1130 Hours: Still unsure of what exactly we’re letting ourselves in for – organ harvesting is one of the more worrying suggestions thrown at us – we arrive in the beautiful Charles de Gaulle airport, armed only with the vague but intriguing documents supplied at our briefing…

1230 Hours: Met by the charming Simona from vente-privee.com, concerns of kidnap are finally quelled – quickly boarding one of their fleet of vehicles, it’s not long before we arrive at the company’s new ‘Digital Factory’ and the size of this outfit begins to dawn upon us…

1315 Hours: We meet Jean-Baptiste for a tour of the Digital Factory. There seem to be photography and live motion studios behind every door, and the photography equipment storeroom is bigger than some apartments we’ve seen – it becomes apparent that vente-privee.com’s way of doing things is to keep everything firmly in-house, and we mean everything…

With countless studios, including Jean-Baptiste’s favourite, the new “shower studio” – we guess he’s looking forward to the swimwear shoots in a few months – the Digital Factory handles all the photography that you see on the website, so that means input from designers, photographers, make-up artists, hairstylists, all vente-privee.com employees, meaning that – shooting over 15,000 photos daily – they’re one of Europe’s biggest photo production companies and one of the Parisian modelling industry’s most important clients…

1500 Hours: After a thoroughly pleasant lunch – Foie gras terrine and steak frites if you must know – Simona takes us to the suitably impressive headquarters. Part offices, part studios and, well, part art gallery – it would seem the founders have more than a passing interest in contemporary art – vente-privee.com’s HQ is staggeringly impressive, and with some 1,500 employees, it’s amazing to see what goes on behind the scenes at a dot com…

1515 Hours: We’re swiftly introduced to Leilah King, one of the team who look after the production of sales in the UK and we get an insight into just how much is involved in each of the private sales that take place. With some of the most respected names in the haute couture industry involved, it’s essential that their brand identity is respected at every stage, and from briefing the in-house photographers and graphic designers to structuring the categories and items in each online sale, the production team’s – there are native staff for the UK, Spain, Italy, Germany, and of course France – orchestrate each sale to be uniquely tailored to the brand and their values…

1600 Hours: Having already been suitably blown away by the scale of the operation, the next stage of our secret mission would leave us blown away by the quality -not just the quantity – of vente-privee.com. Accompanying each of the website’s online sales is a teaser campaign, seducing the users with a taste of what the next sale will bring. Fine you think – a quick Flash clip with some products floating in and out. No, this is vente-privee.com – and one thing we’re learning is that everything is done to the same terribly high standards. We meet motion designer Christophe Massouf who runs us through a selection of previous teasers, it’s like sitting through the showreel of a major London advertising agency. They may do everything in-house here, but that certainly isn’t at detriment to the quality of their output, we’re actually a little bit blown away with just what’s involved here…

1630 Hours: The last stop of the day is with Sébastien in the recording studios, yes – recording studios, you didn’t think they’d outsource the music did you? We can’t pretend for one minute that the next 2 hours resembled anything like work – we’re clearly in the wrong game. Together with Sébastien we deconstruct a Bristolian trip-hop classic – brands or the production team will often suggest a track as inspiration for the teaser’s soundtrack – and rebuild it using our ears, Apple’s Logic and the Frenchman’s considerable musical talents. As music obsessives it’s a splendid way to end the day and further proof that if you want something done well, do it yourself…

1830 Hours: It’s dark outside as we leave, allowing us to see just how far they take their pink brand identity, and as we head back to blighty we’re left to reflect on just how impressive vente-privee.com’s sizeable operation is. To move from a team of 4 in 2003 to a forecasted £628 million turnover for 2010, these plucky Parisians are leading the way in bringing high-end fashion to the online market, and with up to 70% discounts on some 1,200 internationally recognised brands, surely it’s a business model that can’t fail…