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What is Apparel Design and Merchandising?

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What is Apparel Design and Merchandising?

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Before we deep dive into my field of work in apparel design and merchandising, what exactly is it? This website provided by Appalachian State University gives a brief introduction as to what my work will be in apparel design and merchandising. I also felt like this website would be fitting as I will be attending Appalachian State in the spring! Roll Neers!

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The Apparel Design and Merchandising (BS) program encompasses the design, merchandising and marketing of apparel and textile products and provides a comprehensive understanding of the global textile complex.

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Documentation in business usually uses APA style, this also applies to marketing and other subcategories of the world of business. Marketing heavily relies on statistics, research data, and evaluating this in real-world scenarios. In my field of apparel design and marketing, I would use an APA style of writing for documenting, outlining, and researching.

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APA Style provides a foundation for effective scholarly communication because it helps writers present their ideas in a clear, precise, and inclusive manner.

Where Did APA Style Come From?

APA Style originated in 1929, when a group of psychologists, anthropologists, and business managers convened and sought to establish a simple set of procedures, or style guidelines, that would codify the many components of scientific writing to increase the ease of reading comprehension. They published their guidelines as a seven-page article in Psychological Bulletin describing a "standard of procedure, to which exceptions would doubtless be necessary, but to which reference might be made in cases of doubt" (Bentley et al., 1929, p. 57).

Since then, the scope and length of the Publication Manual have grown in response to the needs of researchers, students, and educators across the social and behavioral sciences, health care, natural sciences, humanities, and more; however, the spirit of the original authors' intentions remains.

Why Is APA Style Needed?

Uniformity and consistency enable readers to (a) focus on the ideas being presented rather than formatting and (b) scan works quickly for key points, findings, and sources.

Style guidelines encourage authors to fully disclose essential information and allow readers to dispense with minor distractions, such as inconsistencies or omissions in punctuation, capitalization, in-text citations, references, and presentation of statistics.

When style works best, ideas flow logically, sources are credited appropriately, and papers are organized predictably and consistently. People are described using language that affirms their worth and dignity. Authors plan for ethical compliance and report critical details of their research protocol to allow readers to evaluate findings and other researchers to potentially replicate the studies. Tables and figures present data in an engaging, consistent manner.

Whether you use APA Style for a single class or throughout your career, we encourage you to recognize the benefits of a conscientious approach to writing.

Although the guidelines span many areas and take time and practice to learn, we hope that they provide a balance of directiveness and flexibility and will eventually become second nature.

Does APA Style Cover Everything About Writing?

APA Style covers the aspects of scholarly writing most pertinent to writing in psychology, nursing, business, communications, engineering, and related fields. It specifically addresses the preparation of draft manuscripts being submitted for publication in a journal and the preparation of student papers being submitted for a course assignment.

The Publication Manual does not cover general rules explained in widely available style books and examples of usage with little relevance to the behavioral and social sciences. Among the most helpful general guides to editorial style are Words Into Type (Skillin & Gay, 1974) and the Chicago Manual of Style (17th ed.; University of Chicago Press, 2017).

Style manuals agree more often than they disagree. Where they disagree, the Publication Manual, because it is based on the special requirements of psychology, takes precedence for APA publications.

References

Bentley, M., Peerenboom, C. A., Hodge, F. W., Passano, E. B., Warren, H. C., & Washburn, M. F. (1929). Instructions in regard to preparation of manuscript. Psychological Bulletin, 26(2), 57-63. https://doi.org/10.1037/h0071487

Skillin, M. E., & Gay, R. M. (1974). Words into type (3rd ed. rev.). Prentice Hall.

University of Chicago Press. (2017). Chicago manual of style (17th ed.).

New! 7th Edition

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APA Style provides a foundation for effective scholarly communication because it helps writers present their ideas in a clear, precise, and inclusive manner. APA Style originated in 1929, when a group of psychologists, anthropologists, and business managers convened and sought to establish a simple set of procedures, or style guidelines, that would codify the many components of scientific writing to increase the ease of reading comprehension.

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Writing in The Field of Apparel Design and Merchandising

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Writing in The Field of Apparel Design and Merchandising

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In my field, there are different ways of communicating to different audiences and remaining professional. This article provided by Appalachian State University provides a more in-depth look into different styles of writing conventions needed and different styles of research used. This article also provides a brief overview of different types of research used in my field.

