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This trend report combines my findings and analysis from WGSN, EDITED etc to help me develop a commercial range for Zara. The chosen trend is Winter Foraging and the report describes several trends for different categories such as colour, silhouettes, trims etc. Based on my findings I was able to create a commercial range that I consider would be successful for their brand

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This is a mind map of where I hope to see myself in the future and how I aim to achieve this goal. Seeing this plan and developing it encouraged me to be proactive and more precise in how I can achieve my goals.

Having short, mid and long term goals makes it appear realistic and will keep me focused.

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This is my result for pulse strength questionnaire & employability modules. It identified areas I should focus on such as future career choices, looking for a job, and interviews & follow up

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Post Coronavirus (COVID-19) Company Impact: Inditex

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Post Coronavirus (COVID-19) Company Impact: Inditex

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I used this to give me information & accurate data surrounding the profits & loss that Zara were likely to have suffered being the flagship store of the Inditex Group.

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This article gave me a brief insight into the life of the founder of Zara & Inditex Group. This allowed me to see where their successful business model came from & how important it was from the very beginning.

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Since founding Inditex Group in 1985, Amancio Ortega Gaona has become one of the world's most successful and respected fashion retail moguls, overseeing a fast-growing portfolio that includes 'fast fashion' clothing chains Zara, Massimo Dutti , Pull & Bear, Bershka and Stradivarius.

Pioneering the fast fashion movement in the mid-70s with the launch of Zara, Ortega's innovative retail strategy - rapid response to trends and consumer demand - has turned Zara into a global retailer boasting over 1,700 individual storefronts in 86 countries. Through Inditex Group, Ortega Gaona oversees over 6,000 stores around the world. According to Forbes, Ortega Gaona is the wealthiest retailer in the world and worth $69.1 billion as of 2019.

Ortega Gaona first ventured into retail in his early teens, working as store assistant at Gala, a local shirtmaker and tailor located in his town of A Coruña. In 1963, Ortega launched his own manufacturing company Confecciones Goa S.A., forming sewing cooperatives with local women and offering fast production turnaround. In 1975, with the business growing steadily and having acquired several factories in Spain, Ortega opened his first store in A Coruña, just a few blocks from where he worked as a teenager.

By the early 80s, Zara had expanded to several cities in Spain and in 1988, following the formation of Inditex, Ortega opened his first store in Portugal, followed swiftly by New York and Paris. The group began adding to its retail portfolio with Pull & Bear in 1991 and by 2000, it was distributing more than five different clothing chains in over 30 different markets.

Initially a family-run business, in 2001 Inditex began trading publicly on the stock market, with Ortega Gaona as majority shareholder. In 2011, Ortega stepped down as chairman and chief executive, but remained as an official advisor to the board. Beyond retail, Ortega has investments in two main funds: Pontegadea Inversiones and Pontegadea Inmobiliaria.

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Amancio Ortega Gaona is part of the BoF 500

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Since founding Inditex Group in 1985, Amancio Ortega Gaona has become one of the world's most successful and respected fashion retail moguls, overseeing a fast-growing portfolio that includes 'fast fashion' clothing chains Zara, Massimo Dutti , Pull & Bear, Bershka and Stradivarius.

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This article allowed me to review more about how Inditex were trading during COVID-19 last year and how it was impacting business & sales.

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Zara Autumn 2020 Editorial | Source: Courtesy

By Reuters December 15, 2020 09:29

Sales at fashion retailer Inditex fell 14% in the three months from August to October, recovering from a drop of 31% in the previous quarter, although store-based sales saw a significant impact due to COVID-19 restrictions in November.

The Spanish owner of Bershka and Massimo Dutti said that while 21% of stores were closed in November, most re-opened in the first week of December, with 8% of stores currently closed with an additional 10% at weekends.

However, a signficant proportion of stores are still operating with restrictions, Inditex said.

Sales of apparel in Europe remain 9.5% below pre-crisis levels in October, Eurostat data showed. Inditex and rival H&M reported their first-ever quarterly loss earlier this year as lockdowns shuttered stores and stifled demand for new clothing.

H&M said on Tuesday its net sales fell 10% in local currencies in its fourth quarter, with an accelerating slowdown towards the end of the September-November period.

Inditex said its third-quarter net profit reached 866 million euros, in line with a rebound in profit reported in the second quarter, but still down 26% on the year-ago period.

Total sales reached 6.05 billion euros in the third quarter, with online sales continuing to grow at 76% above last year.

Inditex's results were in line with analysts' forecasts of an 11-15% sales drop.
By Victoria Waldersee; editors: Sonya Dowsett and Alexander Smith.

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Inditex's Sales Decline Slowed Before November Knock

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Zara Autumn 2020 Editorial | Source: Courtesy By Reuters December 15, 2020 09:29 Sales at fashion retailer Inditex fell 14% in the three months from August to October, recovering from a drop of 31% in the previous quarter, although store-based sales saw a significant impact due to COVID-19 restrictions in November.

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Zara compared to its competitor H&M during COVID-19

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Zara compared to its competitor H&M during COVID-19

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This article was really interesting as it backed up evidence that I had found of how Zara is competing with H&M and how they are succeeding them in general.

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I found this article helpful when I was doing my PEST and SWOT to help me understand current issues and how they will or may affect retail industry and my brand & what could be used to improve business like e-commerce & digitilisation.

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This article gave more evidence and data to support Zara's successful business model & how it has been able to survive multiple lockdowns and consistent closure during the pandemic. Multiple article like this really supports how well they are sitting in the current market.

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Another interesting article to see the success of their business model which saw a comment made by the chairman of Inditex suggesting the performance is down to the hard work of everyone working at the group. It isn't Zara specific but Zara is their major retailer bringing them them most profits.

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Their website gave me a lot of information into some of their goals in achieving a more sustainable brand. It gave me insight into the timeframes they have promised but also how they were going to achieve them & I found this helpful when I was researching for PEST & SWOT analysis to be able to compare what other brands were doing / if they were doing anything. I thought it was good to look at their actual website instead of articles as I tried to view it from the consumers perspective.

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PRODUCTS-JOIN LIFE | ZARA United Kingdom

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This document showed me Inditex's commitment to the sustainable fashion and the environment as I got to look into more detail & understood more of what their website meant. I though this was really interesting as Inditex, thereby Zara, aren't 'green washing' consumers into thinking they are making promises to reduce environmental impact. But that they have actually signed up to the initiative to help sustainable fashion.

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Decoding Inditex’s assortment and pricing strategies

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Decoding Inditex’s assortment and pricing strategies

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This article helped me understand Zara's pricing strategy more and helped me understand what to look for when trying to do a comparison to determine where I consider their current market position.

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When Inditex hit the €26 billion sales mark in 2018, the Spanish clothing group confirmed its position as the undisputed leader in fast fashion. During the same period, H&M increased sales to 244.2 billion Swedish krona (€23.7 billion), while the second largest fashion chain in Spain, Mango, ended the year with revenues of €2.23 billion. In partnership with Retviews, a fashion analytics company, FashionNetwork.com compares the value propositions of these three brands and evaluates the offering and pricing strategy of each Inditex business.

Without a doubt, Zara is Inditex's star performer. A key driver of revenue, that label alone generated sales of €8.89 billion in the first half of 2019, up by 7.3% on the previous year. Zara accounts for 69% of Inditex's global sales. By contrast, H&M said revenues reached €10.2 billion during the same period.

But looking beyond their sales performance, how do these mass production companies compare in terms of assortment mix? According to Retviews, there are no big differences between Zara, Mango and H&M's assortment strategies. Accessories, dresses and T-shirts are focal points across all three brands, while the most evident difference is in the 'others' category, which includes lingerie, nightwear, sportswear and swimwear. H&M leads the way here, with this category representing 18.6% of its total assortment, while Zara lags behind with 10.5%. That is because Oysho is Inditex's dedicated innerwear brand, making Zara a destination for outerwear and trend-led pieces.

In terms of pricing strategies, Mango stands out as the most expensive of the three brands with an average price of €39.80, followed by Zara which has an average price of €35.90 and H&M's €26.20. H&M also has the lowest minimum price of all three, reaching just €1.49, compared to €3.95 at Zara and €5.99 at Mango. But it seems the Swedish retail giant is not afraid of high prices, with a maximum price of €399. Zara's maximum price is just €279, while Mango is again identified as the most expensive of the three brands under review with a maximum price of €599.

Zara has the smallest price range, which is reflected in the 'dresses' category. Here, Zara's average price is €41.99 and its most frequent price reaches €49.95. Meanwhile, the average dress at H&M will set you back €37.28 and dresses are most frequently sold for €29.99. Zara is more expensive when it comes to dresses. According to the report, more than half of the dresses collection at Zara retails for €30 to €50, while the majority of dresses at H&M are in the €20 to €40 price range.

Each brand within the Inditex portfolio behaves in a slightly different way, with tailored pricing structures and assortment mixes based on their value proposition and target market. Zara serves men, women and children, and 14.7% of its assortment is made up of dresses. T-shirts are also important, accounting for 14.9% of the range. Womenswear is the top moneymaker, generating 34.6% of sales, followed by Zara Home (26.8%), Zara Man (15.7%) and Zara Kids (22.9%). Interestingly, Zara Home has only been recently integrated into the Zara brand, and Zara will become the only childrenswear retailer in the group once Massimo Dutti completes phasing out the segment this summer. Within Zara, the menswear collection is sold at the highest average price of €36.20, mainly due to the large proportion of outerwear and suits, which account for 22% of the assortment.

Massimo Dutti is also known for its menswear. Aimed at the same age demographic as Zara, the brand has a more aspirational profile with classic looks and elevated classics. Accessories, trousers and outerwear make up 47.4% of the assortment. Massimo Dutti's more refined image is reflected in its pricing, with the brand having the highest average price within Inditex, reaching €88.70 compared to €36.60 at Zara and under €23 at every other brand. And Massimo Dutti has the second strongest menswear focus after Pull&Bear, whose menswear collection accounts for 41.6% of the assortment. At Massimo Dutti, menswear represents 41% of the full range. With an average price of €55.10. Shirts make up 19.3% of the men's collection, compared to 14% at Zara. The collection is also larger in terms of sizing, with 2.6 average available sizes in Zara shirts compared to 5.7 average available sizes in Massimo Dutti shirts. As for suits, a three-piece number will cost €408 at Massimo Dutti, while Zara takes a more relaxed approach with more affordable suits retailing for an average of €170.

Aimed at a younger audience, Pull&Bear, Bershka and Stradivarius focus their efforts on more affordable product categories like T-shirts and accessories. The group's second largest brand in terms of revenue, Bershka, also places significant importance on shoes, with sneakers having a big presence (36.7%), compared to Pull & Bear (32.1%) and Stradivarius (18.8%).

Both Pull&Bear and Bershka release more T-shirts than any other product, beating Zara by up to 30%. The Retviews report also highlighted the use of colour, with vibrant colours (excluding black, white and grey) accounting for 34% of Pull&Bear's tees collection. For Zara, this share amounts to 29.8%. In terms of accessories, Stradivarius is Inditex's undeniable leader. The category accounts for 26.8% of the assortment mix at Stradivarius. Leather accessories (18.4%), jewellery (18.3%), and bags (15.3%) dominate the category.

Finally, Oysho is dedicated to nightwear and intimates, two categories that represent 31.6% and 27.1% of its assortment mix. Sportswear is becoming an increasingly important focus, growing to 10.2% of the total offering, while swimwear has a 14.5% share of the assortment mix.

The report reveals details about Inditex's approach to collaborations, with partnerships with Disney, Marvel, Tidal and music brands helping drive T-shirt sales at various brands. Around 5% of Bershka's and Pull&Bear's collections are T-shirt collaborations, while this drops to just 1.6% and 1.5% at Stradivarius and Zara. According to Retviews, the average price for licensed T-shirts is 41.5% higher than regular tees, meaning customers are ready to splash out more to get their hands on licensed T-shirts and sweatshirts.

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Decoding Inditex's assortment and pricing strategies

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News business : Based on a report from fashion analytics company Retviews, we analyse the offering and pricing strategy of each Inditex brand and compare them with H&M and Mango. (#1197273)

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I found this article helpful to get a full picture of Zara as a brand, from its history, its USP and to where it is today. It helped me gain insight into their success & again, supported research I had found on the impact of Ortega's philosophy having the customer at the centre of the brand.

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Written by- Kalyani Kala, Fashion Business Management, ISDI. Faculty- Belinda Bawa

Zarais a Spanish fast fashion clothing and accessories retailer. The company was founded in 1975 by Amancio Ortega and Rosalía Mera.

The legend began when Ortega established a dress making factory in 1963 under the name of Inditex. The success of his foundation led him to the path of retail market for which he had a vision unmatched. Ten years after having set up a factory Ortega with Rosalía Mera started a small store called Zorba, which he had to rename as ZARA. Marking the year 1975 for a store setup, the investment was merely nothing and yet another feather was pulled out of Spain's hat which has made a remarkable name all across the globe.

After setting up the forst store in A Coruña, Galicia, in Spain, ZARA slowly expanded its empire in the rest of the country and later in Portugal in 1988 and the year after that- 1989 ZARA made it to the United States of America.

This annual growth has not dropped since day one and every year Zara has been expanding in countries and places across the globe. France in 1990. During the 1990s, Zara expanded to Mexico (1992),Greece, Belgium and Sweden (1993). In the early 2000s, Zara opened its first stores in Japan and Singapore (2002), Russia and Malaysia (2003),China, Morocco, Estonia, Hungary and Romania (2004), the Philippines,Costa Rica and Indonesia (2005), South Korea (2008), India (2010),and South Africa and Australia (2011).

Zara Head Quarters

With about 6,500 stores across 88 countries ZARA has kept pace with the technologically advancing world. They pushed out their stock online in the year 2010 in Spain, the UK, Portugal, Italy, Germany and France. In November that same year, Zara Online extended the service to five more countries: Austria, Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg. Online stores began operating in the United States in 2011, Russia and Canada in 2013,and Mexico, Romania, and South Korea in 2014. India in 4 October 2017.

Founder of Zara- Amancio Ortega

Amancio Ortega

The Spanish retail magnate, labelled the secretive billionaire, is the founder of high street chain Zara. He also owns a massive chunk of the rest of the high street brands. Today Inditex announced record half year sales and profits with a 3% rise in net income to £1.2 billion for the six months to July 1. From a small shop in the city of A Coruna to a global retail empire with over 7,000 stores, the brand's visionary founder Amancio Ortega has made Zara the world's largest fashion retailer.

With his first store, Ortega started keeping the vision of a low priced product from the higher end clothing brands. The idea was intself genious. During the 1980s, Ortega changed the design, manufacturing, and distribution process to reduce lead times and react to new trends in a quicker way, which he called "instant fashions". The improvements included the use of information technologies and using groups of designers instead of individuals.

Setting up a brand in such a competitive world where bigger fish already sweep the ramps, setting up and making Zara successful is one of the most remarkable events in the history of Fashion. This kind of success does not go around name or brands waiting with silver spoons or luck, but is built on strong brand values and the utility that a brand creates for its consumers. Getting this step right, Ortega managed to inculcate values in his clothing items that are not recgonised as the USP of ZARA.

The USP of the brand which is the prime reason for it's massive success today-

Beauty, Clarity, and Functionality

1. Zara has remained faithful to its core values, expressed simply in the same four key words that define all our stores: beauty, clarity, functionality and sustainability.

2. Only a few clothing brands can keep up with the latest fashion while maintaining high quality of products and selling then at an affordable price. It is no surprise that Zara, which started off as a small store in Spain is now the world's largest retailer and its founder, Amancio Ortega, the 4th richest man in the world. Zara is one of the largest international fashion companies.

3. Yet no one seems to know very much about Ortega. But without him we'd never have heard of the term 'fast fashion' and our shopping habits would certainly be very different. To put it into context, in 1998 you had to be invited to a fashion show to see what was happening on the catwalk. And it took six months before the likes of you and me could buy something 'inspired' by a designer on the high street.Since the beginning of its establishment, the main idea of Zara is to make luxury products accessible to everyone. Thus, they managed somehow to democratize luxury manufacturer of products inspired by the evolution of fashion. With this policy, Zara is now an industry capable of offering trendy products at affordable prices. On the other hand, it is a company that wants to be close to young people. Also, this desire is felt in its recruitment policy. Zara young employees with styles very marked fashion. However, Zara understands what exactly the customers need and respond to their needs very quickly. That's the main secret of Zara, which gives them a competitive advantage.

4. Zara's value chain is vertically integrated, which offers many advantages. It can react quickly and it may have high control over the entire process from design to final product. Supply chain is efficient when they have a smooth use of distributions centers and warehouses. Its strategy also allows distributing the products within a wide geographic range within a very short time. The other thing also is that the products are close to market demand. Their products are made only in limited editions; consequently, they must sale their products in short period of time so they can be sold at full price without having them to be returned. This responsive approach involves both lower marketing costs, and higher profit margins for the company. IT integration is also an important aspect of Zara's strategy which is significant as it enables information sharing between different joints within the company.

5. Online shopping became huge and significant market; customers can go online and order what they need. If Zara allows customers to purchase online, that would increase their sales. Pablo Isla is the first Deputy Chairman and Chief Executive says: "we view our entry into the Indian market to be of significant strategic importance."

6. The competitive advantage of the company based on three factors: quality items, reasonable prices and very short response time.

7. Their philosophy is: "No Marketing", "no communication".

8. The customer is at the heart of our unique business model, which includes design, production, distribution and sales through our extensive retail network.

9. Another thing that sets Zara apart from the competition is that, unlike most other retailers, they don't just produce one product range per season. Thanks to a huge design team, Zara has the ability to identify new trends and immediately put into production. This means they can produce four or five updated and relevant collections after the initial seasonal launch. This way they never miss a trend.

10. The key to their success is keeping these new introductory ranges small allowing mistakes to be discarded and the hits followed up quickly. These collections are in effect dictated by customer demand. The clever part being how quickly Zara responds to consumer behaviour.

11. Distribution is the key to the speed in which the company can respond. Every item of clothing produced comes through Spain.

12. At the company's vast 10,000 sq ft base in Arteixo, not far from where it all began in A Coruna, an extensive tunnel network carries a huge carousel that transports clothing from the on-site factories to the distribution centre.

13. It is probably the amalgamation of all these qualities that made Zara, the Spanish clothing brand become the go-to fashion brand for all.

14. Ortega thought that customers would regard clothes as a perishable commodity - no different from yogurt or bread - to be consumed, rather than stored in closets.

Zara as brand offers a wide range of choices: the collections for women, men and children. The brand also launched a line of cosmetics, perfumes and household products.

Zara's products are supplied based on consumer trends. Its highly responsive supply chain ships new products to stores twice a week. After products are designed, they take ten to fifteen days to reach the stores.

The business aspect-

Zara as of 2017 manages up to 20 clothing collections a year.

2. Zara is a part of the € 4 billion Inditex group and 100% owned company, based in Barcelona. Over 80% of the group's sales are contributed by Zara's 600 stores. Women's, men's and children's wear, over 724 stores in 56 countries.

3. Zara as of 2017 manages up to 20 clothing collections a year.

4. Zara currently has 1,751 stores worldwide. They incur an annual revenue of over $9 Billion dollars (2009).

5. Its parent company is owned 60% INDITEX by the Ortega family and Inditex has carried out in 2005 to 6.741 billion turnovers. Zara has about 2000 thousands branches around the world. Zara is a distributor of apparels.

6. On the face of it, none of it really makes sense. For starters the company doesn't advertise and still manufactures most of its products in Europe. But when you look at the heart of Ortega's business you start to see what a true retail visionary he is. Right from the outset Zara's business model has been built with flexibility and speed at its heart. Instrumental to the company's success is the connection between the stores, the in-house designers, and its factories. This has always been a key factor, coupled with the company's deft logistical management.

7 .It's these vital ingredients that enable him to interpret trends and get them from the catwalk to the high street within weeks. Before Zara came along it took five to six months. And once we'd had a taste of what is now commonly referred to as 'fast fashion' we just couldn't get enough of it.

8. All of the clothing is processed through the distribution center in Spain. New items are inspected, sorted, tagged, and loaded into trucks. In most cases, the clothing is delivered within 48 hours. Zara produces over 450 million items per year.

Zara's role in building the much needed passion for fashion has grown since its very introduction of the concept of fast fashion. In simpler terms, Zara has made the top level of fashion something that people from another market would want or aspire to own with designs that reflect the fashion trends that are currently breaking the market at the top level. This makes the buyers from a lesser buying capacity feel the desire to own bigger brands. By pleasing all of its buyers in different departments, Zara not only promotes high fashion but also keeps its customers satisfied and wanting for more at the same place which is clearly seen in the way it caters to the customers with its TRF collection.

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The legend began when Ortega established a dress making factory in 1963 under the name of Inditex. The success of his foundation led him to the path of retail market for which he had a vision...

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This article allowed me to understand more how threats come into play within retail industry and the impact COVID-19 had on Zara that it had to close so many stores. Even though it was the Inditex Group and their stores, no doubt Zara would be affected due to it being their largest retailer.

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The owner of Zara will close as many as 1,200 stores around the world as the clothing retailer tries to boost online sales during the chaos wrought by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Inditex said it would "absorb" between 1,000 and 1,200 mainly smaller stores, with losses concentrated among older shops from brands other than Zara. The Spanish company's other brands include Bershka, Pull & Bear and Massimo Dutti.

