Pretail

Pretail, also called pre-tail, pre-retail, pre-launch or pre-commerce, is a business model, generally treated as a subcategory of e-commerce, built around introducing a product to customers and gauging demand for it before it is ever put into full production or placed on general sale. In practice this means pre-launching an offering online, ranging from building an interest waitlist of prospective buyers before launch to collecting reservations or pre-orders for a limited initial quantity before the product actually ships, so that a company only commits to manufacturing a product once it has reached a chosen threshold of buy-in from investors or consumers. Companies gather this early commitment through crowdfunding platforms, waitlists or reservation systems, and the model is credited with three main advantages: marketing efficiency, from building awareness among an already-engaged audience; margin efficiency, from cutting out traditional retail intermediaries; and product efficiency, from collecting direct customer feedback that can shape the finished product. Large companies including Amazon and Apple use pretailing to measure demand and manage supply chains ahead of a full launch, while independent entrepreneurs use platforms such as Kickstarter and Indiegogo to fund manufacturing, test product-market fit and pricing, and take pre-orders before a product exists at scale.