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Apparel Design and Merchandising: A Day in the Life

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Apparel Design and Merchandising: A Day in the Life

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This is an educational video of Stevey Lang who has been in merchandising for over 7 years! This is what her work includes on a day-to-day bases and what her job entails.

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How to Conduct Research in Apparel Design and Merchandising

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How to Conduct Research in Apparel Design and Merchandising

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Conducting research in the realm of apparel design and merchandising can be a bit of a process. In my field, I am learning to understand and analyze market trends. For example what clothes are "trendy" right now? What is everyone wearing? How much longer will this trend last? It is a competitive field, and as a competitive person, it can be a bit tricky. There is so much more to apparel design and merchandising than people realize!

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Are people buying more long-lasting, durable and luxury items in the name of sustainability? How big is the opportunity in second-hand clothes-and how does this affect spending in regular retail stores? Is Gen Z really not buying skinny jeans anymore-and have they scared millennials out of doing that too?

Questions like these keep everyone in the fashion industry up at night, in every part of the supply chain. Designers are frantically scrambling hints on social media to find out whether or not florals for spring are groundbreaking again, marketers are trying to find the next influencer that their target group will love, and commercial leaders are contemplating whether or not the latest fashion trend is a money spinner.

The fashion market is less unpredictable than it seems-and we're not talking about low rise jeans from the 90s coming back to haunt us two decades later. If fashion professionals dive into research and get to know their target market as if they were their best friends, it's very possible to create a proactive strategy for your fashion brand, as opposed to a reactive one.

But where do you start looking? What sources should you combine, what questions need to be asked, and how can you effectively use all that data?

In this article, we'll dive into the art of performing market research in the fashion business. This knowledge will be useful for not only brand managers, marketers and insights professionals, but anyone who wants to get ahead of the game by getting in the head of their customers. The right fashion market research tools can help you to:

Identify golden opportunities in the market

Spot emerging trends before your competitors

Understand what your target market is looking for- sometimes before they're looking for it

Inform your overall fashion marketing plans, even in the face of fast-moving trends.

Defining fashion market research

Fashion market research is all about understanding what your target group wants, and will want in the future. From their spending patterns to the effectiveness of campaigns, fashion market research and market trend analysis covers everything that helps you uncover business opportunities for the next season-and many more after.

The goals of fashion market research vary. A brand that's getting ready for their first collection to drop might want to look into how big the potential is for their future market share, to decide whether it's worth it or not to go live.

But even big players, from Inditex to Chanel, are constantly keeping an eye on their target market. Reasons for them to perform market research are to gain insights into how different customer segments react to trends in the market and certain marketing strategies. They also try to gain insight into how much consumers spend on certain items, to identify areas for growth and new markets. They might even discover a new customer segment to tap into while they're at it.

Long-term market research in the fashion business is all about collecting data that will help a brand understand how to beat the competition, simply by connecting with their customers better and creating new products they can't resist buying.

In the short term, fashion brands can perform research to measure the effectiveness of campaigns and commercials, or to gauge how successful a new line has been.

4 reasons why market research in the fashion industry is important

Market research is important in any industry where there's even the tiniest bit of competition-and the fashion industry especially is one that really depends on it. Here are four reasons why market research is vital for brands and businesses who want to thrive.

Reason 1: The market reacts strongly to trends

Philosophy aside: influencers have a huge, well, influence on the fashion market. In all types of market, they are directly impacting buying decisions. And it's not just fashion bloggers-anyone with a decent following, can alter the way people shop. Just take the show Love Island, where winners get rewarded by having their 'own' clothing line on ASOS. And it's become incredibly easy to shop items that were worn on the show.

But it's not just runways and social media trends that impact the fashion industry. Take the pandemic: after years of being on the rise, both online and brick and mortar fashion stores saw a dramatic drop in sales, one they're still recovering from. The ways people shop have changed, and it's up to brands to figure this out and react cleverly.

Plus, consumers getting more eco-friendly and more resistant to fast fashion, and a call for more inclusive clothing across genders and sizes, will also inevitably leave its mark on the fashion industry.

Reason 2: Target groups vary a lot

Fashionistas who grew up buying Primark and loving every second of the experience fast fashion affords, might have turned into environmentally conscious shoppers who are only interested in bespoke pieces, or who shop mostly on second-hand apps like Depop or Vinted.