Closures are expected to be concentrated in Asia and Europe. It is understood that the 107 Inditex stores in the UK are less likely to be significantly affected.

Inditex said that "headcount will remain stable", with staff offered roles in other jobs such as dispatching online purchases.

The total store count will fall from 7,412 to between 6,700 and 6,900 after the reorganisation, which will also include the opening of 450 new shops.

Inditex, one of the world's largest clothing retailers, has been hit hard during the pandemic, with sales down 44% to €3.3bn (£2.9bn) between 1 February and 30 April, the first quarter of its financial year.

The company reported a net loss of €409m during the quarter. Almost a quarter of its shops remained closed by 8 June.

However, online sales growth made up for some of the sales weakness, Inditex said. Online sales rose by 50% year-on-year during the quarter, and were up 95% year-on-year in April.

Bricks and mortar retailers around the world have been forced to re-evaluate their business models during the pandemic, amid expectations of lower footfall in stores for a significant amount of time. In the UK fashion brands Monsoon Accessorize and Quiz said on Wednesday they would close branches, with hundreds of jobs lost.

The casual dining sector has also been hard hit, with the Restaurant Group confirming on Wednesday that 125 of its outlets - the majority Frankie & Benny's and Garfunkel's - will not reopen after lockdown, putting 3,000 jobs at risk. The company also owns the Wagamama chain, which is unaffected.

Inditex said it would accelerate its push to sell more clothes online as it seeks to fend off the challenge of high street competitors such as H&M and the Uniqlo owner, Fast Retailing, and newer online-only rivals including Asos and Boohoo in the UK which have prospered during lockdown.

Under Inditex's new plan online sales will account for more than 25% of the total by 2022, compared with 14% in its 2019 financial year. Larger stores will act as distribution hubs for online sales.

Inditex, controlled by its founder, Amancio Ortega, plans to spend €1bn on its online offering by 2022 and a further €1.7bn in stores to allow them to integrate better with websites for faster deliveries and real-time tracking of products.

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Zara owner to close up to 1,200 fashion stores around the world

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Inditex seeks to boost online retailing as coronavirus causes 44% sales slump

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I used this article to give me an understanding how Zara are still successful without advertising and marketing compared to other retailers when I was carrying out my SWOT analysis. I thought it was very interesting & made me more aware of Zara's successful position in the market.

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I used this article to gather information and understand how Brexit would impact trade between the UK and Zara as I am not up to date with Brexit. I used this when I was doing my PEST & SWOT analysis.

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For more than two years, Brexit has been a daily hot topic in the news. Ever since the UK's 'leave' vote on 23 June 2016, no other topic has dominated European politics quite like Brexit. Nevertheless, there has been no real progress ever since. Theresa May once promised that "Brexit means Brexit and we are going to make a success of it". However, when following the news in the last few days, it's difficult to recognise Brexit as a real success story.

Currently, it is far from clear which route the UK will take, making it even more difficult to determine the real issues of a Brexit related to IP rights. The UK's Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) has published certain guidelines on its , however nothing seems certain. Therefore, the following article should be considered merely as acknowledgment of certain potential issues:

Many fashion houses have voiced their concerns about the potential consequences of a Brexit for their estimated 50 billion pound industry. In any case, all fashion houses that have clung to the hope of a regulated Brexit or of an "exit from Brexit" should now take precautionary measures.

What could a "no-deal" Brexit scenario mean for the European and British fashion industry?

Free movement of goods: Can I still supply my fashion goods across the new border between the UK and the EU after a "no deal" Brexit scenario?

When Brexit actually happens, all European regulations automatically loose effect in the UK. The Parliament has taken precautions and enacted a law that declares all EU-regulations to remain applicable, unless a new regulation has been found for that particular law. This sounds like a simple solution, but it does not mean that the status quo will remain.

The UK can't simply decide to keep the border to the EU open. The immediate effect of Brexit could therefore result in custom checks and tolls at all EU borders. Since these checks had been abandoned years ago, it is currently unclear if the British authorities will have the capacity to handle this issue on time. Famous retailers such as London's Harrods have begun to stockpile massive amounts of goods to ensure that they won't encounter any shortages in the upcoming summer. Some experts are warning that even delays of 10 to 30 minutes at the border could put companies out of business.

So what do fashion houses have to do? All companies that either import from the UK into the EU or vice versa should prepare all the formalities for customs clearances at the border. Therefore, it must be safeguarded that fashion houses have the necessary resources (e.g. the right amount of staff, IT-infrastructure and extended warehouse capacities) to tackle this issue. At the same time, fashion houses should check their supplier contracts to determine which party may have to bear additional costs and who will be responsible for potential damages. Also, it should be considered to renegotiate these agreements.

Product related duties: What will change in a no-deal scenario?

Fashion goods from the UK which are delivered across the „new border" into the EU could be "made available" on the EU's internal market for the first time.

It is possible that the relevant fashion house would then be regarded as „manufacturer" or "distributor" of these goods. This may lead to additional responsibilities and duties. For example, said fashion house could at least be co-responsible to comply with the relevant laws governing textile labelling.

This may shift the responsibility for a products' character to these fashion houses concerning goods that cross the new border on their order.

Protection of brands and designs

Particularly trademarks protect fashion's most valuable asset, the creative effort and the prestigious brand (what's worth a Louis Vuitton bag without the famous monogram, a Burberry coat without the famous check pattern?)

In a no-deal scenario it is possible that trademarks and designs may at least partially lose their validity. In order to be absolutely sure that this will not happen, fashion houses should apply for UK national rights, too.

What will happen to my EU trademarks and licenses?

Owners of one of the 11 million European registered trademarks can be relieved. Regardless of a deal or no-deal scenario, the UK's Intellectual Property Office (UKIPO) has announced that it will create a "British twin" for all registered European trademarks. The UKIPO will copy all EU trademarks that are registered on the Brexit date and will create separate UK trademarks, supposedly free of charge for the owner. Presumably, all owners will be contacted and receive information on these new national UK trademarks.

This means that all owners of EU registered trademarks may not have to take any immediate steps to keep their trade mark protection in the United Kingdom. However, companies should consider that from the Brexit date onwards, they own two completely independent trademarks. This means that all UK-twins will have to be managed and extended separately. Also, companies that use law firms to manage their trademark portfolio should check if the relevant firm will still be capable of representing them in the UK. Should this not be the case, the owner should consider to instruct new representatives.

However, EU trademarks that are not registered on the Brexit-date will not get a British twin. Fashion houses that wish to have their pending EU trademark application cover the UK as well should therefore file a separate UK national trademark application. Especially when it comes to key trademarks, fashion houses should take precautions to ensure that their trademarks are not taken away by competitors or trademark trolls.

All manufacturers of licensed products will also have to be proactive to protect their products. This does not only affect manufacturers of Star Wars-shirts and Snoopy socks, but also manufacturers of other products such as perfumes, cosmetics and sun glasses which are often manufactured by specialised licensees.

Every fashion house that either licenses trademarks to third parties or that is a licensee of a European trademark should check the relevant license agreements. It should be carefully assessed whether the current license agreement still allows to manufacture and sell the relevant goods after Brexit across the new border. Some of the agreements may have to be renegotiated while it should be considered to register the license in the relevant national register.

What happens to my EU-Designs?

For the fashion industry, design rights are also a key asset. Most fashion houses are protecting certain styles, cuts and the aesthetic character of their fashion items by registering European designs, so-called Registered Community Designs. As a recent example of the value of these rights, the Only the Brave group achieved a major victory for its brands Diesel and Marni. A court in Milan, Italy, ruled that the fast fashion giant Zara had infringed upon its competitors design right for a skinny jeans model called "Skinzee-SP2".

Similar to the treatment of EU trade marks, the UKIPO has announced that Registered Community Designs will also receive a British twin. Designers will therefore not have to re-register their creations.

With respect to Registered Community Design applications that are still pending on the Brexit date, fashion houses should be able to refile these designs with the UKIPO under the same terms for a UK equivalent right.

A similar solution could be enacted for the so-called Unregistered Community Design. Designers may also be able to claim design rights without any fees and without a registration process. If a design fulfils certain requirements, designers can use the Unregistered Community Design to protect their designs against copycats in Europe. However, the benefits of an Unregistered Community Design Right do come at a price. In comparison to the Registered Community Design, the duration of protection is much shorter and in practice, the enforcement of the Unregistered Community Design proves to be more difficult. The case against ZARA was based on both, registered and unregistered designs. Next to the registered design of the skinny jeans, Only the Brave also managed to prove that ZARA had infringed upon their innovative unregistered design for sandals and ordered the Spanish firm to cease all sales of the affected products.

The UKIPO has announced that all existing Unregistered Community Designs will continue to be recognized in the UK. This right is intended to cover all unregistered designs that were first made available in the European Union. For the time after Brexit, the UK has announced to create legislation that grants unregistered designs to UK designers, but it is still unclear what the protection will look like. Companies that have not registered their designs should closely monitor developments in the UK to determine where they have to publish their designs to get the protection they want. An appearance at the London Fashion Week can decide which rights a company acquires. Considering these uncertainties and the fact that design registration is quite cheap, designers are well advised to rather rely upon registered design rights.

In contrast to questions of customs clearances, the UK has taken rather clear measures on how to proceed with European trademarks and designs. Fashion companies can protect their intellectual property with the right strategy. Now is the time to audit the IP portfolio and to take the relevant steps.

Consent of rights owner may be necessary when bringing goods across a new "EU-UK" border.

When importing or exporting fashion goods across the "new border between the EU and the UK", the principle of "exhaustion" for trademarks and designs may no longer apply to this scenario. In this context, IP rights such as trademarks and designs maybe "exhausted" for a given product in case the given product has been marketed in the EU with the right owners consent. As a result, the right owner may no longer prohibit free trade of this given product in the EU's internal market.

Should there be a no-deal scenario, the exhaustion principle may no longer apply in the EU-UK relationship, at least not in the same manner. Hence, a re-import or parallel import of fashion items from the UK into the EU and vice versa could still infringe trademark and design rights should there be no consent of the right holder.

Consequently, it is vital to ensure that there is a corresponding consent of the right holder prior to the movement of goods "across the new EU-UK" border".

It remains to be seen how a hard Brexit is going to affect Europe's economy. Certainly, Brexit will significantly change Europe's fashion industry.

This article is for information purposes only and does not constitute legal advice.
Photo credit: freestocks.org, Pexels

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What does a hard Brexit mean for fashion companies?

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For more than two years, Brexit has been a daily hot topic in the news. Ever since the UK's 'leave' vote on 23 June 2016, no other topic has dominated European politics quite like Brexit. Nevertheless, there has been no real progress ever since.

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Again, I used this to understand Brexit from Zara's perspective when I was carrying out my PEST and SWOT to see how much it would impact the brand.

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Inditex thinks that the impact on the group of a no-deal Brexit from the EU will not be "significant", as indicated in the report on the group's H1 results presented to Spain's National Securities Market Commission (CNMV) on Friday.

Among the main risks arising from Brexit, Inditex has identified potential delays in the transit of goods, economic impacts arising from the imposition of tariffs and from currency fluctuations, and possible restrictions on the free movement of persons, "as well as the derivative effects of contractual risks or issues in managing key third-party relationships," said the group.

However, Inditex stated that, despite the significance of a no-deal Brexit, "in-depth analysis shows that the residual risk for the group, once it will have implemented the appropriate mitigating actions, is not expected to be significant."

Currently, Inditex operates 108 stores in the UK, over half of them (63) flying the flag of its leading fashion chain, Zara.

In the document, the world's largest textile distribution group added that, although there is some uncertainty about the Brexit date, as well as on future developments in this regard, a no-deal exit from the EU will imply changes to the regulatory environment within which the group operates in the UK, and also changes to the UK-EU trading relationship, which would then fall under World Trade Organization rules.

This change would result in cross-border trade being subject to customs controls and tariffs, said Inditex.

From a broader perspective, the group explained that geopolitical, demographic and socio-economic changes triggering further risks in the countries where Inditex sources from or distributes, as well as weaker consumer demand in certain markets, and the modifications of weather patterns induced by climate change, which can in turn affect demand, are some of the "factors which might impact the optimal achievement of the [group's] business objectives."

"In addition, the industry's high degree of competitiveness, driven by new technologies and disruptive innovations, might influence [the group's] ability to compete in an environment where consumer behaviour is constantly changing," concluded Inditex.

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Inditex believes impact of hard Brexit would not be significant for group

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Inditex thinks that the impact on the group of a no-deal Brexit from the EU will not be "significant", as indicated in the report on the group's H1 results presented to Spain's National Securities Market Commission (CNMV) on Friday.

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As I couldn't get to a physical store because of lockdown, I used their app & website plenty of times but also this report to remind me how the store layout is with the help of visual merchandising, music, window displays etc.

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I used this website & information to help me understand more in terms of funding within the fashion industry for PEST analysis and how the government could support the industry after COVID-19.

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The BFC is in constant communication with government and organisations on key issues affecting the fashion industry. Our industry's sponsor government department is the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS) with whom the BFC communicates on a weekly basis. We'd like to hear from you so that we may communicate your specific concerns back to our government colleagues.

If you would like to get regular updates and be a part of industry briefings please get in touch government@britishfashioncouncil.com .

The BFC sits on a number of forums to represent the fashion industry, including:

Creative Industries Council
Chaired by the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport, and Tim Davie BBC Director General. Contribution and updates to CIC website

Creative Industries Federation
Founding member of body that represents, champions and supports the UK's creative industries

Department for Culture Media & Sport Entertainment & Events Group
Chaired by Caroline Dinenage, Minister for Creative & Digital
Group to discuss and feed in issues to support events and festivals under COVID guidelines

Department for Culture Media & Sport Touring Working Group
Chaired by Caroline Dinenage, Minister for Creative & Digital

Cross DIT/DCMS/BEIS groups

Department Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy Consumer Goods Sector Panel Group for Trade Associations

GREAT Private Sector Council

The BFC is working across a number of policy areas to secure government support for the future of the fashion industry and the challenges being faced due to Brexit and the COVID pandemic.

Advice for designers to support their businesses can be found on the BFC's Brexit guidance and Covid guidance webpages.
TALENT
Developing and securing talent is an essential part of the fashion industry, both through education and training, and being able to source, retain and move talent and workers across the EU and internationally.

Skills shortages exist, particularly in certain technical areas, and as a result of Brexit, with gaps in technical education and training which are unlikely to fill the shortage, with a need to broaden routes into the industry.

Diversity & Inclusion within fashion, broadening pathways into the industry.

Global Talent Visa for Fashion Designers , secured in partnership with Arts Council England, and the Home Office, with the support of the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport. The BFC takes the role of Independent Assessor for applications in the fashion industry.

The creation of a Models Code of Practice with the BFMA and Home Office and DCMS that provides guidance to UK Visa Sponsors (model agencies) on how to bring models into the UK under the Temporary Visa creative route, and ensure that they work within their sponsor's licence. Conversations with the Home Office are ongoing.

The BFC led the development of the Fashion Studio Assistant Apprenticeship with the Institute of Apprenticeships and a group of employers, giving new opportunities within the industry.

Representation on DCMS Touring Working Group, Chaired by the Minister for Digital & Culture

The BFC are in direct discussions with DCMS to draft a quarantine exemption for the fashion industry to ensure key talent is able to travel freely

The BFC are engaged with the Home Office Migration Policy Unit

The BFC represent the fashion industry on the Creative Industries Council Education and Diversity & Inclusion Sub-Groups

Input into Migration Advisory Committee consultations

All Parliamentary Party Group: Art, Craft, Design Education

T Level Development Panel for Craft and Design Led by the Institute of Apprenticeships & Technical Education, panel of practitioners developing the new T level route to study technical fashion post GSCE

TRADE
Fashion is a global industry. Understanding the impact of the UK exiting the EU on movement of goods, particularly as the industry relies on movement of components and samples, is a complex issue facing the industry.

Supporting the industry to understand the complexities, decision-making and paperwork required to trade with the EU and internationally under new Free Trade Agreements to reduce management and cost.

VAT & E-commerce - Changes on VAT charges for goods and services to EU and on Duties and VAT for ecommerce sales to EU.

Tax Free Shopping - Calls for a reversal of the decision to abolish the VAT Retail Export Scheme in the UK

The Boeing/Airbus trade dispute with the USA is continuing to have an impact on the fashion industry where punitive tariffs are being applied to fashion and textile products by the USA.

The BFC is lobbying alongside organisations across the luxury sectors to reinstate the VAT Retail Export Scheme for tax free shopping

The BFC is working with the Mayor of London's Business Hub to ensure that the fashion sector in London has a better understanding of new requirements involved in selling, trading and working in the EU. Together we are developing a range of support that will deliver webinars, guides and 1-2-1 activity covering topics such as rules of origin, IP, e-commerce and VAT.

The BFC is working closely with government on Rules of Origin

The BFC organised a seminar for the fashion industry with representatives from DCMS and the Border and Protocol Delivery Group (within Cabinet Office). Policy experts from across the government (HMRC, Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy and the Home Office) spoke on changes arising from the end of the Transition Period which affect the fashion industry and preparations for London Fashion Week. Topics covered movement of people (e.g. travelling to EU/UK for business purposes) and movement of goods (e.g. customs processes, customs relief, temporary admission and rules of origin).

Department for International Trade - Creative Industries Trade Advisory Group (TAG)
Set up to support DIT policy team in defining new free trade agreements

Department for Culture Media and Sport Touring Working Group
Chaired by Caroline Dinenage, Minister for Creative & Digital

Creative Industries Trade & Investment Board

Department for International Trade Luxury Steering Group

Department Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy Consumer Goods Sector Panel Group Weekly call with trade associations to discuss future of industries including Brexit & COVID

THE FUTURE OF FASHION
The fashion industry is committed to reset and change to create responsible, sustainable businesses.

Impact of COVID 19 on sales and businesses in the fashion industry is significant with revenues predicted to drop and a generation of fashion talent, from students and graduates through to start-up businesses will be affected.

Diversity & Inclusion - The BFC's Diversity & Inclusion Steering Committee, is an essential part of its long-term plan to fight prejudice and discrimination and galvanise the industry into action.

Clean Growth & Environment - The BFC's Institute of Positive Fashion aims to support the fashion industry in the UK accelerate towards circularity and the goals set out in the Paris Agreement, specifically it enables positive change through collaboration and knowledge sharing.
Institute of Positive Fashion

Funding support from the government is essential to ensure the future of fashion. The fashion industry has benefited from European Regional Development Funds (ERDF), Mayor of London and Department for International Trade funding for development of the industry and businesses, enabling the industry to work collectively to test new showcasing platforms and support emerging talent.

The BFC have engaged Westminster Council to help us to secure free tests for London Fashion Week productions and filming and our constant conversations with DCMS have enabled London Fashion Week to go ahead under Covid secure guidelines.

The BFC has ensured, with the support of DCMS, that productions for London Fashion Week February 2021 go ahead under COVID secure guidelines.

The BFC worked closely with DCMS to receive an exemption for physical shows to go ahead under COVID-secure guidelines for London Fashion Week September 2020.

Securing funding from the Arts & Humanities Research Council to enable two Post-doctoral researchers to be based with the BFC to undertake research for the Institute of Positive Fashion.

CIC Innovation & R&D Sub-group

CIC Access to Growth Sub-group

UKRI Fashion Working Group

Department for International Development Garment Supply Chains Working Group

INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY
Protection of Intellectual Property is a key issue for the fashion industry, which relies on creativity, design and brands.

The BFC has created a guide for designers and is speaking to partners to help with practical solutions.

Working closely with the Intellectual Property Office

CIC Intellectual Property Sub-Group

TIMELINE
The below timeline outlines the BFC's engagement with the government on behalf of the fashion industry.
March 2021

On Thursday 11th March, BFC Chair Stephanie Phair and BFC CEO Caroline Rush met with Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Oliver Dowden to discuss the key issues facing the fashion industry and what can be done to ensure Britain continues to lead the way in a sector that contributes £35bn to the UK economy and employs over 890,000 people

On Tuesday 9th March, the British Fashion Council and UK Fashion & Textiles hosted a forum for the fashion industry to update on the work they do to represent the industry to the government. This was the first time that this information was presented in one place. Invited guest speakers were: Helen Dickinson CEO of the British Retail Consortium and Tamara Cincik Founder and CEO of Fashion Roundtable. The forum was also attended by government colleagues including the Department for Digital Culture Media & Sport, Department for International Trade, Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, and the Mayor of London's Culture team. These updated forums will be held on a monthly basis and give BFC and UKFT the opportunity to update the industry on developments as well as get feedback first hand. For more information please get in touch with government@britishfashioncouncil.com

The BFC responds to Spring Budget Statement, read more here.

February 2021

The BFC has secured free testing for designers and brands taking part in London Fashion Week through their partnership with Westminster Council.

The BFC is working with the Mayor of London's Business Hub to ensure that the fashion sector in London has a better understanding of new requirements involved in selling, trading and working in the EU. Together we are developing a range of support that will deliver webinars and 1-2-1 activity covering topics such as rules of origin, IP, e-commerce and VAT.

