces are archival, the rest current or recent seasons. Wild West has rented out more than 10,000 items already this year, with the key holiday period still to go.
Membership is tiered: $299 a month for up to up to $3,000 worth of clothes; $499 for up to $6,000 and free delivery in LA; and $999 for up to 15 items at a time with no value cap, as well as perks including free delivery, one-day temporary tailoring services and 10 per cent off all purchases. These prices will increase in the new year, but existing members’ rates won’t change. Members can attend Wild West-hosted events and even host their own. Brand owners can host dinners and afterparties. There’s a book club and backgammon tournaments. A tattoo artist drops by from time to time.
Wild West’s main value proposition is that it offers “a members-only, million-dollar closet for less than the price of a Prada T-shirt”. This gets at the crux of why the concept is compelling at this moment: fashion is more expensive than ever; there are so many products in the world already; and, in an age of social media, people want to change up their look more than ever. It’s a major selling point for young people interested in luxury but priced out of most high-end brands. “The way clothing is consumed is wrong for the environment we’re in,” Skye says.
“Everyone’s closets have always been plan A and if, worst comes to worst, you would go and buy something — plan B,” Feldmann adds. “For our members, Wild West is their plan A, and their closet is plan B. It completely reverses the mindset.”
The Wild West customer
The ethos of Wild West is very different now versus when it started, Skye says. At launch, it stemmed from a gap the founders saw in the market whereby stylists were spending $30,000 to $50,000 a year on restocking fees. It’s steep, especially given how lightly the garments were typically used (if at all), Skye says. “The rule of thumb was a quarter of the retail price [to restock],” Skye says. Wild West wanted to undercut the market by creating a membership-based rental model, which he says is a better deal for stylists.
Stylists’ clients quickly cottoned on to what Wild West had to offer, followed soon after by general consumers. Chatting with clients on the floor, Feldmann and Skye realised many were frustrated with the way they currently consume clothes. Trend cycles move fast, and shoppers would frequently buy new pieces they didn’t need — or love — simply to keep up. “Everybody wants to be [in something] new on Instagram,” Skye says. In past jobs, he and Feldmann had clients that would spend six figures on clothes in a year.
Of course, not all shoppers were spending thousands before joining Wild West; plenty of tier one ($299) members signed on precisely because they don’t have the means to spend like crazy. Still, many of its members have impressive closets of their own. Realising this, the founders now invite members to consign as well. When their items are rented, they get a cut from the consignment — but they also get credits. If they have 40 to 50 items rented per month, their next month is effectively netted out. “We’re trying to build a self-sustaining chain here,” Skye says.
Approaching e-comm
At Wild West, the physical space is part of the charm. “You love coming in, getting the dopamine hit and getting the luxury retail experience,” Skye says.
But it’s not an operation they want to confine to LA. Already, Wild West has New York-based members who come into the space at the beginning of an LA trip. Soon, they’ll be able to rent from their home city — first via Wild West’s new online site, developed by long-time member Mohamed Kharaev, then via a flagship.
There are major benefits to online retail, Skye says, from the decentralised aspect to the amount of pieces you can merchandise. “Online can remember what you like. It can build predictive ways to show you what you want, and show you new things and direct you right to where you want to go,” he says. The goal — and challenge — is to harness the perks of online without sacrificing the community feel of an in-person clubhouse.
The founders believe they can do so by keeping certain perks. Online members — who will pay rates in line with the current membership tiers, and will not be subject to upcoming fee rises — will still have access to a sales associate who they can Facetime to chat about which brands the member likes, what they want to explore, what they want to avoid and what their colours are. If a member books an item online and needs it the next day, they can reach out to their point person. “That’s where you get into the personalised feeling that a good retail experience should offer you,” Skye says.
To speed up efficiencies, Wild West will open a distribution centre in New York in the new year, and plans to offer same-day delivery to New York members by summer 2025 (for inventory located in the state).
The founders are staying open as to where and how they scale, pending the performance of the e-commerce roll-out. “E-comm is going to be a big part of it,” Skye says. “But we don’t know yet where the emphasis will be, between e-comm and IRL.”
What’s certain is that they plan to develop a mix of physical spaces (New York first, then London, with Paris and Miami on the cards) and distribution centres. The location of the latter will be informed by Wild West’s e-commerce members. “Until online actually starts going we will see where our traction lies,” Feldmann says. “And that’s what’s so exciting about this. We do know that people want this. We just don’t know where the masses want this yet. That will be the next step.”
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