The moral of the story? Your current customers could shop elsewhere tomorrow. The fashion industry serves dozens, if not hundreds of customer groups in which consumers fall. It's crucial to get to know them as well as you can, to keep them interested for long enough.

Reason 3: The market is highly competitive.

There are too many brands and stores to count, but together they make up for a value of $3,000 billion (3 trillion dollars!), which is 2 percent of the world's Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

It's not uncommon for busy shopping streets to have multiple stores of the same brand, a stone's throw away from the next one all within seconds' walking distance from each other. If that doesn't tell you everything about how highly competitive the market is, we don't know what will.

Add the e-commerce part of the industry to that, in which brands can almost pop up and go as they please, and you find yourself in one of the most competitive industries on the globe.

Reason 4: It'll help you bond with your target group

Last but not least: market research can be a sneaky yet smart way to connect with your target group.

Especially when done on a large scale, for instance by online surveys that are rewarded with some sort of discount code, brands can reap extra benefits from asking their customers some quick questions. You can ask them about styles and certain products, but also test out if they've seen your recent ads and what they thought of it.

Secondary and primary sources for fashion market research

With the fashion industry being so big both offline and online, it can be hard to find data that really represents the part of the market that's relevant to you. A fashion business that focuses on sustainability is less interested in what's happening in market segments such as luxury brands and designer apparel, but in the big picture, all fashion data is often thrown in together.

If you want your research to remain relevant, you'll have to collect reliable data by combining both primary and secondary research.

Let's look at some sources you can gather information from that will help you make confident decisions.

Primary sources

Information that comes straight off the rack comes directly from consumers, or even from store owners, depending on what you need. Here are some ways you can perform primary market research in the fashion industry:

Online surveys: the more you know, the better. Online surveys are great for that, but you'll want to ask the right people. You can use it to test out campaign ideas, make more accurate consumer profiles, track your brand health or analyse the trends in the industry.

Focus groups: whether it's with designers, buyers, suppliers, independent store managers or anyone else in the industry-sometimes the most valuable information comes out of a conversation between peers, rather than from market research reports. Determine what your topic is, and let the focus groups brainstorm-you never know what you'll learn.

Interviews: this could be interesting to do, for instance when you're looking into a new customer segment. Sit some of your potential customers down and find out how you can convince them to buy from you.

Test marketing: with a/b testing, brands can easily test out if certain campaigns-or even certain products-will be in demand. Create a mock-up campaign and launch it. Does it get a lot of traffic? Then it could be worth pursuing!

Secondary sources

If you're looking for numbers like annual spend, market size, growth numbers and price developments, dive into secondary research. There are countless government statistics out there, and even other fashion brands who will make it easier by publishing their own reports.

How to conduct fashion market research like a pro

Like any type of market analysis, fashion research should always be tailored-pun intended!-to the goal you're trying to achieve. We'll quickly walk you through the steps of conducting market research effectively.

Step one: Define your objective

On one hand, you could just dive into all the secondary research you can find to see if there's something worth focusing on. But that could be disappointing, not to mention incredibly time-consuming-think needles and haystacks.

Instead, flip it around. What is the goal your company has? What are you curious about, specifically? Then, work backwards and find the information you need to achieve that goal or answer that question.

Step two: Find the right sources and tools

Like we mentioned earlier, informed decisions are often made on a mix of information. Determine how you'll gain insights and what sources you will gather information from, before you frantically start looking.

Also, when working with a survey or anything like that for the primary research part, make sure you have it ready and checked by everyone involved before launch, so you don't get the results back and realise you missed an important question.

With Attest you can launch your first survey for free.

Step three: Analyse your insights

Start off this step by organising all the data you've gathered. You want to draw conclusions from the big picture, not from something that coincidentally was highlighted along the way.

Step four: Implement!

Market research should be done to not just gain insights, but to take action. If you use it to formulate a marketing plan, make sure it gets implemented. If you use it to get more insights about consumer behaviour, ask sales and marketing how they plan to use this information.

Step five: Keep checking in

Depending on the type and length of the research, make sure to follow up with both the results and the way it was implemented.

Get fashion market insights and data with Attest

If you're looking for a reliable way to reach a lot of people at the same time, who fit your target group specifics to a T-use Attest.