January 2021

An open Letter to the Prime Minister to focus attention on the challenges facing the fashion industry by Caroline Rush, British Fashion Council published in GQ

DCMS and the Border and Protocol Delivery Group (within Cabinet Office) hosts a webinar with the British Fashion Council. Policy experts from across the government (HMRC, Department of Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy and the Home Office) spoke on changes arising from the end of the Transition Period which affect the fashion industry and preparations for London Fashion Week. Topics covered movement of people (e.g. travelling to EU/UK for business purposes) and movement of goods (e.g. customs processes, customs relief, temporary admission and rules of origin).

The BFC has ensured, with the support of DCMS, that productions for London Fashion Week February 2021 go ahead under COVID secure guidelines.

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The BFC is in constant communication with government and organisations on key issues affecting the fashion industry. Our industry's sponsor government department is the Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS) with whom the BFC communicates on a weekly basis.

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Again, I got more information about the impact Brexit would have on the fashion industry when conducting the PEST & SWOT analysis. This gave me information about tariffs for importing which would be most relevant when analysing Zara due to it coming from Spain.

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The page you were looking for can't be found. It may have moved, or it may no longer be available. Please try one of the options below:

Check the Web address you entered to make sure that it's correct. Try to access the page directly from the Home Page or Site Map below, instead of using a bookmark. If it has moved, reset your bookmark.

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The British Fashion Council promotes leading British fashion designers in a global market. Its events and initiatives support and strengthen the UK's reputation for developing design excellence.

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Using information from Inditex website gave me a brief timeline into the history of the brand & where they are now in terms of number of stores & their locations. This helped me understand what markets Zara are already in when considering how they could continue to expand. It also reiterated how important store presence is for the brand.

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Our story traces the growth of a small business into one of the largest fashion retail groups in the world.

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I used this platform to gather data on Zara's engagement with their customers & was able to compare it to H&M and ASOS who I thought would have been most suitable in terms of competitiveness.

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Total Visits 76.99M 7.05%

Avg. Visit Duration 00:06:55

Estimated Data Verify Your Website

Traffic Sources for zara.com

Traffic Sources Find out which are the main sources of desktop traffic for zara.com.
March 2021 analysis

zara.com's marketing strategy is focused on Direct with 50.40% of traffic coming from this channel, followed by Search with 42.86%

On desktop

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Zara.com Traffic, Ranking & Marketing Analytics | Similarweb

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Total Visits 76.99M 7.05% Avg. Visit Duration 00:06:55 Estimated Data Verify Your Website Traffic Sources Find out which are the main sources of desktop traffic for zara.com.March 2021 analysis zara.com's marketing strategy is focused on Direct with 50.40% of traffic coming from this channel, followed by Search with 42.86% On desktop Get Full Comparison with SimilarWeb Pro Outbrain has been using SimilarWeb for over a year and it's been instrumental for our ability to analyze our competitive environment, benchmark our performance, keep track of industry trends, and generate new leads.

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Zara - digitilisation & biggest UK store

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Zara - digitilisation & biggest UK store

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This article gave me insight into their first digital store which is in London's Westfield Shopping Centre. By reading the article & after doing precious research I started to understand and consider the purpose of the stores location and presence in the market using new technology to improve customer experience and increase sales.

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The Zara gods are shining down on us Brits with a swanky new store that is larger than ANY OTHER in the whole of the UK. If 3,877sq metres or 41,731 sq ft means anything to you, that's how big this dreamy shopper's paradise is, although to put that into perspective, it's still only half the size of the largest Zara shop in the whole world - so we have some way to go still!

Zara opened up the newly refurbished store in Westfield London (White City) after taking over next door's Banana Republic to create one gigantic Zara shopping space.

Of course with all that space Zara has plenty of room to show off its menswear, womenswear and kidswear collections and - for the first time - this store has a specially crafted accessories section with exclusive bags and shoes you will only find in this one shop. Finally some Zara items not everyone in the world will own too? We're SOLD.

One other benefit we're hoping this Zara will have is loads more tills and changing rooms so we waste less precious life time in Zara queues (it's a daily struggle).

The Westfield store, while large, is still a baby compared to the 65,000 sq ft giant that recently opened in Madrid.

This content is created and maintained by a third party, and imported onto this page to help users provide their email addresses. You may be able to find more information about this and similar content at piano.io

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The UK's biggest Zara has just opened and OH MY

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The Zara gods are shining down on us Brits with a swanky new store that is larger than ANY OTHER in the whole of the UK.

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I used this article for more information on allegations I was seeing made against Zara when I was conducting my SWOT and PEST and see if these were true and how this would impact their brand. - Negative publicity.

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Allegations of labour exploitation in the fashion supply chain are rampant. In the month of July alone, UK fast fashion retailer Boohoo was accused of worker exploitation at one of its Leicester suppliers (the company refutes the allegations); advocacy groups alleged that Los Angeles' garment district put workers at risk of Covid-19 contagion; and a new report linked Malaysian factories to alleged forced labour.

For Raphaël Glucksmann, vice-chair of the Subcommittee on Human Rights of the European Parliament (or DROI Committee), the only solution is to hold companies legally responsible for any form of violation of human rights in their value chain, including violations perpetrated by their suppliers, subsidiaries and subsidiary contractors.

"[Brands] will take all the progressive stances in the world as long as it does not impact their business model, but the problem is their business model," he says. "The only way to convince them is to show that if they don't change [it], they might face justice."

Western fashion companies have long relied on outsourcing their production to countries that often have poor labour conditions and rule of law. But as consumer awareness builds and governments like the European Union take a stronger stance, fashion faces a costly re-evaluation of its business model and entire supply and value chain. Eighty-two well-known international brands, including Adidas, Lacoste, Nike and Zara, were linked, direct and indirectly, to Chinese factories that allegedly used forced labour earlier this year. The Australian Strategic Policy Institute report alleged 80,000 Uighurs had been deported to work in factories in the last two years "under conditions that strongly suggest forced labour".

Vogue Business reached out to the fashion companies named in the report. Of the brands that responded to a request for comment, Gap, H&M, Ralph Lauren and Uniqlo denied sourcing garments from or working with manufacturers in Xinjiang. A&F Co. says it believes it does not work with any factories listed in the report. Nike said it does not source products or components directly from Xinjiang and doesn't use textiles or spun yarn from the region. Cerruti 1881 said it has never used the Uighur minority forced labour directly or indirectly. L Brands said it cut ties with one supplier with ties to Xinjiang earlier this year. PVH said that since January 2019 the company and its licensees are prohibited from producing finished goods in the region. Jack & Jones is increasing focus on due diligence procedures in tier 3 and 4 production in the province. Lacoste said specialist auditing firms found no non-compliance among its suppliers in China. Puma said that only one of the two manufacturers associated with the company by the report works, indirectly, for Puma and there is no evidence of any form of forced labour in its factory. Zara said it does not have commercial relations with any factory in Xinjiang. Zegna said none of the companies named in the report is a supplier to Zegna, but that one of the companies purchases fabrics from them.

Adidas, Fila, Li-Ning and Skechers didn't reply to a request for comment at the time of publication.

Glucksmann is working on a EU legislative initiative that would make human rights and environmental due diligence mandatory for companies through their entire supply chain, based on a duty of care, which is a legal obligation to adhere to a standard of reasonable care. In effect, a European parent company will be legally liable for failure of due diligence not only in its owned operations, but on all levels of the supply chain beyond first-tier suppliers and no matter where they are in the world. While details are still scarce, the legislation could also require the burden of proof in reverse (which means that the defendant will have to prove its innocence as opposed to the prosecutor having to prove their culpability) and address all human rights, not only severe violations. American companies that don't comply will be taxed.

"The decision to go with something mandatory is groundbreaking," says James Marlow, a lawyer on Linklaters' ESG team, adding that previous initiatives tended to be on a voluntary basis as agreement on a mandatory position couldn't be reached. "[Due diligence] is not just finding and getting the information; it's finding the information, finding the issues and then doing something about it." With the additional "standard of reasonable care" it won't be enough for companies to prove that they did due diligence, but they'll have to do it in a way that "a reasonable business would have done".

In short, the law could allow affected communities and individuals employed by lower-tier suppliers in any legislation to bring their case against the top-tier European parent company to a European court, instead of bringing the local supplier to court in a local court. A German company that works with suppliers employing workers under conditions of forced labour, then, could be taken to trial in Germany.

The Uighur issue

Glucksmann was aware of the numerous reports around the mass detention and forced labour practices suffered by Muslim ethnic minorites, specifically Uighurs, in the Northwestern Chinese region of Xinjiang. But he wasn't aware of the full extent of the issue until he had hearings with members of the Uighur diaspora in Europe in September 2019. "The deeper I went into [it], the more horrible the story looked," he says. In the years since the Chinese government escalated crackdowns against Muslim ethnic minorities in 2009 and again in 2014, leaked government documents, satellite images and former Uighur detainees and activists have confirmed the existence of heavily surveilled internment camps and allegations of forced sterilisation and abortions have been reported. The Chinese government denies wrongdoing.

For Glucksmann, who initiated a social media campaign to raise awareness of the issue in September 2019, the alleged involvement of fashion companies was an opportunity to further his efforts. "Public campaigns work better with fashion brands because 90 per cent of their business strategy is based on their image," he explains, adding that brands that have been increasingly shaping their image as philanthropic and progressive would have a hard time ignoring allegations of involvement in forced labour, even if they are aimed at their suppliers.

For now, answers to his campaign have been varied. Since the release of the report, Glucksmann's campaign has targeted Adidas, Lacoste, Nike and Zara, asking for meetings with executives and public responses regarding their alleged involvement with the factories named in the ASPI report. According to Glucksmann, Adidas and Lacoste both agreed to cease all activity with suppliers and subcontractors involved in the exploitation of Uighur forced labourers. Nike refused to share evidence that Taekwang, the supplier to which it was linked in the report, stopped recruiting new employees from Xinjiang and also refused to share its written exchanges with the supplier. Zara just recently accepted to meet with Glucksmann. (Adidas didn't reply to a request for comment; Nike and Lacoste didn't address a specific question about their exchange with Glucksmann; Zara declined to comment on a request to confirm its meeting with Glucksmann).

Similarly to Gen Z consumers' mild response to the allegations of malpractice against Boohoo, the allegations of Uighur forced labour haven't driven the outspoken consumer reactions and call-outs triggered by brands' responses to the Black Lives Matter protests around the world or for their response to other political, social and environmental issues. Glucksmann, however, believes the association between forced labour and one's favourite brand will lead an increasing number of customers to ask for a good track record in terms of environmental and human rights.

"Xinjiang and Western China look so far from our lives," he says. "Our job is to show that what you are wearing is connected to the worst crime against humanity of today." He said that in September the focus will move to H&M.

Implications for businesses

Adhering to the EU mandatory due diligence legislation, if passed, will be a difficult undertaking for brands, especially small and medium-sized businesses with complex supply chains and limited resources. But it's not impossible, says Linklaters' Marlow, who stresses that the effort is going to require engagement across the entire business. "It's something that requires multidisciplinary attention, senior level attention and a cultural shift across organisations in the industry," he says, adding that mandatory laws could encourage collaboration, leading to more progress.

Some companies see a standardisation of norms in a positive light. In a statement, H&M said that they "welcome and publicly support the development of a law regulating how companies should carry out human rights due diligence, and believe that going from a voluntary to a mandatory framework would lead to a greater accountability... We therefore actively support initiatives within the EU to ensure that the development of such a law is prioritised." Cerruti 1881 said that, while it's company policy to never comment on politics, "it is obvious that strength lies in numbers, and human rights and style of law should be backed by texts internationally enforceable." Every other brand did not respond to requests for comment or did not provide a specific comment on the legislation.

Glucksmann says that the legislation, which should be voted in plenary in December barring a second wave of restrictions due to Covid-19, seems to have a "surprisingly" majority consensus for the moment. This is partly motivated by a frustration from some political parties with what they perceived as an economic overdependence on China, which became apparent when Covid-19 brought global supply chains to a standstill, bringing the discourse around the localisation of production to the forefront.

But simply walking away from the supply chain doesn't eradicate the underlying human rights and labour rights abuses that are part of the globalised fashion system and the legislation shouldn't bring companies to pull away from supplier countries en masse. "What we want to do is not to close borders and be protectionist... it's to standardise norms [to make it that] with your search for lower costs will come a necessity of responsibility," says Glucksmann.

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Update: The story was updated to include comments from A&F Co., Ralph Lauren and Zara received after initial publication. (3 August 2020)
More from this author: Covid-19 has emphasised the importance of brand transparency Lacking financial support, Black-owned businesses are suffering Should fashion freelancers unionise?

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The EU's fight against fashion's forced labour supply chain

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Allegations of labour exploitation in the fashion supply chain are rampant. In the month of July alone, UK fast fashion retailer Boohoo was accused of worker exploitation at one of its Leicester suppliers (the company refutes the allegations); advocacy groups alleged that Los Angeles' garment district put workers at risk of Covid-19 contagion; and a new report linked Malaysian factories to alleged forced labour.

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This helped me understand better how to do a SWOT analysis on Zara and things to consider. It helped me consider things I might have left out.

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In this article, we'll walk you through a SWOT analysis for Zara. Inditex, the world's biggest fashion retailer owns the brand Zara. In 1975, Amancio Ortega, Inditex's founder, opened the first Zara store in Spain. Since 1975, Zara has grown to be a dominant presence in the fashion industry.

Today, with 2,240 stores across 96 countries, Zara brought home €19.5 billion in 2019. Contributing 70% of Inditex's revenue in 2019, Zara is Inditex's crown jewel.

What makes Zara such a popular brand? Well, our SWOT analysis for Zara helps you learn why. Here's what the SWOT analysis covers:

Strength: Internal factors enabling Zara's growth.

Weakness: Internal factors hindering Zara's progress.

Opportunity: External factors aiding Zara's rise.

Threat: External factors pulling Zara down.

Reading this SWOT analysis helps you upgrade your business IQ and develop your problem-solving skills. Interested in getting smarter? Just five minutes will do it. Shall we start?

What are Zara's major strengths?

Pioneer Advantage: Fast-fashion focuses on designing, producing, and selling clothes as soon as they identify a trend. In traditional fashion, the process takes months; Zara does this in 3 weeks. As pioneers, Zara has the most evolved strategy and management practices in running the supply chain.

Stores: Zara is selling in 202 markets and has stores in 96 of them. Totaling 2249 stores, Zara has the most number of fashion retail stores in the world. The number is almost twice the number of retail stores than Nike has, which has the second-highest number of retail stores.

Supply Chain: Zara refreshes its online and retail collection two times a week. Zara's 10 logistic centers deliver to any location in the world within 48 hours. Inditex also has an in-house team who design software to double the speed at which the company dispatches orders.

Design Team: Inditex has a team of 700 trained designers who transform the customer's desires to designs. The team of designers outputs 50,000 creatives a year. And, it takes them just 3 weeks to get the designs from the drawing board to the stores.

Switch to Online: Inditex is investing $3 billion in bolstering its online sales. The investment focuses on developing an engaging online buying experience and integrating existing physical infrastructure. The company aims to generate a quarter of its revenue through online sales by 2022.

The reason Zara is so successful is that Zara has mastered the game of fast-fashion. But due to growing concerns about the environment and ethics, fast-fashion turns out to be a double-edged sword. We'll cover this and more in our next section on Zara's weaknesses.

What are some of Zara's weaknesses?

What makes Zara unique in the world of fashion is its commitment to revise its collection every two weeks. This commitment gives Zara a place at the top of the industry. But the edge comes at a price. Here's more:

Fast-Fashion: Interestingly, the trend that helped propel Zara to the top is the cause of its most pressing weakness. With the focus on sustainability increasing among customers and policymakers Zara's weakness is balancing sustainability with fast-fashion.

Reliance on Physical Stores: The pandemic accelerated Zara's plans to limit the number of physical stores. Online sales helped Zara climb out of a massive drop in sales because of COVID-19-related causes. However, even with online sales picking up, the sales are only at 89% of what it was in 2019.

Expansion to US and Asia-Pacific: Zara has 99 stores in the US. This accounts for only 4.4% of Zara's 2249 stores. However, the US is the biggest apparel market in the world. And the Asia-Pacific accounts for 38% of the apparel market share. Zara's presence in both geographies is weak.

Ethical Work Practices: Inditex works with 1520 suppliers across 7108 factories. Although Inditex deserves credit for creating a rigorous code of conduct, a large gap exists in enforcing the code. An issue, as reported by Buzzfeed, regarding the treatment of workers in Myanmar points to this gap.

AI-Enabled Prediction: Currently, Inditex is working with AI and Big Data companies to create an AI-enabled system that predicts consumer behavior. However, the current system is still in its testing stage. When such a system goes online, Zara will have the unrivaled capability in predicting and fulfilling customer's needs.

What are some opportunities for Zara?

One of the biggest advantages Zara has is its experience in capitalizing on fashion trends quickly. This advantage puts Zara in the right place to leverage opportunities on the horizon. Some of these opportunities are:

Rapid Delivery Cycle: Customers visit Zara's shops on an average of 17 times a year. This is because Zara responds to trends as soon as they emerge. Right now, Zara delivers a trend from start to finish in just 2 to 3 weeks. However, in the future, Zara could shorten the cycles even more.

Personalization: Collecting data and segmenting the customer base after analyzing the data is becoming easier than ever before thanks to AI. This allows for providing personalized suggestions to customers. Zara should capitalize on this technology.

Eco-Friendliness: According to the Sourcing General, more than 1/3rd of Millennials and Gen Z look for "sustainable" and "environment friendly" labels on clothes. Together, the two groups account for 50% of the population. So, Zara must listen and respond to this growing need.

Resale: The re-sale market, currently valued at $28 billion today, is predicted to grow to $64 billion in 5 years. Integrating a re-sale strategy to their current platform would allow customers to purchase more with less wastage. This encourages consumerism while supporting sustainability.

Influencer Marketing: Unbox Social says influencer marketing is the most effective strategy for promoting lifestyle brands. Zara's success with the #DearSouthAfrica campaign involving 60 micro-influencers engaged 8 million people. This should be a model for the future.

What is the biggest threat to Zara?

Zara's biggest competition in the traditional sense would be H&M. However, in the online space, Zara faces competition from multiple businesses. But competition is just one of the threats to Zara.

Competition: China's fast-fashion giant, Shein, is the world's biggest fashion retailer with a purely online presence. During September, the Shein app saw 10.3 million downloads. Zara, with only 2 million downloads in the same period, must watch out for its rivals in the digital arena.

Price War: Fast-fashion, Zara's primary niche, brings the latest trends from the ramp to the customers quickly and at low costs. However, the industry is vulnerable to imitators waging price wars to leech off from Zara's line.

COVID-19: In the first quarter of 2020, Inditex reported a 44% drop in sales. Inditex's report states the closure of 88% of its stores because of the Coronavirus lead as the central reason for the drop in sales.

Government Regulations: Inditex has 13 factories in Spain. Due to the Spanish government's lockdown measures, only 3 of the 13 factories operated in the early months of the pandemic. With Europe heading towards a second wave, the company can expect similar measures.

Sustainability: The use-and-throw attitude people had towards fashion is changing. People are conscious of the impact of fashion on the environment and people. Thus, Zara would have to push towards making fast-fashion a sustainable business - economically and ecologically.

Zara SWOT Analysis: Conclusion

Recovering from the COVID-19 crisis and strengthening online presence is Zara's current priority. Inditex's financials show signs of recovery and the management is optimistic about boosting online sales. So, we could say Zara has things under control for now. But what about external factors?

Well, the pandemic has accelerated the growth of online shopping. In the immediate future, Zara must consolidate its footing in the digital and physical space. Zara has got many things right in its rise to the top of fashion retail. The question is - can Zara do the same online?

From this SWOT analysis for Zara, we hope you have seen how creativity and commitment to customers strengthen a brand in adversities. Here's the takeaway - get in touch with your audience, build a strong relationship with them, and give them what they want.

SWOT analysis is the best way to learn from the successes of the business world. We've put together many of them. Look at our SWOT analysis library for more. In case you would like to learn what is a SWOT analysis, read our guide on how to do a SWOT analysis. You can also use SWOT analysis examples and our SWOT analysis template to get the hang of it.
Images via DepositPhotos

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What makes Zara such a popular brand? Οur Zara SWOT analysis helps you learn why by taking a look at Zara's major strengths, weaknesses and threats.

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Again, this helped me in conducting my PEST by understanding further what Current issues may impact Zara.

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Zara is one of the hottest fast fashion brands in the world. Born out of Spain and now with more than ten thousand stores around the globe, the story of Zara is an exciting one. The question is, is this decades-old brand here to stay?

In this PESTLE analysis, we review Zara's current market standings through Political, Economic, Sociocultural, Technological, Legal, and Environmental lenses. As you'll see in a second, Zara's future certainly isn't too bad...

Political

Here are the Political factors impacting Zara:

European Trade Agreements

Zara is a Spanish brand, so it enjoys all of the benefits of operating a business out of the European Union. In a political context, one of the biggest pros of running a company in the EU is the country's extensive trade agreements. Not only does this make it incredibly easy to import raw materials and export finished products within the European Union, but it also means that Zara can send its merchandise across the world with little effort and for a low cost. Overall, the EU's free-trade policies are massively beneficial for Zara; let's just hope the Union continues to thrive!

Economic

Here are the Economic factors impacting Zara:

Low Cost of Labor

As mentioned previously, Zara is a Spanish brand. Since Spain has one of the highest unemployment rates within Europe, this means that it has a relatively low cost of labor - especially in comparison to other Western European countries, such as France, Germany, and the United Kingdom. Zara manufactures a good fraction of its products in Spain, so this low labor cost allows them to minimize costs and, in doing so, improve profitability. Again, the low cost of labor in Spain is definitely a positive for this brand!

Relative Affordability

Zara is a well-recognized brand, so those less familiar with its products might think they're quite expensive. On the contrary, Zara is considered a relatively affordable brand in comparison to other European highstreet fashion names. This allows the company to thrive even in poorer countries; for example, despite Spain's slow economy, Zara is still one of the most popular clothing brands in the country. Indeed, Zara has some more expensive products, but what's most important is that it can cater to the majority of shoppers with the rest of its clothing lineup.

Sociocultural

Here are the Sociocultural factors impacting Zara:

Fashionable Brand

Despite its affordability, Zara is a fashionable name for most shoppers. This is where you can only praise the company for its hard work. Zara delivers a good-quality product for not a lot of money. And thanks to the brand's clever marketing efforts, it feels rather exclusive for buyers. Overall, this strong, positive brand presence allows Zara to collect healthy profit margins for its shareholders, while buyers still feel like they're getting a great deal.

Online Shopping Trend

There's no doubt that online shopping is a major trend in the 21st century. Although clothes shopping might not be the best fit for the web, consumers now want to order their garments with the tap of a button, and from the comfort of their own homes. This isn't necessarily a bad thing for Zara, since they already have a popular webshop. However, Zara will have to pay close attention to the performance of its online store, since consumer's preferred channels are definitely changing.

Technological

Here are the Technological factors impacting Zara:

Use of Big Data

Zara is one of many brands looking to use technology to expand its reach. As one of the world's most popular fashion retailers, the company has both the money and the audience needed to get the most out of data. As a result, Zara is looking to big data - the study of analyzing huge data sets - to find better ways to reach and appeal to consumers. With both online and in-person customer touchpoints, this isn't a straightforward task. But if Zara can pull off some successful data analysis, you bet they'll be able to propel their powerful business even further.

Legal

Here are the Legal factors impacting Zara:

Copyright Issues

Like all of us, Zara has to operate within the bounds of the law. For all fashion brands, copyright law is one of the scariest legal branches out there. Since Zara loves capturing hot clothing trends and making them more affordable, it's bound to run into some issues with copyright. In fact, the major retailer already has. It's been accused of stealing designs and clothing concepts from the likes of Adidas and Balenciaga. In past cases, Zara has largely been able to weave itself out of uncomfortable legal situations like these, but who knows if the behemoth brand will continue to have such good luck.

Environmental

Here are the Environmental factors impacting Zara:

Fast Fashion Impact

The world of fast fashion is often associated with wastefulness. Many fast fashion products simply aren't designed to last; instead, they're supposed to be affordable garments that look good in the changing rooms. What's more, fast fashion is said to encourage shoppers to quickly jump on trends, throwing away clothing just to stay with whatever is hot. Some might classify Zara as a fast fashion brand, so they might be accused of this wastefulness. With shoppers becoming more and more eco-conscious, this could have a negative effect on the brand if it doesn't begin to take sustainability more seriously.

Sustainability Pledge

To show its concern for Environmental matters, Zara's parent brand Inditex has openly published a sustainability pledge. On its website, the brand shares its "commitment" to water, climate change and energy, biodiversity, sustainable materials, animal welfare, and other environmental and ethical issues in depth. If Zara can adhere to these guidelines, we can assume it will continue to thrive even under scrutinous eyes.

PESTLE analysis of Zara: Final Thoughts

Zara is a big brand for a reason: it creates luxury-feeling fashion products at an affordable price. With lower labor costs ensuring a solid margin for shareholders, the company's core business model is solid. There are concerns about Legal and Environmental issues, but Zara should be more than mature enough to handle them!

Image by Markus Spiske

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Zara is one of the hottest fast fashion brands in the world. Born out of Spain and now with more than ten thousand stores around the globe, the story of Zara is an exciting one. The question is, is this decades-old brand here to stay?

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This article helped me understand more about how Zara are using AI and how that is helping them as a brand. It made me realise the importance of AI in retail industry and has me more aware of how it will aid retail in the future.

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Created in 1975, the famous fast-fashion company has proven the reliability of its widely acclaimed business model, built on technology innovation and customer experience. Using little to no advertising, Zara acheived a $254 million second-quarter profit in 2020.

However, the brand has recently faced three main challenges: e-commerce, competition and sustainability.

To sustain its global expansion, the brand made a step toward digital expansion even before the pandemic hit, and it paid off. So far in 2020, Zara reports a 74% jump in online sales alone. Executive chairman of the brand Pablo Isla said the growth in online sales demonstrated the importance of the company's "integrated store and online" strategy, which was the "cornerstone" of the business. Despite this, sustainability concerns are rising among consumers as the eco-movement gains momentum, and Zara is known for its fast-fashion approach.

Thankfully, Zara can count on artificial intelligence to make a difference by better forecasting trends of best-selling products to boost its e-commerce sales.

Zara FW20 by Steven Meisel

A digital transition: Sign of the times

The Zara business model is a good example of the high stakes of a digital transformation for a brick-and mortar retailer. Pablo Isla has said that by 2020 all the Inditex brands will be online, and while physical stores still drew in profits this year, the pandemic made it apparent how vital online stores have become.

During the height of the pandemic this year, Zara was forced to close 1200 stores globally. But upon reopening, from May to July, the brand succeeded in reopening 98% of its stores. Amancio Ortega considers 2020's third quarter to be a "a progressive return to normality."

As for e-commerce, Zara saw a 74% jump in online sales this year, as they upped their digital communications and retrofitted their supply chains to accomodate shipments over in-store inventory. They even adapted their collections to fit "quarantine trends," including styles such as wide trousers, jumpers, and house slippers.

If not for Zara's digital reactivity, the brand would not have such a success online this year. This proves how vital digitalization and awareness of the times became throughout 2020.

Predicting the threat of the rise of ultra-fast fashion

Accounting for 14% of net sales, e-commerce remains a small portion of Zara's business. It pales in comparison to its online native competitors like Boohoo and Fashion Nova. These digital pureplay retailers deliver designs faster than Zara thanks to marketing tools. Moreover, because they exclusively launch celebrity-led collections, they master influence marketing better. Fashion Nova, for instance, has mastered influencer collaborations, with their May 2019 collection with Cardi B reportedly bringing in a whopping $1million just after launch. With these new entrants, time-to-market has shrunk while variety has ballooned.

Freed from physical store loans and benefiting from more efficient supply chains, new fast fashion competitors have large stock inventories and more agile capabilities.

With this in mind, Zara aims to get over a quarter of its sales through online channels by 2022. This follows the results of the 44% drop in their first-quarter sales, which were mitigated by online growth. .

The necessity to transform into a sustainable model fuelled by trend forecasting

Due to a disruptive time-to-market, quick response policy and just-in-time manufacturing, Zara applies a lot of pressure on its end-to-end supply chain. There is growing evidence that clients, concerned with sustainability issues, are beginning to wonder whether they should make fast-fashion purchases. To answer these concerns, Zara has developed its own sustainable line under the #joinlife label. Contrary to H&M's conscious collection, the initiative was discreetly implemented.

AI can improve customer-centric strategies to help boost e-commerce and be more sustainable

If Zara has succeeded in mastering its physical fast-fashion production chain, it is running late on digital. AI-powered trend forecasting is the way forward.

Zara has already multiplied technology-powered initiatives. In 2018, the fast fashion powerhouse teamed up with Jetlore, an AI-powered consumer behavior prediction platform, and Spanish big data company, El Arte de Medirn. Furthermore, it partnered with Intel and Fetch Robotics to measure clothing volume in boxes and improve stock inventory. Finally, to secure its product inventory and improve its traceability all along the supply chain, Zara implemented micro-chips from Tyco.

Since then, the brand continues to use these features in 2020. Earlier this year, they even added AI-powered robotics to automate order pick-up and reduce customer wait times.

Zara e-commerce site

Developing e-commerce to fight competition

In launching e-commerce platforms to boost its online sales it will take time for its visual merchandising teams to manage product features. Finding relevant mix and match styles to build silhouettes in line with real consumers habits can be really time-consuming.

Artificial intelligence can enable Zara to improve its trend radar to maintain a distance from its competitors and ultra-fast fashion's new entrants.

The cutting-edge technology can spot and predict the most popular product and brand associations, most attractive styles, colors and textures to provide guidance for online merchandising photoshoots and other lookbooks.

Most of all, through its analysis of 3 million images each day on social media, Heuritech offers a powerful market intelligence tool capable of identifying the best influencer styles and forecasting the latest upcoming trends.

From just-in-time production to forecasting demand and trends: how Zara can become more sustainable

The Zara case study shows the difficulty for a fashion retail leader in changing its image when faced with a rampant consumerism shift towards more sustainable brands.

The speedy logistics champion now wants to be seen as a "responsible fashion" player.

Artificial intelligence can help solve the "just-in-time" manufacturing loophole, by improving demand forecasting . The company focuses on responding to current fashion needs rather than forecasting fashion trends for a distant future: 85% of its production is done during the current season. By doing so, Zara can avoid overproduction, an issue its rival H&M also faces, and become more sustainable. Identifying client needs months in advance and suggesting specific product designs will enable the retailer to launch products that customers really want.

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How can Zara maintain its leadership thanks to AI?

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Created in 1975, the famous fast-fashion company has proven the reliability of its widely acclaimed business model, built on technology innovation and customer experience. Using little to no advertising, Zara acheived a $254 million second-quarter profit in 2020. However, the brand has recently faced three main challenges: e-commerce, competition and sustainability.

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The Secret of Zara’s Success: A Culture of Customer Co-creation

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The Secret of Zara’s Success: A Culture of Customer Co-creation

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This article was really useful in getting an indepth view on Zara as a brand, how their marketing strategies have impacted their success & its history. I really enjoyed this article as it was very broad and covered a lot of topics which I found very interesting.

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Zara is one of the world's most successful fashion retail brands - if not the most successful one. With its dramatic introduction of the concept of "fast fashion" retail since it was founded in 1975 in Spain, Zara aspires to create responsible passion for fashion amongst a broad spectrum of consumers, spread across different cultures and age groups. There are many factors that have contributed to the success of Zara but one of its key strengths, which has played a strong role in it becoming a global fashion powerhouse as it is today, is its ability to put customers first. Zara is obsessed with its customers, and they have defined the company and the brand's culture right from the very beginning.

The Zara brand offers men and women's clothing, children's clothing (Zara Kids), shoes and accessories. The sub-brand Zara TRF offers trendier and sometimes edgier items to younger women and teenagers.

The Zara brand story

Zara was founded by Amancio Ortega and Rosalía Mera in 1975 as a family business in downtown Galicia in the northern part of Spain. Its first store featured low-priced lookalike products of popular, higher-end clothing and fashion. Amancio Ortega named Zara as such because his preferred name Zorba was already taken. In the next 8 years, Zara's approach towards fashion and its business model gradually generated traction with the Spanish consumer. This led to the opening of 9 new stores in the biggest cities of Spain.

In 1985, Inditex was incorporated as a holding company, which laid the foundations for a distribution system capable of reacting to shifting market trends extremely quickly. Ortega created a new design, manufacturing, and distribution process that could reduce lead times and react to new trends in a quicker way, which he called "instant fashion". This was driven by heavy investments in information technology and utilising groups instead of individual designers for the critical "design" element.

In the next decade, Zara began aggressively expanding into global markets, which included Portugal, New York (USA), Paris (France), Mexico, Greece, Belgium, Sweden, Malta, Cyprus, Norway and Israel. Today, there is hardly a developed country without a Zara store. Zara now has 2,264 stores strategically located in leading cities across 96 countries. It is no surprise that Zara, which started off as a small store in Spain, is now the world's largest fast fashion retailer and is the flagship brand of Inditex. Its founder, Amancio Ortega, is the sixth richest man in the world according to Forbes magazine.

Today, Inditex is the world's largest fashion group with more than 174,000 employees operating more than 7,400 stores in 202 markets worldwide including 49 online markets. The revenues of Inditex was USD 23.4 billion in 2019. The other fashion brands in the Inditex portfolio are:

Zara Home: Home goods and decoration objects founded in 2003. Operating in 183 markets, 70 of them with stores.

Pull & Bear: Casual laid-back clothing and accessories for the young founded in 1991. Operates in 185 markets, 75 of them with stores.

Massimo Dutti: High end clothing and accessories for cosmopolitan men and women acquired in 1995. Operates 186 markets, 74 of them with stores.

Bershka: Blends urban styles and modern fashion for young women and men founded in 1998. Operates in 185 markets, 74 of them with stores.

Stradivarius: Casual and feminine clothes for young women acquired in 1999. Operates 180 markets, 67 of them with stores.

Oysho: Lingerie, casual outerwear, lounge wear and original accessories founded in 2001. Operating in 176 markets, 58 of them with stores.

Uterqüe: High-quality fashion accessories at attractive prices founded in 2008. Operating in 158 markets, 17 of them with stores.

Apart from fashion brands, Amancio Ortega has also set up a global real estate investment fund, Pontegadea Inversiones, which manages corporate offices across 9 countries including United States (Seattle), Britain (London), France (Paris), Canada, Italy, South Korea. These corporate properties house large companies including Facebook, Amazon and Apple, and prestigious luxury and retail brands.

The Zara brand strategy

In 2019, Zara was ranked 29th on global brand consultancy Interbrand's list of best global brands. Its core values are found in four simple terms: beauty, clarity, functionality and sustainability.

The secret to Zara's success has largely being driven by its ability to keep up with rapidly changing fashion trends and showcase it in its collections with very little delay. From the very beginning, Zara found a significant gap in the market that few clothing brands had effectively addressed. This was to keep pace with latest fashion trends, but offer clothing collections that are a combination of high quality and yet, are affordable. The brand keeps a close watch on how fashion is changing and evolving every day across the world. Based on latest styles and trends, it creates new designs and puts them into stores in a week or two. In stark comparison, most other fashion brands would take close to six months to get new designs and collections into the market.

It is through this strategic ability of introducing new collections based on latest trends in a rapid manner that enabled Zara to beat other competitors. It quickly became the people's favourite brand, especially with those who want to keep up with fashion trends. Founder Amancio Ortega is famously known for his views on clothes as a perishable commodity. According to him, people should love to use and wear clothes for a short while and then they should throw them away, just like yogurt, bread or fish, rather than store them in cupboards.

The media often quotes that the brand produces "freshly baked clothes", which survive fashion trends for less than a month or two. Zara concentrates on three areas to effectively "bake" its fresh fashions:

Shorter lead times (and more fashionable clothes): Shorter lead times allow Zara to ensure that its stores stock clothes that customers want at that time (e.g. specific spring/ summer or autumn/ winter collections, recent trend that is catching up, sudden popularity of an item worn by a celebrity/ socialite/ actor/ actress, latest collection of a top designer etc.). While many retailers try to forecast what customers might buy months in the future, Zara moves in step with its customers and offers them what they want to buy at a given point in time.

Lower quantities (through scarce supply): By reducing the quantity manufactured for a particular style, Zara not only reduces its exposure to any single product but also creates artificial scarcity. Similar to the principle that applies to all fashion items (and more specifically luxury), the lesser the availability, the more desirable an object becomes. Another benefit of producing lower quantities is that if a style does not generate traction and suffers from poor sales, there is not a high volume to be disposed of. Zara only has two time-bound sales a year rather than constant markdowns, and it discounts a very small proportion of its products, approximately half compared to its competitors, which is a very impressive feat.

More styles: Rather than producing more quantities per style, Zara produces more styles, roughly 12,000 a year. Even if a style sells out very quickly, there are new styles waiting to take up the space. This means more choices and higher chance of getting it right with the consumer.

Zara only allows its designs to remain on the shop floor for three to four weeks. This practice pushes consumers to keep visiting the brand's stores because if they were just a week late, all the clothes of a particular style or trend would be gone and replaced with a new trend. At the same time, this constant refreshing of the lines and styles carried by its stores also entices customers to visit its shops more frequently.

In the following sections, the key components of Zara's winning formula in the fashion retailing industry are illustrated.

Customer co-creation: Zara's principal designer is the customer

Zara's unrelenting focus on the customer is at the core of the brand's success and the heights it has achieved today. There was a fascinating story around how Zara co-creates its products leveraging its customers' input. In 2015, a lady named Miko walked into a Zara store in Tokyo and asked the store assistant for a pink scarf, but the store did not have any pink scarves. The same happened almost simultaneously for Michelle in Toronto, Elaine in San Francisco, and Giselle in Frankfurt, who all walked into Zara stores and asked for pink scarves. They all left the stores without any scarves - an experience many other Zara fans encountered globally in different Zara stores over the next few days.

7 days later, more than 2,000 Zara stores globally started selling pink scarves. 500,000 pink scarves were dispatched - to be exact. They sold out in 3 days. How did such lightning fast stocking of pink scarves happen?

Customer insights are the holy grail of modern business, and the more companies know about their customers, the better they can innovate and compete. But it can prove challenging to have the right insights, at the right time, and have access to them consistently over time. One of the secrets to Zara's success includes using Radio Frequency Identification Technology (RFID) in its stores. The brand uses cutting-edge systems to track the location of garments instantly and makes those most in demand rapidly available to customers. Additionally, it helps to reduce inventory costs, provides greater flexibility to launch new designs, and allows fulfillment of online orders with stock from stores nearest to the delivery location thereby reducing delivery costs.

Another secret of Zara's success is that the brand trains and empowers its store employees and managers to be particularly sensitive to customer needs and wants, and how customers enact them on the shop floors. Zara empowers its sales associates and store managers to be at the forefront of customer research - they intently listen and note down customer comments, ideas for cuts, fabrics or a new line, and keenly observe new styles that its customers are wearing that have the potential to be converted into unique Zara styles. In comparison, traditional daily sales reports can hardly provide such a dynamic updated picture of the market. The Zara empire is built on two basic rules: "to give customers what they want", and "get it to them faster than anyone else".

Due to Zara's competitive customer research capabilities, its product offerings across its stores globally reflect unique customer needs and wants in terms of physical, climate or cultural differences. It offers smaller sizes in Japan, special women's clothes in Arab countries, and clothes of different seasonality in South America. These differences in product offerings across countries are greatly facilitated by the frequent interactions between Zara's local store managers and its creative team.

In the fashion world, a trend starts small, but develops fast. Zara employees are trained to listen, watch and be attentive to even the smallest seismographic signals from their customers, which can be an initial sign that a new trend is taking shape. Zara knows that the quicker it can respond, the more likely it is to succeed in supplying the right fashion merchandise at the right time across its global retail chain. Zara has set up sophisticated technology driven systems, which enable information to travel quickly from the stores back to its headquarters in Arteixo in Spain, enabling decision makers to act fast and respond effectively to a developing trend. Its design teams regularly visit university campuses; nightclubs and other venues to observe what young fashion leaders are wearing. In its headquarters, the design team uses flat-screen monitors linked by webcam to offices in Shanghai, Tokyo and New York (the leading cities for fashion trends), which act as trend spotters. The 'Trends' team never goes to fashion shows but tracks bloggers and listens closely to the brand's customers.

The fact that Zara's designers and customers are inextricably linked is a crucial part of the brand strategy. Specialist teams receive constant feedback on the decisions its customers are making at every Zara store, which continuously inspires the Zara creative team.

Zara's super-efficient supply chain

Zara's highly responsive, vertically integrated supply chain enables the export of garments 24 hours, 365 days of the year, resulting in the shipping of new products to stores twice a week. After products are designed, they take around 10 to 15 days to reach the stores. All clothing items are processed through the distribution center in Spain, where new items are inspected, sorted, tagged, and loaded into trucks. In most cases, clothing items are delivered to stores within 48 hours. This vertical integration allows Zara to retain control over areas like dyeing and processing and have fabric-processing capacity available on-demand to provide the correct fabrics for new styles according to customer preferences. It also eliminates the need for warehouses and helps reduce the impact of demand fluctuations. Zara produces over 450 million items and launches around 12,000 new designs annually, so the efficiency of the supply chain is critical to ensure that this constant refreshment of store level collections goes off smoothly and efficiently.

Here are some of the characteristics of Zara's supply chain that highlight the reasons behind its success:

Frequency of customer insights collection: Trend information flows daily into a database at head office, which is used by designers to create new lines and modify existing ones.

Standardization of product information: Zara warehouses have standardised product information with common definitions, allowing quick and accurate preparation of designs with clear manufacturing instructions.

Product information and inventory management: By effectively managing thousands of fabric, trim and design specifications and their physical inventory, Zara is capable of designing a garment with available stock of required raw materials.

Procurement strategy: Around two-thirds of fabrics are undyed and are purchased before designs are finalized so as to obtain savings through demand aggregation.

Manufacturing approach: Zara uses a "make and buy" approach - it produces the more fashionable and riskier items (which need testing and piloting) in Spain, and outsources production of more standard designs with more predictable demand to Morocco, Turkey and Asia to reduce production cost. The more fashionable and riskier items (which are around half of its merchandise) are manufactured at a dozen company-owned factories in Spain (Galicia), northern Portugal and Turkey. Clothes with longer shelf life (i.e. the one with more predictable demand patterns), such as basic T-shirts, are outsourced to low cost suppliers, mainly in Asia. Even when manufacturing in Europe, Zara manages to keep its costs down by outsourcing the assembly workshops and leveraging the informal economy of mothers and grandmothers.