Whether you're an established brand looking to track your brand health or a fashion start up still creating a consumer profile, we've got you covered: you get access to 125 million people across 58 countries and can use our filters and quotas to make it as niche as you need.

Fashion industry market research FAQs

1. What is fashion market research?

Fashion market research looks into consumer behavior and market trends in the fashion industry. It's used to inform decisions about anything that matters to a fashion brand: from the next collection to the next commercial. Attest is here to make fashion market research easy.

2. Who should be conducting fashion market research?

Who shouldn't? Everyone working in the fashion industry who is involved in growing a brand, is helped by doing research: designers, brand managers, influencers and store owners.

3. What types of primary research are most appropriate for fashion market research?

Online surveys are a great way to reach a big pool of people and ask them highly specific questions in a way that enables them to answer honestly. With our Jobs To Be Done (JTBD) template, gathering real consumer insights has never been easier.

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How to Conduct Effective Market Research for Fashion | Attest Blog

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The fashion industry is competitive & ever-changing. Find out how to conduct market research for fashion to stay ahead of the game & remain relevant.

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Learning and Overcoming Challenges in the Field

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Learning and Overcoming Challenges in the Field

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With every job there come challenges, learning these obstacles and how to overcome them is important to every field of work! In my future field of work I will be going into apparel design and merchandising, it is a very specific field of designing products and learning to market them and handle a business agenda. You may think it's just displaying the clothing but it is much more tedious than that. I have to build the face of a company, learn demographics, learn the identity of a brand, and how to continuously keep customers happy.

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Great merchandising, like great value, never goes out of fashion. In a dynamic and increasingly digital apparel, fashion, and luxury market, companies that get merchandising right tend to outperform their peers. One reason is that the umbrella term "merchandising" describes many of the skills associated with excellent retailing. These include expertise on products, quantities, consumer behaviors, channels, timing, pricing, promotions, and replenishment: elements that are key drivers of value creation and vital tools to create competitive advantage.

Across the industry, we see six shifts in the industry's merchandising model that are presenting decision makers with a significant opportunity (see sidebar, "Definitions and skill sets"). If they can optimize their merchandising activities to react to these shifts, they are likely to create a playbook that can help them navigate a tough economic environment and set up their businesses for growth.

Shifts in the industry's merchandising model

Less is more during economic uncertainty. With inflation running at a 40-year high in many markets, the cost of running a fashion business is rising fast. In periods of economic uncertainty, there is an urgent need for brands to embrace leaner business models so that each dollar earned, and saved, goes further.

Consumers demand newness and storytelling. Over recent sales cycles, product life spans have contracted, putting a premium on newness. Consumers want companies to convey clear brand stories and have a positive impact on society. To react, brands need to ensure close and early cross-functional alignment in their go-to-market plans.

Sustainability is climbing the agenda. Shifting consumer attitudes are driving change and regulatory intent is hardening, requiring the industry to clean up its act. In response, companies need to reduce waste, prioritize sustainable materials, design for circularity, and ensure a sustainable, responsive supply chain.

Channel dynamics are continuing to evolve. E-commerce saw unprecedented growth during the pandemic and many brands moved to direct-to-consumer (DTC) models. However, a new reality is now settling in. To grow, brands will likely need to diversify their channel mix, including wholesale and third-party marketplaces, alongside DTC.

Data and insights have become a necessity. Digital is a surefire driver of performance, but not working in silos is key. Integrated digital solutions enable faster time to market, more full-price sell through, and lower manufacturing costs. They support pricing and promotions strategy and inform range planning and optimization.

Talent crunch puts pressure on the operating model. The war for talent makes a well-oiled merchandising operating model a priority. From defining the merchant role as the exciting and business critical role it can be to finding the right balance between core merchandising skills and horizontal excellence functions, the need to act is clear.

Less is more during economic uncertainty

Beyond pricing, merchants can transition to leaner inventories and refine assortments to more cross-season products, extending shelf life to maximize sell through and minimize markdowns.

Consumers demand newness and storytelling

Another driver of accelerated cycles is digital engagement, which enables brands to feed consumer appetite for newness. However, a parallel effect is increased demand volatility amid influencer-fueled hype that can lead to a product selling out in days. Over a short period in 2021, for example, Seasum leggings racked up nearly 800 million views, leading to sellouts on platforms including Amazon.