Distribution management: Zara's state-of-the-art distribution facility functions with minimal human intervention. Optical reading devices sort out and distribute more than 60,000 items of clothing an hour.

In addition to these supply chain efficiencies, Zara can also modify existing items in as little as two weeks. Shortening the product life cycle means greater success in meeting consumer preferences. If a design does not sell well within a week, it is withdrawn from shops, further orders are canceled and a new design is pursued. Zara closely monitors changes in customer preferences towards fashion. It has a range of basic designs that are carried over from year to year, but some in-vogue, high fashion, inspired by latest trends items can stay on the shelves for less than four weeks, which encourages Zara fans to make repeat visits. An average high-street store in Spain expects customers to visit thrice a year, but for Zara, the expectation is that customers should visit around 17 times in a year.

This expectation for such a high frequency of repeat visits is evidence of Zara's confidence that it is keeping on top of changing consumer needs and preferences and is helping them shape their ideas, opinions and taste for fashion. In reality, Zara is also helping in giving birth to new trends through its stores or even helping in extending the longevity of some seasonal styles by offering affordable lines.

Sustainability at the core of Zara's operations

Sustainability has been a hot topic in business for the last decade and is now quickly becoming a must-have hygiene factor for companies that want to resonate with and win the loyalty of its global customers. For Inditex, this means having a commitment to people and the environment.

Commitment to people: Inditex ensures that its employees have a shared vision of value built on sustainability through professional development, equality and diversity and volunteering. It also ensures that its suppliers have fundamental rights at work and by initiating continuous improvement programs for them. Inditex also spends over USD 50 million annually on social and community programmes and initiatives. For example, its "for&from" programme which started in 2002 has enabled the social integration of people with physical and mental disabilities, by providing over 200 stable employment opportunities across 15 stores.

Commitment to environment: Being in a business where it taps on natural resources to create its products, Inditex makes efforts to ensure that the environmental impact of its business complies with UNSDGs (United Nations Sustainable Developmental Goals). Inditex has pledged to only sell sustainable clothes by 2025 and that all cotton, linen and polyester sold will be organic, sustainable or recycled. The company also runs Join Life, a scheme which helps consumers identify clothes made with more environmentally friendly materials like organic cotton and recycled polyester.

Additionally, Inditex takes wide-ranging measures to protect biodiversity, reduce its consumption of water, energy and other resources, avoid waste, and combat climate change. For example, it has outlined a Global Water Management Strategy, specifically committing to zero discharge of hazardous chemicals. It has also been expanding its waste reduction programme through which customers can drop off their used clothing, footwear and accessories at collection points in 2,299 stores in 46 markets today.

Zara's culture: The word "impossible" does not exist

Zara has a very entrepreneurial culture, and employs lots of young talent who quickly climb through the ranks of the company. Zara promotes approximately two-thirds of its store managers from within and generally experiences low turnover. The brand has no fear in giving responsibility to young people and the culture encourages risk-taking (as long as learning happens) and fast implementation (the mantra of fashion).

Top management gives its store managers full liberty and control over their store's operations and performance with clearly set cost, profit and growth targets with a fixed and variable compensation scheme. The variable component amounts to up to half of the total compensation - making store level employees heavily incentive-driven.

In addition, once an employee is selected for promotion, his or her store develops a comprehensive training program for that individual with the human resources department, which is followed up by periodic supplemental training - reflecting Zara's commitment to talent development. The organizational structure is also flat with only a few managerial layers.

Customers are the most important source of information for Zara, but like any other fashion brand, Zara also employs trend analysts, customer insights experts, and retains some of the best talents in the fashion world. The creative team of Zara comprises of over 200 professionals. They all embody and enact the corporate philosophy that the word "impossible" does not exist in Zara.

For example, while many companies struggle with long lead times in discussions and decision making, Zara gets around this challenge by getting various business functions to sit together at the headquarters and also by encouraging a culture (through structures and processes) where people continuously talk to each other. The sales and marketing teams who receive trend feedback talk regularly with designers and merchandisers. It is important that there is constant two-way communication so that sales and marketing teams can talk about new lines to customers and designers / merchandisers have a strong visibility of customers' needs and preferences enacted at a store level. The production scheduling is also closely coordinated so that there is no time wasted on approvals. The design team structure is very flat and focuses on careful interpretation of catwalk trends that are suitable for the mass market - the Zara customer. The design and product development teams, who are based in Spain, work closely to produce 1,000 new styles every month.

Besides being customer centric, another important reason why Zara's employee strategy is so successful is the fact that it empowers its staff to make decisions based on data. Zara has no chief designer. All its designers are given unparalleled independence in approving products and campaigns, based on daily data feeds indicating which styles are popular.

Due to the unwavering focus on the customer, the entire business model is designed in such a way that the pattern of needs for the finished goods dictate the terms of the production process to follow, instead of having the raw materials determine the nature of the production process - something that is very rare in multinational companies of similar scale.

In sum, the entire brand culture is extremely customer-centric, which has been and continues to be a significant contributor to Zara's success.

The Zara brand communication strategy

Zara has used almost a zero advertising and endorsement policy throughout its entire existence, preferring to invest a percentage of its revenues in opening new stores instead. It spends a meager 0.3 per cent of sales on advertising compared to an average of 3.5 per cent by competitors. The brand's founder Amancio has never spoken to the media nor has in any way advertised Zara. This is indeed the mark of a truly successful brand where customers appreciate and desire the brand, which is over and above product level benefits but strongly driven by the brand experience.

Instead of advertising, Zara uses its store location and store displays as key elements of its marketing strategy. By choosing to be in the most prominent locations in a city, Zara ensures very high customer traffic for its stores. Its window displays, which showcase the most outstanding pieces in the collection, are also a powerful communication tool designed by a specialized team. A lot of time and effort is spent designing the window displays to be artistic and attention grabbing. According to Zara's philosophy of fast fashion, the window displays are constantly changed. This strategy goes down to how the employees dress as well - all Zara employees are required to wear Zara clothes while working in the stores, but these "uniforms" vary across different Zara stores to reflect socio-economic differences in the regions they were located. This effectively communicates Zara's focus on the mass market, yet another detail that reflects its close attention on the customer.

To tap into the emerging e-commerce trend, Zara launched its online boutique in September 2010. The website was initially available in Spain, the UK, Portugal, Italy, Germany and France, and was extended to Austria, Ireland, the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg. Over the next 3 years, the online store became available in the United States, Russia, Canada, Mexico, Romania, and South Korea. In 2017, Zara's online store launched in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam and India. More recently in March 2018, the brand launched online in Australia and New Zealand. Today, its online store is available in 66 countries. As of 2019, online sales grew to constitute 14% of Zara's total global sales.

As a fast fashion retailer, Zara is definitely aware of the power of e-commerce and has built up a successful online presence and high-quality customer experience.

Zara's future brand and business challenges

Charting a new digital strategy in the COVID-19 crisis: With its primarily offline shopping experience, Zara has been hard hit by global store closures amid the COVID-19 crisis in 2020, with sales falling 44% year-on-year in Q1 2020 and the company reporting a net loss of USD 482 million. Inditex has announced that it will be closing between 1,000 to 1,200 stores worldwide, focusing on smaller ones in Asia and Europe. While online sales have been encouraging - Zara's online sales for Q1 2020 grew 50% - it is not enough to mitigate the damage.

Amancio Ortega plans to spend USD 1.1 billion scaling up its digital strategy and online capabilities by 2022 and a further USD 2 billion in stores to improve integration between online and offline for faster deliveries and real-time tracking of products. Its goal is for online sales to constitute at least 25% of total sales. To achieve this goal, Zara will need to think of new ways to engage its customers digitally, not just through its online store, but through online communities and social media.

Mobile commerce: Zara woke up late to the potential of mobile commerce and needs to catch up fast with competitors. Different forms of market analysis strongly point towards a scenario wherein spends on mobile commerce will overtake desktop based ecommerce by 2021. On an average, most brands currently get about 15-20% of their website traffic via mobile devices and this is growing rapidly. With the deluge of investments planned in the mobile commerce space and Zara's competitors already having an advantage on the mobile front, Zara needs to quickly make mobile shopping not only an effortless experience but also a delightful one.

Price is not an advantage anymore: Offering the latest fashion lines at affordable prices continues to be a strategic advantage for Zara, but cannot continue to be the only one. Across the world, and closer to home in Europe, competitors are cutting prices and refining their business models to cut the competitive advantage that Zara has. Swedish fast fashion retailer H&M, which is placed #30 just behind Zara on Interbrand's list, launched an online store in Spain in 2014 to take own Zara in its home turf. Again in its home market, it now faces increasing competition from brands like Mango, which cut prices and started focusing on fashion segments in which Zara enjoyed popularity. In addition to H&M and Mango, other competitors like Gap and Topshop are all fighting for a share of the fast fashion retail market pie. Also with the rise of e- and m-commerce, the number of indirect competitors has mushroomed. We now have online fashion aggregators that bring in multiple brands under one single online platform and cut through borders and price segments. Some examples of such aggregators who are doing well include Lyst, Farfetch, Spring and Yoox Net-a-Porter.

For Zara to effectively compete and maintain its strategic advantage, the focus needs to shift away from price but towards quality. Even today the Zara brand enjoys high levels of appeal, which is evident by the serpentine queues outside its stores when it launches in new markets. There is a need for Zara to start investing in building a strong brand positioning and aggressively communicate it. Additionally, Zara needs to adopt, imbibe and leverage social media and digital platforms in its advertising and communication strategies deeper going forward.

Need for marketing strategy to evolve: As discussed above, Zara does not engage in advertising and instead uses its store locations as a marketing strategy. However, brand communication is crucial in attracting new customers to the brand to support its growth. Without advertisements, Zara relies heavily on word of mouth or social media. This causes the perception of potential customers towards Zara to be heavily shaped by family and friends, which may not be accurate. In addition, Zara's social media platforms such as Facebook and YouTube exists merely as a feed for updates rather than a platform that consumers can interact with. Its videos on YouTube are also seeing very low viewership in comparison with its follower count, which is not ideal as videos are a powerful medium for brands in the fashion industry. This is a gap that Zara needs to plug immediately as the reach and impact of social media marketing gets stronger. As Zara's target customer segments start using more social and digital platforms for communication and for sharing their lives, it is important for Zara to have a strong presence on such platforms.

Family business planning and succession: With various technological and business disruptions in the past decade, leadership in the 21st century will be influenced by constant change, geopolitical volatility, and economic and political uncertainty. For Zara's first 36 years in business, the brand has been controlled by its founder Amancio Ortega, who is currently 85 years old. In 2011, Ortega passed the chairman title on to Pablo Isla, Zara's Deputy CEO since 2005.

Succession is currently taking place at Inditex and generational transfer will empower the next generation in one of the wealthiest business families in the world. Pablo Isla, chairman of Inditex since 2011, steps down in April 2022, and 37-year-old Marta Ortega will take over as chair in the company that her father Amancio Ortega started with his ex-wife Rosalia in 1975 in Galicia, Spain. Marta Ortega is the youngest of Amancio Ortega's three children.

Marta Ortega will become a non-executive chair, and will head the Inditex group, the portfolio of companies including supervision of strategic operations. She has been with Inditex for over 15 years, starting out working in a Zara store at King's Road in London, and as an assistant at the portfolio brand Bershka. In recent years, Marta Ortega has been involved in strategy, brand building and fashion proposals for the Inditex portfolio of brands.

Marta Ortega will not be involved in daily management of the financial performance to shield her and the family from too much public exposure. Amancio Ortega has always been known for appearing less in public and avoiding any media exposure. His photo did not appear in the Inditex annual report until 2000. Marta Ortega seems to be more open to media interviews and public appearance, and granted her first interview with Wall Street Journal in August 2021.

Óscar García Maceiras will be appointed CEO of Inditex in April 2022 and will run the daily business. He joined Inditex in March 2021 and is currently general secretary of Inditex and secretary of the board.

The sharing of executive powers between the chair and the CEO to enhance corporate governance has historically been less common in the corporate world in Spain but is often seen in Europe and elsewhere. Inditex will therefore return to dual leadership in April 2022 with Marta Ortega as chair and García Maceiras as CEO, the very same structure that ran for six years with Amancio Ortega as chairman and Pablo Isla as CEO until 2011.

Despite working at Inditex for over 15 years, Marta Ortega Pérez does not hold an office. Her father, Amancio Ortega, never had an office either and always preferred to work in an open space in the fashion design department to be close to teams around him.

To effectively manage the above changes, Zara's next generation leadership needs to step up to the succession planning challenge by being resilient in staying true to the brand promise to consistently produce "freshly baked clothes" for its fashion-forward consumers, and by balancing both short-term (profitability) and long-term goals (growing the business and reaching more consumers).

More importantly, despite Zara's global reach and consequent product standardization, it needs to constantly find new ways to serve local fashion needs and preferences of its consumers across the globe. This will be a challenge for the brand's leadership in the next decade.

Conclusion: Take Zara's cue and listen to your customers

The Zara brand was born with a keen eye on its customer - its ability to understand, predict and deliver on its customers' preferences for trendy fashion at affordable prices. In addition to its effective supply chain, the brand's ability to have its customers co-create designs is unique and provides it with a competitive advantage. Most fashion trends often start unexpectedly, originate from uncommon places and grow out of nowhere. With reference to the pink scarf trend mentioned above, it could have been that Hollywood actress Scarlett Johansson had worn a pink scarf to a charity gala the evening before in Los Angeles, or golf star Michelle Wie had showcased a pink scarf at a celebrity tournament in Asia. The fact that Zara was able to quickly jump on to this trend and provide hundreds of customers with the pink scarves they desperately wanted to buy.

In a world swamped with Big Data, and yet more collected at an even more rapid pace than before, brands still need to be careful and observant. Big Data does not provide answers to all business challenges, and it may be too hyped to be considered as the Holy Grail.

One of the secrets behind Zara's global success is the culture and the respect for the fact that no one is a better, authentic trendsetter than the customer himself or herself - and this philosophy needs to be continually reflected in all its business strategies going forward.

So, why not consult your customers for a start? Zara always does.
Follow Martin Roll on LinkedIn >>
Insights links
About the author: Read about Uniqlo: Read about Forever 21: Read about Charles & Keith: Read more: Insights & Articles Charles & Keith - A Truly Successful Asian Global Fast Fashion Retail Brand Forever 21 - Fast Fashion Retail Brand With An Edge Uniqlo - The Strategy Behind The Global Japanese Fast Fashion Retail Brand Martin Roll - Business & Brand Strategist

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The Secret of Zara's Success: A Culture of Customer Co-creation | Martin Roll

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Zara is one of the most successful global fast fashion retail brands competing on design & styles, strong retail marketing, lean supply chain and strong corporate culture, Inditex is the world's largest fashion group with 170.000 employees, operating more than 7,400 stores in 96 markets worldwide and 49 online markets

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I asked Annie a number of questions regarding her lifestyle, habits, likes & dislikes in terms of fashion and most specifically referring to Zara as she is an avid shopper there. I gained consent to carry out the interview with her. I tried to compile a list of questions that would give me an idea if Annie fitted the customer profile of Zara which was supported by the information provided on Acorn.co.uk

She really fit Zara's target consumer well. I tried to narrow down the conversation as best I could while still portraying her perfect profile.

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This report helped me identify what colours were rising in popularity this season & helped me choose what I thought would benefit & suit my range for Zara. I was able to explore trend colours also which I was able to experiment in Photoshop. Once I had a selection of colours I liked, seeing them on my CADs on photoshop helped me narrow down my colour mix.

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This section of the key items report helped me gather data from WGSN to back up my reasoning to choose a duvet coat as one of my items for my range.

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This article gave me some inspiration for street style & trickle down for my trend which was helpful when trying to collate my data together & deciding on key product, trends, fabrics etc that would suit Zara for A/W21

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When Vogue's trusted street style photographers stepped out in Milan, Paris and Tokyo to capture the fashion scene around the autumn/winter 2021 shows, the results were somewhat surprising.

Read more: Spring/Summer 2021 Fashion Trends

Gone were the full designer looks and high-voltage blowouts that were once the markers of the lens-conscious street style set. In their place came irreverent vintage 'fits that tap into the spontaneous creative spirit that is currently inspiring everything from our TikTok timelines to our love of journalling.

The best street-style looks also just got affordable. From scarlet tights (spotted in Tokyo) to mini kilts and pastel denim (we see you Paris) - this is your debrief on spring's most wearable trends.

The roomy, black leather knee boot

We're guessing that Bella Hadid's love of equestrian style has something to do with the rise of the 'pony club boot trick'. The silhouette - which catapults a centuries-old military look into the modern age - sees baggy pants tucked into sturdy leather knee boots. The more jarring the boot pairing (note the offbeat appeal of white trousers and a nostalgic cardigan), the greater the street-style score. Extra marks for dusting off Frye's Campus 14L style, which last made waves in 2003.

Preppy, pastel trousers

Paris's answer to mood-lifting casuals? Pick a confectionery hue and ensure that everything, from your face mask to your vintage Dior mini-bag, matches. The caveat: swerve sweatpants in favour of a straight-cut jean or linen trouser (try Monki's Parma Violets denim colourway and Paloma Wool's Ross trouser) and elevate your retro aerobics sweatshirt with layers of keepsake necklaces.

The '90s mini kilt

From Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss to Jennifer Aniston and The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air 's Tatyana Ali - when it comes to mastering the mini kilt's retro-chic credentials, the '90s fashion playbook is the gift that keeps on giving (clipping a pager to your waistband is optional). Have you recently rediscovered the streamlining powers of a trusty pair of opaque tights? Us too. File the failsafe combination of a graphic T-shirt, collegiate tights and mini kilt (Depop's answer to the bike short) under 'dressed in less than five minutes'.

'Yuppie' '80s neutrals

Now that Instagram seems to have gotten over its obsession with mid-'90s beige, let us turn your attention to the untapped fashion trove that is late '80s neutrals. Groomed polo necks (hi, Uniqlo), sculpted shoulder blazers and contrasting circle-buckle belts transform the decade's yuppie style traits into something ironically chic that we can get behind. Faux-corporate baseball caps included.

Scarlet tights

We're going to need to take a minute to talk about the next-level layered looks that led the way at Tokyo Fashion Week autumn/winter 2021. From the cult, monochrome sneakers upwards, Japan's street-style cohorts are reimagining prettified day dresses with a little help from characterful blouses and playful totes. Hunt down a pair of Comme des Garçons Black Cdg Air Max 95 trainers and break out the scarlet tights - anyone looking to restyle last year's summer dress needs to pay attention to how Tokyo's fashion stars pull together an original, head-turning look.
More from British Vogue:

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5 Affordable Pieces To Shop From AW21's Biggest Street Style Trends

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When Vogue's trusted street style photographers stepped out in Milan, Paris and Tokyo to capture the fashion scene around the autumn/winter 2021 shows, the results were somewhat surprising. Read more: Spring/Summer 2021 Fashion Trends Gone were the full designer looks and high-voltage blowouts that were once the markers of the lens-conscious street style set.

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I really found this report helpful as it showed statistics of the upcoming trends for A/W21/22 and again, enabled me to back up when I was deciding on details, fabrics, garments etc for the trend. It was really interesting to see data clearly impacted by the pandemic & the rise of sustainability issues where dresses & embellishments have dipped. Using an analytics report going forward will be useful to accurately justify reasons behind a range plan

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This report identified all the popular trending colours for A/W21. Ysing this alongside analytical data helped me to make decisions for my colour palette and which ones to test out, which ones would be core colours to drive sales etc.

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Inspiration for prints, colours, patterns, texture & products 

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Inspiration for prints, colours, patterns, texture & products 

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This was more related to nature with its tones & styles

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Inspiration for shapes from London Fashion Show AW21

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Inspiration for shapes from London Fashion Show AW21

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Inspiration for Fabrics & Textures from the Catwalks 

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Inspiration for Fabrics & Textures from the Catwalks 

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This report inspired me to develop my fabric & textures for the range and help me determine which would be most suitable in order to build a commercial range with sustainability a key value for my trend.

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EDITED - Fabrics & texture Trend AW21:22

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Understanding the Buyers perspective for including prints & patterns for the range

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Understanding the Buyers perspective for including prints & patterns for the range

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This helped me identify what prints were popular for the coming season and helped me narrow down my decision when developing the range and choosing a suitable print for my range.

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Inspiration for the most popular trends among the cities

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Inspiration for the most popular trends among the cities

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This report helped me decide what trends I wanted to focus my attention to be able to develop a successful range - As Zara develop clothes inspired from catwalks I wanted to make sure I was following the trends of certain catwalks.

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This report helped me identify what matching set trends would be suitable for my trend & how I could incorporate them into the range. I decided on knitted bralet & midi skirt as both can be styled separately, adding versatility & sustainable items to my range

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This helped me decide what concepts I had researched may work best going by catwalk trends

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Inspiration from catwalks for details & trims

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Inspiration from catwalks for details & trims

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EDITED - Details & Trims AW 21 Catwalk Looks

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Brand You Form: Personal Vs Professional 

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Brand You Form: Personal Vs Professional 

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This Brand You form shows the qualities I think my friends & family would say about me.

They are different however I definitely believe that I bring some of my personal qualities to the workplace on a professional level.

I am a loyal friend but I am also a loyal employee which helps me perform to the best of my ability for my employer & create positive experiences for others where they feel they can rely on me as a friend & colleague.

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Authentication Form - Contextual Studies 

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Authentication Form - Contextual Studies 

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Contextual Studies Assignment Reflective Blog

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How Flares are being used in fashion today 

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How Flares are being used in fashion today 

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More forecasting for Flares fir AW21/22 fashion and how they have been developed for the 21st century consumer

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More forecasting for Flares fir AW21/22 fashion and how they have been developed for the 21st century consumer

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Contextual Studies Assignment - 1960's Hippies & Flares

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Contextual Studies Assignment - 1960's Hippies & Flares

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Contextual Studies Assignment - 1960's Hippies & Flares 

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The History & Timeline of Flares throughout the years 

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The History & Timeline of Flares throughout the years 

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This was interesting to see who was wearing flares at what time. It showed me more of what history was like at the time & how fashion was influenced by social & political movements. But also how flares became a trend in the future

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For the past few years, fashion designers have been telling us flared trousers are coming back. We'll see. They've been around a long time, but only one decade really embraced them: the 1970s. Rich and poor, teeny boppers and football hooligans all wore their flares with pride. Here we look back at those halcyon, bell-bottomed days of yore

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For the past few years, fashion designers have been telling us flared trousers are coming back. We'll see. They've been around a long time, but only one decade really embraced them: the 1970s. Rich and poor, teeny boppers and football hooligans all wore their flares with pride.

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This gave me insight into what hippies were like and what influenced the movement and the culture they formed

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'60s hippies were a single piece in a tumultuous decade of social change. Rapidly advancing technology, musical revolution, major conspiracy theories, and booming Civil Rights movements all converged in the 1960s, and the effect made waves. That said, the '60s weren't quite "The Sixties" as they're remembered until about halfway through the decade.

After nearly twenty years of postwar prosperity, JFK's assassination in 1963 and escalation in the Vietnam War set the stage for unrest among the American people. Perspectives across the nation shifted to ones of vulnerability, loss of innocence, and even mistrust. From this came a surge of protests, skepticism, and political activism from the younger generation in particular. With a growing influence and a wild sense of self expression, these students developed into the iconic counterculture of the 1960s - hippies. Their anti-fashion silhouettes, Flower Power prints, psychedelic colors, peace signs, long hair, and flared pants were radical fashion statements that took America by force in the mid 1960s... until they became the norm in the mid '70s, that is.

Why did that happen? How did that happen so quickly? Believe it or not, it had a lot to do with clothes. This article details a brief history of '60s hippies, while the second half delves into the development and influence of '60s hippie fashion. If you'd like to skip to the fashion part of the article, scroll down or click here.

Who were 1960s Hippies?

If you had asked a businessman in the late 1960s, he wouldn't have painted a pretty picture. Hippies at the time were typically seen as dirty, drug-addled college drop-outs who didn't know how the world worked. Their penchant for disruption put them at odds with a nation still stuck in the white picket fence suburbia of 1950s culture. While their style and ideals would grow increasingly more popular in the late 1960s, the "hippie" label always carried with it a rather dirty reputation. From the press and the public alike came accusations of drug abuse, corruption of youth, political extremism, conspiracy, and an association with cult leader Charles Manson in the later years.

The reality wasn't quite so stark. Hippies of the 1960s were free-spirited, predominantly white upper-middle class students from liberal colleges, notably Berkeley and San Francisco State University. Their roots and inspiration came from the '50s Beat Generation and its anti-establishment, anti-materialism, and pro-obscenity lines of thought. It was hippies themselves who popularized the use of psychedelics, created experimental music as self-expression, and forged a more upbeat philosophy on the richness of life, experience, and harmony. Hippie hedonism and in-the-moment values could be summarized by one of their own key phrases: "if you like it, do it."

Looking back at them today, hippies are remembered mostly as a group of peace advocates. Their political leanings are credited with defining the "New Left" as well as modern environmentalism, and you have them to thank for the popularity of organic foods, tie dye, yoga, light-wash jeans, bohemian fashion, and the omnipresence of that "live and let live" attitude. Even over fifty years later, '60s hippies hold enough social influence and appeal to generate neo-hippie communities both in person, in fashion, and online.

History of the 60s Hippie Movement

In 1964, author Ken Kesey and his band of Merry Pranksters took a painted-up school bus from California to New York in an acid-fueled, psychedelic road trip. 1965 marked the word "Hippie" first appearing in a newspaper, referencing the "hipster" community of San Francisco's Haight-Ashbury district. By 1967 there were countless names (and insults) for this emerging group of youth - hippy, drug freak, drop-out, flower child, Vietnik, Yippie, treehugger, and countless others. There was also just as much division among them.

Very little initially unified 60s hippies as a subculture, much less as a political group. Perspectives were almost universally progressive, though not always political. Instead, they mostly revolved around sexual liberation, drug use, and the importance of "breaking out of it" - or expanding horizons. The divide between hippie activists and the politically detached hippies put both protests and "why bother?" anti-protests from various groups under the hippie name. This and constant infighting only added to the disorganization of hippies as a whole.

The foundation of a more standard hippie identity, as well as their recognition as a 1960s counterculture, began with the Human Be-In of 1967. Students from various campus groups came together and unified under the mutual rejection of the Vietnam War, government authority, and reigning middle class values. Further, they voiced support of artistic expression, experimental drugs, spiritual transcendence, harmony with nature, and communal brotherhood. Many early hippies rejected this new identity and the way things were turning - that they were too political, not political enough, too involved in drugs, and countless other complaints came from the fringes. But with this new cohesive role, the hippie influence took off. Resistance was silenced by the sheer numbers of new hippies flooding San Francisco to join the movement.

More be-ins, festivals, and protests were organized in what grew to be known as the '67 Summer of Love. By the end of the year, there were so many hippies that the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood was beyond capacity and many were left sleeping on the streets. By the end of the decade, hippies had become a cultural commodity.

While there is no official date marking the end of the hippie movement, there were many factors contributing to its quick decline in the early '70s. The Woodstock Music Festival of 1969 was such a massive success that it showed the profitability of the music industry - the event actually lost money, but its popularity fueled others to produce more concerts with better planning. Music festivals, a major aspect of hippie culture, began powering themselves with cash instead of good vibes. In the same window of time, major Hippie musicians such as Janis Joplin and Jimi Hendrix died of drug overdose. Drug addiction and the consequences of drug use among hippies became impossible to ignore, communes dissolved, and the movement itself once again lost its footing.

Perhaps the biggest contributor to the end of the hippies in the '70s, however, was its own overwhelming success. By the early-mid 1970s, America had changed. Opposition to the Vietnam War was the majority perspective, Civil Rights movements had made massive advancements, and that "disruptive" hippie anti-fashion became, well, fashionable. With the Fall of Saigon in 1975, "flower power" became pop culture, and reacting to that pop culture came the new counterculture - punks and metalheads.

Hippie Fashion

1960s hippie fashion wasn't always flares and tie dye shirts. As a matter of fact, the foundation of what hippies wore, particularly in the beginning, was similar to Beatnik or early Mod fashion. Color palettes were toned down, patterns (if present) were basic, and outfits were overall simple. Workshirts, drainpipe trousers, mohair sweaters, tee shirts, and canvas shoes made up a majority of the early hippie wardrobe for both men and women.

These early hippie outfits were made distinct with an "accent" piece such as a garish Western shirt, a non-matching hat, or bright rubber rain boots. Day-Glo paint was also used to paint bodies, faces, hands, and clothes.

Go here for more about 60s mod fashion for women that you can adapt into early 60s hippie outfits. Look here for men's 60s outfit ideas.

Seeking the role of anti-fashion, this "cleaner" hippie look would evolve just as quickly as it took for people to adjust to it. In the five years between 1964 and 1969, hippie fashion did a full 180. Pants became flared and baggy, colors grew saturated, and psychedelic patterns such as paisley and mandalas were inescapable. 1968 was the height of flower power and trippy hippie fashion, and it began seeping into the mainstream.

Jeans could be bleached, studded, adorned with patches, torn up, and then painted over. As soon as "ridiculous" was established, it would become popular, then it was on to "even more ridiculous" to produce the same effect. Dedicated hippies who sought to look "way out" fought hard to stay ahead of an ever-rising standard that they themselves were setting.

In a time of disruption, the hippies were an endless source of inspiration for new trends, silhouettes, and colors for fashion designers. Their rebelliousness and stylistic emphasis on drawing attention would pave the way for a decade of groovy 1970s individuality, loudness, and casualwear.

Influences and Motifs of 1960s Hippie Fashion

The evolution of hippie fashion was sculpted by the passions, perspectives, and backgrounds found within the movement. While it would be impossible to name everything to ever influence their clothing style, the primary ones were as follows:

Asia. Like beatniks, hippies took heavy inspiration from the East - particularly its religion and iconography. Silhouettes went loose and flowy with tunics, kaftans, kimono shawls, and light crisp fabric clothes. Rich ethnic prints were popular for any article of clothing, and Eastern dyeing techniques were adapted to make the iconic hippie tie dye. Dharmic symbols, Buddha, and the Taoist yin-yang were used often in fabric prints, art, stencils, and jewelry. In 1968, The Beatles took a trip to India that would make the Asian influence even more popular, both with hippies and in mainstream fashion.

Psychedelia. Hippie culture was heavily immersed in psychedelic substances such as LSD and psilocybin (magic mushrooms). From the widespread use of these psychedelics came an appreciation for "trippy" art, which in turn popularized bright colors and kaleidoscopic, far-out patterns. Clothes were also lightened for both comfort and ease of functioning while high.

Mother Nature. Prairie dresses and flower power were key to making a statement in both anti-war and environmental protesting. Flowers, feathers, hemp rope, leather, linen, straw, and recycled fabrics gave even more earthy and natural aspects to wardrobes as hippies began living closer to nature. This eco movement came from both environmentalism and a psychedelic feeling of oneness with the world.

Militaria and Bikers. Many Vietnam veterans who returned home joined the hippie movement, introducing field jackets, vests, utility coveralls, and patches into hippie style. Bikers, a fellow counterculture group with a heavy veteran presence, also wore practical clothes and introduced rugged biker boots, leather goods, vests, and jackets. Military surplus stores were cheap, accessible, and the best source for clothes endorsed by both groups. The iconic hippie bell bottom jeans began as Navy bell-bottom trousers sold at surplus stores.

Western Clothes and Workwear. Chambray shirts, bolo ties, henleys, mechanic's trousers, and Western shirts were accessible, baggy, and durable. Westernwear with more Native American style such as fringe jackets and moccasins had even greater appeal for their ruggedness and unconventional appeal. Denim, both pants and jackets, became a staple of hippie clothing for men and women.

Contrarianism. When the Hell's Angels were the meanest thing to ride the streets in 1964, hippies befriended and associated with them. When a man was arrested in 1968 for wearing an American flag patch, hippies across the nation began wearing the stars and stripes. Antique clothing was very out of style and could be found cheap, so it was worn often. Whatever the populace rejected, the hippies embraced. A surprising amount of savvy went into being the antithesis of society!

Mainstream hippie fashion. By 1970, you could head to your favorite department store and find light blue flare jeans, a groovy paisley shirt, and maybe even a purple bandanna or printed shawl. Hippie-style clothes were the next big thing, and finding certain aspects of it grew much easier when they caught on with designers. In addition to adding some uniformity to the hippie look, it also sanitized hippie fashion into something far less chaotic to appeal to a wider buyer base.
Pictures of 60s Hippies:
Up next, we will dive into the specifics of Hippie Fashion for women and men.

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Hippies in the 60s : Fashion, Festivals, Flower Power

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Who were the 60s hippies? What was the inspiration for 60s hippie fashion? Dive into the 1960s hippie movement, fashion, fesitvals and flower power.

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This was really interesting to read more about the war & how the hippies formed because of their disagreements with Americas involvement. It allowed me to make more sense of why they formed a counterculture

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On March 8, 1965, two battalions of U.S. Marines landed on beaches of Da Nang, marking the first official engagement of American troops in the Vietnam War. Over the next several years, as the United States escalated its ill-fated involvement in that conflict, hundreds of thousands of Americans joined in mass protests across the country, repulsed and outraged by the terrible bloodshed taking place in Southeast Asia.

Though the anti-war movement had begun on college campuses at the dawn of the 1960 s, more and more people joined in opposition to the war in the latter half of the decade, as television brought images of its atrocities into American homes in a new level of excruciating detail.

The hippie counterculture, which emerged in the late 1960s and grew to include hundreds of thousands of young Americans across the country, reached its height during this period of escalation of American involvement in the Vietnam War, and subsided as that conflict drew to a close. But hippies' rejection of mainstream American culture, and their distinctive brand of rebellion-including their long hair and beards, colorful style, psychedelic drug use, love of rock music and eco-conscious lifestyle-left a lasting impact on the nation in the decades to come.

Counterculture Prior to the Vietnam War

In many ways, the hippies of the 1960s descended from an earlier American counterculture: the Beat Generation. This group of young bohemians, most famously including Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and William S. Burroughs, made a name for themselves in the 1940s and '50s with their rejection of prevailing social norms, including capitalism, consumerism and materialism.

Centered in bohemian havens like San Francisco and the East Village of New York City, Beats embraced Eastern religions, experimented with drugs and a looser form of sexuality; their followers became known by the diminutive term " beatniks."

"What's significant about [the Beats] is that the movement was very small, it was literary-so it had a claustrophobic quality about it," explains William Rorabaugh, professor of history at the University of Washington and author of American Hippies (2015). "You weren't allowed to be in the group unless you were either a friend of or a poet."

Who Were the Hippies?

As the 1950s gave way to the 1960s, the Beats and beatniks gradually gave way to a new kind of counterculture: the hippies, who actually preferred to call themselves "freaks" or "love children." The hippies were much younger than the beatniks (they could even have been the Beats' children) and had a much different style. They listened to folk and rock music, not jazz; they dressed flamboyantly, in bright colors, where the Beats and beatniks had favored shades of black and grey. Ripped jeans, bell bottoms, tie-dyed clothing and flowers worn in the hair were all big parts of the typical hippie style.

The biggest difference between the hippies and the Beats? " LSD came on the scene," Rorabaugh says. "The hippie counterculture, more than anything else, was about taking LSD. Seeking spiritual perfection through drugs, but particularly through psychedelic drugs."

The vast majority of hippies were young, white, middle-class men and women who felt alienated from mainstream middle-class society and resented the pressure to conform to the "normal" standards of appearance, employment or lifestyle. By wearing their hair long and growing beards (for the men), taking drugs and exploring spirituality outside of the confines of the Judeo-Christian tradition, hippies sought to find more meaning in life-or at least have a good time.

Though the Haight-Ashbury neighborhood of San Francisco and New York City's East Village were famous hippie meccas, the movement thrived all over the country.

In a cover story published in July 1967, during the "Summer of Love," Time magazine reported that the hippie movement was "blooming in every major U.S. city from Boston to Seattle, from Detroit to New Orleans," encompassing some 300,000 people. Many hippies eventually chose to move outside the city, where the cost of living was lower. (Hippies were perennially broke.)

On a growing number of rural communes, hippies joined disaffected political radicals and Vietnam draft dodgers in embracing back-to-the-land living, including free love, organic farming, vegetarianism, holistic medicine and a lot of marijuana use.

Among the various groups that made up the vibrant '60s counterculture in the United States-including the civil rights movement, the Black Panthers, gay rights and women's liberation activists, anarchists and other political radicals-hippies stood out for their relative lack of a distinct political ideology. Hippie politics was more a "politics of no politics," Rorabaugh says. "One of the things hippies said was 'you should do your own thing, you should do whatever you feel like doing.'"

All the same, it's no accident that the path of the hippie movement that emerged in the late '60s traced very closely the trajectory of American involvement in Vietnam. Hippies saw mainstream authority as the origin of all society's ills, which included the war. According to Rorabaugh, hippies joined with political radicals in their support for the civil rights movement and their opposition to the Vietnam War. "Hippies would agree with that, but they would not protest," he points out. "That was the difference-hippies were not protesters."

The most identifiably political hippie group was the Diggers, an anarchist organization formed in 1966 in San Francisco. They were known for passing out free food to the hippies panhandling in Golden Gate Park, and operating a free store (stocked with stolen goods) that would provide clothing for draft dodgers and AWOL soldiers seeking to go incognito. Like the Diggers, the Yippies, or the Youth International Party (YIP) founded in early 1968, also tried to attract hippies to politics, with little success.

In addition to the Summer of Love, that hippie heyday in 1967 when some 100,000 people from around the country converged on Haight-Ashbury, the most famous celebration of hippie counterculture occurred in August 1969 at the Woodstock Music Festival. Advertised as "three days of peace, music and love," Woodstock "brought both political people and counterculture people together," Rorabaugh says. Indeed, somewhere between 300,000 and 400,000 people, far more than its organizers originally expected, flocked to upstate New York to hear artists like Joan Baez, The Grateful Dead, Jimi Hendrix, Janis Joplin, Jefferson Airplane, The Who, Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young and Creedence Clearwater Revival play the music that fueled the hippie movement.

Decline and Lasting Effects of the Hippie Movement

In some ways, the Summer of Love also marked the beginning of the end for the hippie movement, as drugs, homelessness and crime had infested Haight-Ashbury, pushing out many of the neighborhood's original residents. In October 1967, the Diggers held a "Death of the Hippie March" in San Francisco to decry the commercialization of hippie culture. The march ended at the famed Psychedelic Shop, an early hippie hangout that was closing. Marchers buried the shop's signs, marking a symbolic death for the hippie heyday.

On November 15, 1969, several months after Woodstock, growing opposition to the Vietnam War culminated in the largest antiwar demonstration in U.S. history, with as many as half a million people attending a protest in Washington, D.C., in addition to smaller protests around the country. A month later, violence broke out at another hippie gathering, the Altamont Music Festival, leaving five people dead. When combined with other acts of violence, including the gruesome Manson Murders of 1969 and the National Guard shootings of students at Kent State in 1970, Altamont brought the free-wheeling attitudes of the "love generation" crashing down into a more sordid reality.

By the time U.S. participation in the Vietnam War ended in 1973, the media had largely lost interest in the hippie movement, even though many of the hippies' formerly radical style choices (beards, sideburns and long hair on men, for example) had been adopted by mainstream American culture. But the communes, which endured until the mid-'70s and even longer, in some cases, would be the source of many of the hippies' lasting legacies, including pro-environmental attitudes and practices that are still very much in force today.

"Natural food, organic food, eating local, co-op groceries-all of that came out of the communes," Rorabaugh says. "Also a looser style of child-rearing, and more casual attitudes about sex. And solar panels-Northern California hippie communes were the first people to have solar panels in 1970. They did it because they needed some hot water for washing dishes. They were off the grid, and they didn't want anything to do with the utility company."

Though some hippies remained committed to the lifestyle for the long haul, many others assimilated themselves into the mainstream culture they had once despised. Perhaps the most famous of these, Rorabaugh says, was Steve Jobs, founder of Apple.

Jobs, who embraced Buddhism after a trip to India in the early '70s, "conceived of the idea of personal computer as putting computer power in the hands of ordinary people, and taking it away from IBM," as Rorabaugh puts it. "Taking computer power away from giant corporations and giving it to ordinary people"-what could be more anti-establishment than that?

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How the Vietnam War Empowered the Hippie Movement | HISTORY

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The hippie counterculture reached its height during the war's escalation, and subsided as the conflict drew to a close.

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This was insightful into what fashion was like and how it developed over the years in the 60s

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Fashion in the 1960s became progressively more casual across all genders and ages. Womenswear followed three broad trends: a continuation of the previous decade's ladylike elegance, the youthful styles of Mary Quant and the Space Age influence, and the late 1960s "hippie" style. Menswear saw an increasing amount of color and pattern, military influence, and new fashion icons in the form of rock stars. Children's wear saw less change, but also became more casual and bright in color and pattern.

Broadly categorized, there were three main trends in 1960s womenswear: 1) the lady-like elegance inherited from the previous decade seen on the likes of First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy, 2) the fun, youthful designs popularized by Swinging London, and 3) the Eastern-influenced hippie styles of the late 1960s. Along with these diverse styles, there came a shift in the way that women shopped and for whom the styles were created.

In the early years of the decade, fashion continued along the lines of the 1950s. Skirt suits and coordinating accessories were emphasized as one decade transitioned into the next. First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy epitomized this look during her husband's presidential campaign and short presidency. She was admired around the world for her put-together, lady-like look consisting of boxy skirt-suits like the Givenchy suit in figure 1 and navy suit in figure 2, sheath and A-line dresses (Fig. 3), and luxurious coats-all accessorized with white gloves, pearls, and a matching hat. This look was being produced by the likes of Hubert de Givenchy and Cristóbal Balenciaga (Fig. 4), but as the decade progressed, it became clear that the momentum was towards a new kind of designer in the 1960s.