Sustainability is climbing the agenda

In promoting the sustainability agenda, merchandisers have a key role to play. They can reduce waste (by tightening collections and focusing on efficiencies), prioritize sustainable materials, design for circularity, and ensure a sustainable, responsive supply chain. They also need to unlock different ways of working, and forge closer collaboration between merchants and their design and supply counterparts through the product development cycle. There should be earlier cross-functional alignment on seasonal business needs, while guardrails should prevent overdevelopment in the design concepting phase. Furthermore, merchandisers can help supply teams better understand assortment needs, helping them accelerate raw-material development, optimize capacity, and reduce waste.

Channel dynamics are continuing to evolve

Regardless of the extent to which fashion brands have built their businesses around selling direct to consumers online, the deceleration of e-commerce growth and mounting digital marketing costs require a careful recalibration of channel strategies. To grow, brands will likely need to diversify their channel mix, including wholesale and third-party marketplaces alongside DTC, and adopt processes that enable earlier visibility and transparency of cross-channel strategies. Critical to this is having a clear distribution segmentation, allocating wholesalers and DTC to distinct value tiers and setting the guardrails on multiple dimensions, including the assortment that is offered and the level of investment that accounts receive. This enables brands to develop cohesive assortments that can work across their distribution networks.

Data and insights have become a necessity

Talent crunch puts pressure on the operating model

The war for talent means a well-oiled merchandising operating model is more important than ever. From organizational structure and decision rights to KPIs, culture, and talent management, companies need to make sure they are set up to deliver on their strategies and retain key employees. This starts by defining the merchandising role as the exciting and business critical role it can be, and then creating a culture that provides opportunities to grow beyond traditional silos and acquire cross-functional expertise.

Cross-functional expertise is especially critical as the role of the merchant becomes increasingly more complex. Brands need to find the right balance between core merchandising skills and horizontal excellence functions, like sourcing and supply chain, and create clear roles and responsibilities for them in order for vertical and horizontal teams to collaborate most effectively.

Taking action

With uncertainty baked in over the short to mid term, and pressure on revenues and margins continuing to rise, decision makers face an imperative, and an opportunity, to streamline their merchandising and go-to-market models. Effectively implemented, this will boost customer engagement and create more efficient and effective operations. Here we gather nine actions that reflect the priorities of some of the industry's leading companies as they look to capitalize on the six shifts we have highlighted.

1. Segment go-to-market calendar: implement multilane calendars to create distinct processes for newness and continuity, increasing your speed to market and derisking your collections where possible

2. Adjust sourcing model: define a fit-for-purpose sourcing strategy and model that balances speed, cost, quality, and sustainability to match and enable your merchandising choices

3. Focus on net margin: review your KPIs and incentive schemes to ensure product and commercial teams focus on delivering net margin, and thus help tackle declining full-price sell through and increased dependency on promotions

4. Scale up test and repeat: build a discrete approach and the required data and analytics capabilities for test and repeat to better react to shifting demand and rapidly double down on best-selling lines

5. Manage open to buy: increase the share of your open to buy to derisk seasonal stock through more short-term, demand-focused assortment decisions

6. Reduce range complexity: simplify your range architecture and reduce the long tail of SKUs to increase efficiency, reduce excess stock, and derisk supply chain bottlenecks

7. Define clearance strategy: create a long-term path to clearing stock, taking an omnichannel lens and considering the role of outlets to not dilute the strength of your brand

8. Create organizational clarity: train, upskill, and empower your merchants to make business decisions, and build the necessary cross-functional network around them to drive excellence

9. Walk the talk on sustainability: embed sustainability as a core business KPI for merchants to have clear targets on how much of a collection should be made up of sustainable items

Companies that are able to embed these strategic priorities to fit their unique circumstances are likely to make the most progress on adapting their business models to the challenges of the current environment. Moreover, the most successful will leverage these approaches to embed a more agile merchandising capability that creates flexibility, not only to manage through the downturn but also to respond effectively to the future return of growth.

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Great merchandising never goes out of fashion

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Learn how fashion companies can adapt and achieve new competitive advantages in the face of dramatic shifts in the industry's merchandising model.

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Although my field is being taken over by many large fast-fashion factories, it's important to not forget where it all started, with the hardworking women of our past. Working on new ways of sustainably creating fashion is vital for our planet and hard workers in this field. Learning the importance of the hard work behind these products is something everyone should keep in mind when shopping. I hope this brought more attention to my field of work!