The cultural phenomenon termed Swinging London began in 1955 but reached its zenith in the early- to mid-1960s. It was a phenomenon that focused on youth, spotlighting music and fashion. It brought us The Beatles and the miniskirt, Twiggy (Fig. 9) and The Who. The designer who led the way in the "youthquake" was Mary Quant who opened her first shop, Bazaar, on the King's Road in Chelsea, London in 1955. Quant's simple, colorful designs appealed to teenagers and young people who had more disposable income than any generation before. It differed from the stuffy looks of the older generation and appealed to young women who embraced the child-like styles Quant produced (Fig. 7). Fashion historian James Laver writes of Quant in Costume and Fashion: A Concise History,

"Rejecting the constraints of seasonal shows, she produced as many as twenty-eight collections during her early years, creating simple, practical, often mix n'match designs which had an element of classlessness perfectly suited to the mood of the sixties" (261-262).

Bazaar was in the new boutique style, a revolutionary new way to shop that differed from the traditional designer atelier and the department store. Besides the accessibility of the clothes in the shop, boutiques also created a frenetic atmosphere, as seen in figure 5. In her book The Lost Art of Dress, Linda Przybyszewski writes, "Boutiques were groovy places where modern music played and young owners and customers collaborated on new looks that came only in small sizes" (202).

One of the most revolutionary designs attributed to Quant was the miniskirt and minidress (Fig. 6). Eschewing the prim below-the-knee skirts of the late 1950s and early 1960s, by the mid-sixties, young women were wearing skirts that fell at the upper thigh. Like the short skirts of the 1920s, the miniskirt shocked but was also a highly popular look for young women. Miniskirts and minidresses were adopted by Parisian designers as Quant and her contemporaries continued to gain popularity.

Along with the miniskirt came a craze for the playful, innovative use of new materials and a focus on scientific progress. Newly developed materials such as acrylics, polyesters, and shiny PVC were used in women's clothing while designers were inspired by pop art and space, like the miniskirt in figure 10 and the dress in figure 11. Pierre Cardin and André Courrèges debuted space-inspired designs in shades of white and silver. Laver writes, "Courrèges' Spring/Summer 1964 'Space Age' collection featured 'astronaut' hats and goggles, white and silver PVC 'moon girl' loon trousers, catsuits and white patent or kid leather, mid-calf-length boots" (264, Fig. 8). Sheath and A-line minidresses, both without defined waists, were popular silhouettes. These modern designs dominated the mid-sixties as fashion moved toward a more playful and freeing look.

While the miniskirt reached its height mid-decade, by the late 1960s, a new style and culture was emerging. Skirts dipped back to mid-calf and by 1969, the full-length maxi-skirt had emerged (Fig. 12). This came with the move towards the "hippie" aesthetic. Elizabeth Wilson writes in Gerta Buxbaum's Icons of Fashion: The Twentieth Century, "Between 1965 and 1967, the uncluttered, futuristic design of André Courrèges and Mary Quant - featuring short skirts, childish pinafores, and boxy shapes - were superseded by a return to the styles of Art Nouveau, Hollywood, and William Morris" (98). Suede, headbands, kaftans, Afghan coats, beads and other non-Western elements of adornment were embraced as were flowing skirts and secondhand clothing (Laver 267-268). Janis Joplin, seen in figure 13, embraced this style in the late 1960s.

Both the "Mod" movement, to which Quant contributed, and the hippie movement were part of a new model of "street style" in which fashion is disseminated from the streets up to the designers rather than vice versa. Jane Mulvagh writes in Icons of Fashion, "1962 to 1968 were crucial years in which the allure and originality of street style challenged, and finally broke, the hegemony of high fashion" (86). The trajectory of fashion in the 1960s saw three very diverse overarching styles but also a shift from a designer-centric fashion ecosystem to one where the consumer was at the center of creation.

An enduring icon of the 1950s and '60s, movie star Audrey Hepburn embraced the progression of sixties fashion up to the hippie aesthetic of the last part of the decade. Having firmly established herself as a leading lady in 1950s films like Roman Holiday, Sabrina, and Funny Face, Hepburn's influence continued into the sixties.

In 1961, she starred as Holly Golightly in one of her most iconic films, Breakfast at Tiffany's (Fig. 14). In this film, like so many others, Hubert de Givenchy designed the costumes, including the iconic black dress from the opening scene (Fig. 17). Hepburn and Givenchy worked together both on- and off-screen to create a simple, but stylish wardrobe that was easily copied by women of all means.

In the early 1960s, Hepburn wore feminine, Jackie Kennedy-esque skirt suits. Like the First Lady, she paired these suits with the requisite accessories: gloves and hat, like the green Givenchy suit worn in Paris When It Sizzles in 1962 (Fig. 18). The clothes she wore in 1963's Charade would not have looked out of place on Kennedy but also cut a stylish figure as she gallivanted through Paris (Fig. 15). As the decade progressed, so did her fashion. In the mid-sixties, Hepburn began to wear more "Mod" styles with bright colors and minidresses working their way into her wardrobe. In the 1966 film How to Steal a Million, she sported white-rimmed sunglasses à la Space Age styles and a stylish bob hairstyle accented by dark eyeliner to give her the popular doe-eyed look of the period (Fig. 16).

Though she would remain admired for her fashion for the rest of her life, by 1969, when the fashion world had started to turn to Eastern influences and longer skirts, Hepburn married Andrea Dotti in a pink minidress (Fig. 19). Looking happy, she represented the part of the population, including couture designers like Givenchy, who had not yet embraced the new style.

Just as womenswear became more casual and colorful throughout the 1960s, so too did menswear. While menswear began moving towards a more casual style in the 1950s, the frenetic energy of Swinging London found its way with bright prints and colors for men. As there had not been very much movement in men's fashion for over a hundred years, the change was striking. The V&A writes,

"Perhaps the most remarkable development in 1960s dress was the dramatic change in menswear. For the past 150 years, clothing for men had been tailor-made, and plain and sombre in appearance. Now, colourful new elements were introduced, such as the collarless jacket, worn with slim-fitting trousers and boots" (History of Fashion 1900-1970).

Where the mid- to late-1950s saw a rise in the popularity of Italian style suits with narrow striped ties, menswear gradually incorporated brighter colors and patterns, and ties began to widen again as the decade progressed. The difference between the conventional suit seen in 1963 (Fig. 20) and those designed by Cardin (Figs. 22-24) and worn by George Harrison (Fig. 21) is striking.

By the mid-1960s, even the suit itself was seeing changes. Brightly striped or patterned suits were worn by bold young men, while even the trousers and jacket did not escape from new styling. The V&A writes,

"As the 1960s gathered pace, the standard template for a man's suit began to accommodate subtly daring new elements: the collarless jacket (a look popularised by The Beatles in 1963, the year they launched their first album) and slim-fitting trousers, matched with heeled boots rather than shoes" (The Peacock Revolution: 1960s Menswear).

As mentioned, even who was inspiring men's style was changing: where movie stars had been the primary style icons since the 1930s, rock stars such as The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, and Mick Jagger, among others, became a primary influence on men's fashion.

From the mid-1960s, men's fashion was influenced by military elements, with many of the rock influences contributing to its popularity. Mick Jagger (Fig. 26) and Jimi Hendrix (Fig. 25) both sported military jackets during performances, while The Beatles' 1967 album Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band showed the band wearing neon versions of the styles (Buxbaum 100). Partly thanks to this style, army-and-navy surplus clothing stores and secondhand stores became popular in the late 1960s. Like womenswear, menswear also saw an influence from space as Pierre Cardin designed futuristic clothing for men, too. In Swinging Sixties, Jenny Lister writes,

"His 'Cosmos' collection of 1966/7 was too extreme to enter the mainstream, but elements of the look such as turtle-neck sweaters, and zipped tunics in bonded jersey, were taken up and worn with more accessible styles" (34).

You can see some of these elements in the green suit from 1960 (Fig. 22) and the space-inspired suit from 1965 (Fig. 24). By 1968, Cardin's suits had returned to a more conventional look, though the jacket still had a bold pattern (Fig. 24).

Like women's fashion, menswear turned to Eastern influences and secondhand shopping in the late 1960s. Rejecting the consumerism and synthetic materials of the earlier part of the decade, men began to wear vintage clothes, especially those from the 1930s and 1940s. This meant that men's suits began to widen again, as they had in the thirties and forties. George Harrison was an early adopter of the style and the boldly patterned suit jacket from boutique shop Granny Takes a Trip he wore in the mid-sixties foreshadows the style to come (Fig. 21). Tie-dye, loose-fitting shirts, and velvet vests were all a part of the men's hippie aesthetic in the later part of the 1960s while color continued to remain front and center. As the 1960s moved into the 1970s, flared trousers, jeans, and long hair were all widespread men's styles.

Children's clothing in the 1960s saw less change than their adult counterparts. While women's and men's fashion were changing quickly and radically, children's fashion changed at a much slower, subtler pace. Both boys' and girls' fashion continued along the same lines in the early sixties, but they did wear clothes made from the new synthetic materials which were easier to care for.

Girls continued to wear dresses with defined waists and full skirts at the beginning of the decade, like those seen in the 1962 Good Housekeeping feature (Fig. 28). Mary-janes, white ankle socks, and peter pan collars all continued to be popular aspects of young girl's clothing, and girls were sometimes even still required to wear white gloves for special occasions. As the decade progressed, however, girls' fashion slowly started to become more casual. Bright colors, bold patterns such as plaids and bright florals, and oversized bows became popular, like the fun styles featured in the McCall's patterns (Fig. 27). New silhouettes such as the A-line, dropped waist, and babydoll began to replace the nipped-in waist of earlier in the decade (Fig. 29). As styles became more casual, it became more acceptable for young girls to wear pedal pushers, shorts, and trousers while playing.

One of the areas where girls did follow the trends of adults was in accessories. Young girls could be seen wearing the same brightly colored and patterned tights that young women wore with their miniskirts. Others might wear the shiny white go-go boots that went along with the Space Age fashions. In some ways, many of the adult styles actually took after young girl's fashion rather than the other way around.

Boy's fashion saw the popularity of denim and plaid throughout the decade. In the early 1960s, cuffed jeans and corduroy pants were favorites paired with tucked in polo shirts and athletic jackets or blazers. As the decade progressed, the color and pattern that was seen in men's clothing began to slowly creep into young boy's fashion (Fig. 30). Striped and plaid blazers were popular formal options, while turtlenecks, a popular style among men, and brighter colors such as red, yellow, and orange were worn in the mid-sixties. Neither girl's nor boy's fashion saw a strong influence from hippie fashion, although some boys began to wear bell-bottom jeans in the later part of the decade.

References:

Breward, Christopher, David Gilbert and Jenny Lister. Swinging Sixties: Fashion in London and Beyond 1955-1970. London: V&A Publications, 2006. http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/552142953.

Brown Jones, Bonny. "Fashion for Children in the 1960s." Our Everyday Life, January 10, 2019. Accessed June 27, 2019. https://oureverydaylife.com/fashion-for-children-in-the-1960s-12487774.html.

Buxbaum, Gerda. Icons of Fashion: The 20thCentury. Munich: Prestel Verlag, 2005. http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/773599428.

Ewing, Elizabeth. History of 20th-Century Fashion. 4th ed. London: B.T. Batsford Ltd, 2001. http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/456545252.

Moseley, Rachel. "Audrey Hepburn - Everybody's Dream Girl." The Observer, March 7, 2004. Accessed June 27, 2019. https://www.theguardian.com/film/2004/mar/07/highereducation.gender.

Olivier, Lucy. "Jackie Kennedy - A True Fashion Icon." The Telegraph, January 6, 2017. Accessed June 24, 2019. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/films/jackie/true-fashion-icon-jackie-kennedy/.

The People History. "Vintage 1960s Children's Fashion Clothes." Accessed June 27, 2019. http://www.thepeoplehistory.com/1960skidsfashion.html.

Przybyszewski, Linda. The Lost Art of Dress: The Women Who Once Made America Stylish. New York: Basic Books, 2014. http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/1023179396.

Stratford, SJ. "1960s Clothes for Girls." Love to Know. Accessed June 27, 2019. https://childrens-clothing.lovetoknow.com/1960s-clothing-girls.

Victoria and Albert Museum. "An Introduction to 1960s Fashion." Accessed June 24, 2019. https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/an-introduction-to-1960s-fashion.

Victoria and Albert Museum. "History of Fashion 1900 - 1970." Accessed June 24, 2019. http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/h/history-of-fashion-1900-1970/.

Victoria and Albert Museum. "Introduction to 20th-Century Fashion." Accessed June 24, 2019. http://www.vam.ac.uk/content/articles/i/introduction-to-20th-century-fashion/.

Victoria and Albert Museum. "The Peacock Revolution: 1960s Menswear." Accessed June 24, 2019. https://www.vam.ac.uk/articles/the-peacock-revolution-1960s-menswear.

Events:

1961 - John F. Kennedy becomes president. His wife, first lady Jacqueline Kennedy, soon becomes a fashion icon. Fur coats are much sought after because they are seen as a status symbol. Movements in the following decades protest vigorously against the wearing of fur.

1962 - The Sidney Janis Gallery in New York exhibits works by contemporary American pop artists and the "Nouveau Realisme" movement in a groundbreaking show called the "International Exhibition of the New Realists."

1963 - The Beatles make their first national TV appearance. Their identical haircuts became a popular look among young men on both sides of the Atlantic.

1964 - Young designers, including Mary Quant and Andre Courreges, introduce the miniskirt and minidress.
Maija Isola designs the iconic Unikko (poppy) print for Finnish fashion firm Marimekko.
The first Biba store, the inspiration of designer Barbara Hulanicki, opens in London, selling young, creative styles at budget prices.

1965 - Yves Saint Laurent's Mondrian- inspired color blocks sweeps through the international fashion world.
Young fashion designers, including Foale and Tuffin and Mary Quant, go on the British "Youthquake" tours to the US arranged by the Puritan Fashion Corporation and J.C.Penney in New York.

1966 - By early 1966 the waistline disappears, and designers like Norman Norell showcase loose-fitting dresses with loose sleeves. Twiggy, the "Face of 66" and one of the world's first supermodels, shoots to fame. Jewelry designer Paco Rabanne causes a sensation when he launches his linked chain and plastic paillettes and minidresses in Paris.

1967 - American fashion designer Geoffrey Beene presents his sequined football jersey evening gowns, following his ball gowns in gray flannel and wool jersey shown the previous year.

1968 - The rock musical Hair opens on Broadway and in London's West End, making Marsha Hunt a star and proclaiming "black is beautiful."The first Ossie Clark for Radley collection is shown at Chelsea Town Hall.

1969 - The Woodstock festival takes place in New York state, and is seen as a defining moment of the "hippie era" and the counterculture of the 1960s. The US lands the first men on the Moon, after space exploration earlier in the decade, which inspires space-age fashion looks.

Resources for Fashion History Research

To discover primary/period sources, explore the categories below.
Have a primary source to suggest? Or a newly digitized periodical/book to announce? Contact us!

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Fashion in the 1960s became progressively more casual across all genders and ages. Womenswear followed three broad trends: a continuation of the previous decade's ladylike elegance, the youthful styles of Mary Quant and the Space Age influence, and the late 1960s "hippie" style.

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This helped me gather information on the key looks & idols of the time and allowed me to compare hippies against the mainstream fashion looks & their influences

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Women's 1960s fashion was an extreme style and attitude from the start of the decade to the end. In the early years, the fashion idol was Jackie Kennedy with her perfect white pearls and tailored suit dresses. By the middle of the decade, supermodel Twiggy had women freeing their minds and bodies into clothing that didn't require any extra thought or effort.

From modest to "there is no such thing as too short," 1960s fashion was in many ways like the 1920s flapper revolution. But it didn't happen overnight.

Skip the history and shop 1960s style clothing:

Women's 1960s Fashion Trends

What clothes were popular in the 1960s? Shift dresses, mini skirts, go go boots, flare pants, jumper dresses, colorful denim, cloche hats, turtleneck shirts, flat shoes, pattern tights, and daisy flower prints. Many of these 60s clothes are back in style now.
Even more 1960s fashion trends were:

Jackie Kennedy, Brigitte Bardot, and Mary Quant were fashion icons.

The Youthquake movement created "Babydoll" clothing.

Short, shapeless shift dresses in bright colors and colorblock patterns became a staple of the Mod look.

Button-down shirts, turtlenecks, and chunky knit sweaters made up casual outfits.

Mini skirts or pencil skirts in plaid were a teenage girl's school outfit.

Jax pants, stirrup pants, bell bottoms, and pantsuits were new trends.

Low heel flats, step in boots, and vinyl shoes made up 60s footwear.

Stockings or tall socks came in all colors.

Pop Art jewelry was collectable.

60s hairstyles could be short and bobbed or long and straight.

Hippie fashion - Blue jeans, ethnic clothing, psychedelic swirls, tie-dye in the mid-late 1960s.

1960s Fashion Icons

Jackie Kennedy's style was clean, simple, and well fitted, with perfectly matched accessories. Janie wore dresses without collars and jackets that buttoned only with one large top button.

On her feet she wore sensible low heeled shoes (although many women still preferred high heels). She was the last celebrity woman to wear hats, a pillbox hat, as a necessary fashion.

Jackie O' put a lot of care into her look, and women both in the USA and abroad copied her style with enthusiasm.

Sadly, after her husband's assassination, Jackie was no longer in the public eye. Women had to find a new 1960s fashion idol to be inspired by.

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Brigitte Bardot was that woman. She was Jackie's opposite. Jackie was put together, simple and modest. Brigitte was tacky, cheap, bold, and even silly. Her 1959 pink gingham wedding dress with white lace trim was so unexpected that gingham and lace quickly became a new trend in the early 60s.

Mary Quant was another 1960s fashion influence. Her style moved away from "grown-up fashion" to playful "youth" driven clothing. Her shift dresses were short, very short, and her prints were bold and colorful "mod" prints. Her fashion as well as her personality set the tone for the rest of the 1960s: "fashion is fun."

It was the whole idea of a return to childhood that drove most of the fashion in the 1960s. Oversized collars, bows, and delicate trim miniaturized women and made them appear smaller.

Shapeless 60s mini dresses de-emphasized a woman's natural form. The flat and boxy look took away women's curves and made them little girls once more.

Kitten heel pumps, Mary Jane strap shoes, and flat sneakers were all childhood shoes returned to the '60s youthquake culture.

It was no coincidence that a young culture had a lot to do with half the American population being under 25 and with European countries having a similarly large youth population, too.

After growing up in the '50s as "little adults," the youth embraced their fond early childhood memories and fashions. By children's fashion, we mean babies and toddlers. The 1960s "babydoll" look was incorporated into dress, hair, and even makeup.

1960s Dresses

The full skirt and tight bodice of the '50s swing dress continued in the early '60s, with a slightly above- or at-the-knee hemline and modest high necklines.

1960s dress colors and patterns were bigger, brighter, and streamlined with simple necklines and short cap sleeves. This full-skirted look didn't leave fashion in the 1960s. Instead, it carried through to the 1970s in a pared down, less fluffy form.

The other style of early 60s dresses was the contoured sheath dress. Like the 50s version, it was knee-length, modest, and simple, but tailored to the hourglass curve of the body. By 1963, the sheath was losing its tight curves (a welcome relief) and relaxing into the shift dress.

The shift dress lacked any sort of tailored waistline, but did pinch in slightly around the ribs and skimmed over the hips to just above the knee. This loose but narrow looking dress was very comfortable and easy to wear. It became the primary women's dress style of the 1960s.

1960s skimmer dresses were a cousin of the shift dress. Skimmers fit straight on the body with a high neckline and (usually) a belt to define the waist, but not shape it. They "skimmed" the body without touching the skin. The hemline also hovered above the knee- how daring!

The 1960s drop waist dress was a 1920s throwback where the skirt circled the low hip and dropped to the knee. It was a bit more fitted than the shift dress, with a gathered or pleated skirt. The drop waist dress seemed to have been favored by mature women who were more used to a tailored fit.

1960s dresses became shorter and shorter. Anything above the knee was a "mini skirt." How short a woman's dress became a sign of how confident she was - not necessarily that she had great legs.

Hem length was directly proportional to how 60s women felt about their own sexual liberation.

1960s short skirts were not meant to attract men for the sake of sexual interest, but instead were a way to attract attention so that a WOMAN could be the one to decide if his attention was wanted. It was sexual power through fashion.

The jumper dress was a Mary Quant invention that captured the youthful, playful side of 1960s fashion. That style immediately made a 20-year-old look 10, a welcome change from the '50s mature fashion. Big bows, large round collars, pastels, and polka dots were all dress details that made women look like a little girl's dolls. The more innocent, the better.

Colors and prints were at first inspired by the pop art and modern art movements, AKA "Mod" culture.

Checkerboard, horizontal stripes, windowpane, polka dots, colorblock, honeycomb, houndstooth and Campbell's soup cans were all placed on short shift dresses with contrasting white cuffs and collars. Black and white was especially MOD.

Psychedelic swirls and prints introduced a trippy edge to clothing that was picked up by the hippies around 1966-1968. Being over the top was never too much. Large paisley swirls, neon flower daisies, and tropical beach prints all made an appearance. Bright yellow, orange, hot pink, and lime green were the favorites. These bold colors and loud patterns were seen on dresses, skirts, tops, and pants.
Shop 1960s style dresses here
There was also a trend of earth tone colors, especially as the 60s decade moved toward the hippie movement. Moss green, earthy browns, mustard yellow, and burnt orange were common colors year-round.

See more examples of vintage 1960s dresses here.

Hippie outfits are popular 60s party costumes. Learn more about who the real 1960s hippies were and what they wore. Shop more 70s style hippie dresses too.

1960s Cocktail, Prom, and Evening Dresses

For swanky 19 60s cocktail parties, the party look of the '60s was the same short shift, tent, and skimmer dress styles in luxury fabrics, mostly in black ... or white.

The two-piece jacket dress was a classic with mature ladies.

For the young, dressy shell tops and cigarette pants were a welcome change from dresses.

In the late '60s, wide-leg jumpsuits became a type of hostess dress, acceptable for evening house parties.

In the 1960s, pastels were worn in the summer and rich jewel tones in fall. Lace was a popular 1960s fabric as well as velvet or a classic light crepe. Most cocktail dresses were undecorated, but some had braid and metallic mesh trim around the necks and hems. "Minimal" was the sixties look to achieve.

For 1960s evenings and prom, the choice was between short or long empire waist dresses.

Usually sleeveless, the longer dresses were shaped like a column with pleats at the back. The top was often a contrasting lace or damask material cinched in with a bow on the front or back.

Short 60s evening dresses looked the same as long dresses, just shorter. Many were tent shaped or A-line instead of the slim column shape.

Learn more about 1960s cocktail party/evening wear/wedding party attire here.

1960s Tops, Sweaters, Coats

1960s women's tops, shirts, blouses, and sweaters all took direction from casual clothing in the 1950s. The primary change was that shirts and sweaters now fit straight on the body, with no emphasis on the bust or waist.

1960s tops could also be worn untucked. Gasp!

Women's 60s tops hung out over pants and skirts and grew longer as the decade advanced. Necklines also grew higher, back to the modest look of the 1930s.

The mock neck blouse or knit shirt was a classic. Sleeveless in summer and typically called shells, the fit was always boxy. They were casual solid tops worn with pants and shorts. Long sleeve black turtlenecks were a uniform of the Beatniks in London, but in the USA horizontal stripes were worn by every young person.

Big roll collars, round Peter Pan collars (often in contrasting white), big bows, and pointed shirt collars called attention to a thin neck and short hair.

Women's 1960s button up shirts took on the look of menswear with round or straight hems, oversized collars, and bold prints.

Bright colors and big prints made colorful statements when paired with a solid color matching pant. Learn more about 1960s blouses, tops, and shirt styles for women.
Shop 1960s tops and shirts here.
1960s knitted sweaters were usually solid colored pullovers or in the boxy cardigan style.

'60s knitwear designs favored texture - thick textured cable knits and wide rib knits were very popular. Many had large fold-out collars and oversized roll necks. Cardigans were usually collarless with some unique print in the early to mid-'60s such as small argyle, checks, chevron, or florals.

Read more about 1960s knitwear and sweaters
Shop 1960s sweaters and cardigans.
For winter wear, a good wool coat was still necessary. 1960s women's coats narrowed down and shortened up to fit over new, thinner, clothes.

Round collars with big buttons, flap pockets, geometric prints, and maybe a belt kept 60s coats looking cute and fun. Outerwear came down to just above the knee so that long, lean legs would continue to be the focal point.

Women's 1960s legs froze in winter. Only a warm pair of stockings, tights or tall socks could save them.

Short jackets in the 60s, especially those made of suede and leather, were popular options for the young and casual girl.

Shiny plastic-like vinyl was even more trendy with the space-age loving mod set.
Shop 1960s coats and jackets.
Most 60s women, however, chose a blazer-type jacket that was dressy enough to be worn with dresses, but also casual enough to be worn with pants on the weekends.

1960s Skirts

Women's 1960s skirts came in knee lengths with classic circle skirts/swing skirts, straight pencil skirts, and box-pleated A-line skirts (school girl style) in the early to mid 60s. Plaid patterns were very popular in the fall and winter, and solid pastels in spring and summer.

The late '60s saw the first shocker - the mini skirt - enter fashion. Mini skirts were 4-6 inches above the knee in box pleats or A-line button front shapes.

Plaids, pleats, corduroy, and heavy knits were perfect for 60s mini skirts. They were worn with tights and tall go go boots by teens and trendy college-age girls.

Mature women didn't wear minis. They went the opposite direction - longer! Button front knee-length skirts, knee-length skorts, and at-the-knee denim skirts were all newer options for 1960s women.

The maxi skirt came about at the end of the 60s decade too. Women and girls of all ages loved them.

Long skirts were gathered at the waist, sometimes with a tie bow, and hung down in a column shape. They took inspiration from prairie dresses and were made in hippie loving calico prints or swirly psychedelic eye poppers. In the evenings, long skirts were quilted or made with shiny taffeta fabrics.
Shop mini skirts, A-line skirts, long maxi skirts, denim skirts, and more.
The 1960s style skirt has returned to fashion this year.

1960s Pants

1960s Jax pants with a very high waist, shaped hip, and slender leg continued to be favorites from the 1950s. Women's 60s pants were usually lined, with side zippers and no waistband.

Women's 1960s pants could be worn with blouses tucked in, but more often had longer tops untucked.

Crop tops were a favorite in 60s summer - never too short, but occasionally long enough to overlap the pants' waistband.

The 1960s stretch pant and stirrup pant took advantage of a new kind of knit fabric.

Easy to sew and wear, the elastic stirrup under the foot kept pants smooth and straight. It didn't matter that the stirrup was visible. When ankle boots came into fashion, suddenly visible stirrups were taboo. Boots must be worn!

All 1960s pants / trousers came down to just above the ankle until the late '60s, when longer pants became the new trend. They also still zipped up the back or side for most of the decade, but moved to the front for trousers and jean styles.

Pants in the 60s were high waisted (circling the belly button) except for the youthful hip hugger styles that appeared in the mid '60s. They were more popular in Europe than America, and very trendy with the Mods and Beatniks.

1960s denim jeans followed the fit and style of slim pants: high waist, tapered leg, ankle crop, and in many more colors than just blue. White was especially trendy. Blue jeans were not as common as you might expect. They somewhat disappeared in the 1960s, only to return with a vengeance in 1969 with a flared boot cut.
Shop 1960s style pants here.
Flare jeans and pants may have started in the 1960s, but didn't go mainstream until 1969 and into the 1970s. There were a few casual flared leg pants designed as early as 1967, but for the most part, flared jeans and bell-bottom pants were not part of the 1960s. Even the hippies wore straight-leg pants in the 1960s. Learn more about 1960s pants, capris, jeans and culottes.

1960s Suits

Women's 60s suits, like the '50s, were dresses (or skirt and top separates) worn with a matching short jacket. They were the most professional choice for looking polished and lady-like.

Mature women liked the tailored suits with pencil skirts and cropped jackets, while young women embraced the knit suit with an open cardigan style jacket or light blazer.

As shocking as a 1960s mini skirt was to society, there was an equal confusion over the new pantsuit. It was a look directly copied from men's suits, but tailored down to feminine proportions.

Some 1960s work offices and establishments forbade women from wearing pantsuits. There was confusion over whether they were an insult to femininity or empowerment for women (which "disrespected men").

While 1960s fashion magazines debated, women flocked to the stores to buy pantsuits. Women were already wearing casual pants everywhere else, so wearing dressy pants seemed only natural.

Jumpsuits were another outfit that emerged in the late 1960s. These ultra wide leg one piece top and bottom overalls came in dramatic prints with big belts to match.

Many 1960s jumpsuits were sleeveless but could be worn over a blouse. They could be worn for lounging around the house or hosting an elegant house party.

They differed from the 1970s jumpsuit with a straight, wide palazzo leg.

Two peice jumpsuit looking sets were a matching tunic top and palazzo pant. Shop 60s and 70s jumpsuits.

1960s Shoes and Stockings

With women's 1960s legs now fully exposed by short hemlines and the youthful girl look on-trend, shoes took a drastic turn from high fashion with high heels to street fashion with low to no heels. Flats were in. Cheap was in. Color was in. Sophistication was out.

Thanks to new materials, notably PVC (Vinyl), women's 60s shoes could be mass-produced for cheap and come in a lot of bright colors to match dresses. The low heel made them easy to walk and live life in.

All the footwear designs of the earlier decades- loafers, Mary Janes, T-straps, monk straps, ballet, saddle shoes, and Oxfords - were designed into a low heeled shoe for the '60s.

Tall and skinny stiletto heels were still an option for evenings in the 1960s. The single strap Mary Jane came back in fashion, as did the slingback with cutouts on the sides.

Even 60s boots had flat heels. Thanks to an interest in all things futuristic looking, tall boots in white or silver became the new black. Everyone wore them.

1960s boots looked great with short dresses and mini skirts.

Tall white boots were called go-go boots, named after night club dancers in LA who wore them. Teens loved them and wore them with mini skirts to school (if they were allowed). Go Go boots are the most iconic shoe of the 1960s.

In the late '60s, suede boots in natural colors dominated fall and winter fashions. Both tall and short boot styles were worn with short shift dresses. Booties could be worn with long pants too.

Most 1960s boots were step in or pull on styles with a side zipper. The lace up boot was coming into style closer to the 1970s.

In the summer, it was the 1960s sandal heel, flip flop, and mule that had women feeling cool in the heat.

1960s summer shoe colors were bright and the straps were either very wide or very skinny.

Women's 60s sandal heels had a closed square toe, whereas casual sandals had a large open toe. Sandals were every woman's new favorite shoe. They could be worn with almost any outfit at any time of day, and not look out of place.

Women's 1960s casual shoes were canvas flat sneakers that we often refer as the brand name "Keds" today.

Keds were either slip-on loafers or lace-up sneakers in bright, happy colors, chosen to coordinate with an outfit. They were cheap, so women could afford to have one in every color. In the spring and summer, they were worn without socks.
Shop 1960s Style Shoes.
Read more about ALL the 1960s shoe styles here.

1960s Colored tights were worn with short skirts and dresses in a variety of colors and textures: white, black, purple, yellow, green, orange, fishnet, herringbone, ribbed, and lace. Tights covered up ugly knees and didn't cause garter straps like sheer stockings did.

Once pantyhose were perfected, they were the savior of women's legs anywhere. 1960s pantyhose camouflaged hair, bumps, bruises, and wide kneecaps. Even skin tone tights were thick and dark. To go bare-legged with dresses in the '60s was still too immodest. Ironic?

Shop colorful tights and socks inspired by the 1960s.

Tall socks could be worn instead of tights in the sixties. Chunky rib knits with a fold-down cuff were a mainstay for teens and young adults. All primary colors were worn as well as deep textures: waffle, cable knit, ribbed, honeycomb and others.

1960s Jewelry

Colorful women's clothing needed equally colorful 1960s jewelry.

In the early 60s, traditional jewelry continued to favor textured gold, white pastel, and colored pearls. These pretty and safe designs complemented the feminine 1950s style clothing.

The one change to traditional jewelry was the length. Longer pearls and tassel tip necklaces were preferred over the older short styles.

1960s necklaces hung down low on plain front shift dresses but were usually of a matching color so as not to distract from the dress. Round button earrings or small chandelier earrings matched 60s necklaces.

The new youth with their obsession with fake plastics, vinyl, and bold colors favored jewelry inspired by Pop Art.

Geometric shapes made their way onto over-sized dangling earrings.

Large chunky bangles or stacks of thin bracelets jingled up and down bare arms.

Novelty shapes were still popular, but they embraced brighter colors and more comical themes.

The same went for flowers, now made from plastic resins. They were cheerful pastel or primary-colored clusters hanging from 60s necklaces, earrings, and bracelets.
Shop 1960s inspired jewelry.
Learn more about 1960s jewelry styles here.

1960s Hairstyles

Without a hat to call attention to a woman's head, 1960s hairstyles became a new focus for women. The 60s bouffant hairstyle teased hair to new heights... literally.

Guiche curls kissed her cheeks (made possible by a bit of nail polish to keep them pointed to a crisp). All that volume made faces appear smaller and more doll-like.

60s hair length rose from shoulder to chin to cropped above the ears as the decade progressed, only to come crashing down again in the '70s.

See more examples of 1960s hairstyles here.

Headbands were a trendy 60s hair accessory. Simple, wide satin headbands swept hair away from the face.

Hair scarves/bandannas were also trendy in the later half of the decade.

Cloche hats experienced a revival with the mod look. Pillbox hats and flower pot hats were in style with the early 60s looks.

Shop hats, hair accessories, and wigs here.

1960s Makeup

The early 60s makeup saw the exaggerated cat eye and full red lip continue. Eyebrows were shaped into subtle peak instead of a high curve. Pink blush was subtle and almost non-existent.

There were also 1960s makeup styles for the mod look (AKA babydoll face), specialty products for black women, looks for eveningwear, and others.

Powder - Flesh tone.

Blush - Soft rose pink.

Eye Shadow - White-pink, purple, light blue, aqua.

Eye Liner - Dark brown or black, top and bottom lined and extended outwards.

Lipstick - Deep pink, orange-red.

Eyebrows - Shaped into a soft peak.

Learn more about 1960s makeup.

Late 1960s Fashion: The Hippie Look

The late '60s saw a movement of anti-fashion, a political statement that grew so popular it became a mainstream fashion style. Real hippie clothing and hippie fashion were completely different.

Early on in the 1960s movement, festival going hippies wore mainstream fashions such as the shift dress in psychedelic colors of 1966-68. Tye-die was popular in 1968, taking plain white men's undershirts and dyeing them with multiple colors. The more color, the better - and the gaudier the colors, the better!

In 1968-69, the fashion shifted to earth tones, faded denim jeans, embroidered tops and tunics, and handmade accessories such as headbands, friendship bracelets, and hair wraps.

The flower child decoration of patches, embroidery, painting, and peace signs were added by many hippies to make their jeans feel less commercial or to make an anti-war statement.

60s Hippie fashion influenced mainstream designers who turned back to the down to earth, homemade, ethnic arts and crafts styles. Forest green with brown suede, and sunshine yellow with denim blue were signature colors of the ethnic-hippie '60s.

Crochet pieces, suede vests, wood beads, headbands, sandals, and embroidered trim decorated shift dresses or flared jeans. It was a blend of current silhouettes and folk art decoration.

Learn more about 60s hippie fashion influences, history of 60s hippie clothes and check out these 10 hippie outfit ideas.

The 1970s continued the hippie trend into mainstream fashion. The youth-oriented looks turned to the complete opposite - granny style.

Romanticized granny clothes from several generations ago, like pioneer women, returned fashion back to long dresses and sleeves, ruffles, lace trim, small cotton prints, and long hair (worn down this time, not up).

The age of the mini skirt "grew up" and turned into adults, not like their parents but instead like those of generations before, which seemed to have a simple life that hippies idolized.

Continue learning about 1970s fashion here.

More 60s History and Outfit Ideas

Need more help with your 60s outfit? Just ask us anytime!

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1960s fashion history for women. A return to youth, shocking colors, shorter hemlines, pop art and the hippie movement. What did women wear? Answered.

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This gave me more information on the difference between subculture and mainstream culture

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High Culture and Popular Culture

Do you prefer listening to opera or hip hop music? Do you like watching horse racing or NASCAR? Do you read books of poetry or celebrity magazines? In each pair, one type of entertainment is considered high-brow and the other low-brow. Sociologists use the term high culture to describe the pattern of cultural experiences and attitudes that exist in the highest class segments of a society. People often associate high culture with intellectualism, political power, and prestige. In America, high culture also tends to be associated with wealth. Events considered high culture can be expensive and formal-attending a ballet, seeing a play, or listening to a live symphony performance.

The term popular culture refers to the pattern of cultural experiences and attitudes that exist in mainstream society. Popular culture events might include a parade, a baseball game, or the season finale of a television show. Rock and pop music-"pop" is short for "popular"-are part of popular culture. Popular culture is often expressed and spread via commercial media such as radio, television, movies, the music industry, publishers, and corporate-run websites. Unlike high culture, popular culture is known and accessible to most people. You can share a discussion of favorite football teams with a new coworker or comment on American Idol when making small talk in line at the grocery store. But if you tried to launch into a deep discussion on the classical Greek play Antigone, few members of U.S. society today would be familiar with it.

Although high culture may be viewed as superior to popular culture, the labels of high culture and popular culture vary over time and place. Shakespearean plays, considered pop culture when they were written, are now part of our society's high culture. Five hundred years from now, will our descendants associate Breaking Bad with the cultural elite?

Subculture and Counterculture

A subculture is just what it sounds like-a smaller cultural group within a larger culture; people of a subculture are part of the larger culture but also share a specific identity within a smaller group.

Thousands of subcultures exist within the United States. Ethnic and racial groups share the language, food, and customs of their heritage. Other subcultures are united by shared experiences. Biker culture revolves around a dedication to motorcycles. Some subcultures are formed by members who possess traits or preferences that differ from the majority of a society's population. The body modification community embraces aesthetic additions to the human body, such as tattoos, piercings, and certain forms of plastic surgery. In the United States, adolescents often form subcultures to develop a shared youth identity. Alcoholics Anonymous offers support to those suffering from alcoholism. But even as members of a subculture band together, they still identify with and participate in the larger society.

Sociologists distinguish subcultures from countercultures, which are a type of subculture that rejects some of the larger culture's norms and values. In contrast to subcultures, which operate relatively smoothly within the larger society, countercultures might actively defy larger society by developing their own set of rules and norms to live by, sometimes even creating communities that operate outside of greater society.

Cults, a word derived from culture, are also considered counterculture group. The group "Yearning for Zion" (YFZ) in Eldorado, Texas, existed outside the mainstream and the limelight, until its leader was accused of statutory rape and underage marriage. The sect's formal norms clashed too severely to be tolerated by U.S. law, and in 2008, authorities raided the compound and removed more than two hundred women and children from the property.

The Evolution of American Hipster Subculture

Skinny jeans, chunky glasses, and T-shirts with vintage logos-the American hipster is a recognizable figure in the modern United States. Based predominately in metropolitan areas, sometimes clustered around hotspots such as the Williamsburg neighborhood in New York City, hipsters define themselves through a rejection of the mainstream. As a subculture, hipsters spurn many of the values and beliefs of U.S. culture and prefer vintage clothing to fashion and a bohemian lifestyle to one of wealth and power. While hipster culture may seem to be the new trend among young, middle-class youth, the history of the group stretches back to the early decades of the 1900s.

Where did the hipster culture begin? In the early 1940s, jazz music was on the rise in the United States. Musicians were known as "hepcats" and had a smooth, relaxed quality that went against upright, mainstream life. Those who were "hep" or "hip" lived by the code of jazz, while those who were "square" lived according to society's rules. The idea of a "hipster" was born.

The hipster movement spread, and young people, drawn to the music and fashion, took on attitudes and language derived from the culture of jazz. Unlike the vernacular of the day, hipster slang was purposefully ambiguous. When hipsters said, "It's cool, man," they meant not that everything was good, but that it was the way it was.

By the 1950s, the jazz culture was winding down and many traits of hepcat culture were becoming mainstream. A new subculture was on the rise. The "Beat Generation," a title coined by writer Jack Kerouac, were anticonformist and antimaterialistic. They were writers who listened to jazz and embraced radical politics. They bummed around, hitchhiked the country, and lived in squalor.

The lifestyle spread. College students, clutching copies of Kerouac's On the Road, dressed in berets, black turtlenecks, and black-rimmed glasses. Women wore black leotards and grew their hair long. Herb Caen, a San Francisco journalist, used the suffix from Sputnik 1, the Russian satellite that orbited Earth in 1957, to dub the movement's followers "Beatniks."

As the Beat Generation faded, a new, related movement began. It too focused on breaking social boundaries, but it also advocated freedom of expression, philosophy, and love. It took its name from the generations before; in fact, some theorists claim that Beats themselves coined the term to describe their children. Over time, the "little hipsters" of the 1970s became known simply as "hippies."

Today's generation of hipsters rose out of the hippie movement in the same way that hippies rose from Beats and Beats from hepcats. Although contemporary hipsters may not seem to have much in common with 1940s hipsters, the emulation of nonconformity is still there. In 2010, sociologist Mark Greif set about investigating the hipster subculture of the United States and found that much of what tied the group members together was not based on fashion, musical taste, or even a specific point of contention with the mainstream. "All hipsters play at being the inventors or first adopters of novelties," Greif wrote. "Pride comes from knowing, and deciding, what's cool in advance of the rest of the world. Yet the habits of hatred and accusation are endemic to hipsters because they feel the weakness of everyone's position-including their own" (Greif 2010). Much as the hepcats of the jazz era opposed common culture with carefully crafted appearances of coolness and relaxation, modern hipsters reject mainstream values with a purposeful apathy.

Young people are often drawn to oppose mainstream conventions, even if in the same way that others do. Ironic, cool to the point of noncaring, and intellectual, hipsters continue to embody a subculture, while simultaneously impacting mainstream culture.

Cultural Change

As the hipster example illustrates, culture is always evolving. Moreover, new things are added to material culture every day, and they affect nonmaterial culture as well. Cultures change when something new (say, railroads or smartphones) opens up new ways of living and when new ideas enter a culture (say, as a result of travel or globalization).

Innovation: Discovery and Invention

An innovation refers to an object or concept's initial appearance in society-it's innovative because it is markedly new. There are two ways to come across an innovative object or idea: discover it or invent it. Discoveries make known previously unknown but existing aspects of reality. In 1610, when Galileo looked through his telescope and discovered Saturn, the planet was already there, but until then, no one had known about it. When Christopher Columbus encountered America, the land was, of course, already well known to its inhabitants. However, Columbus's discovery was new knowledge for Europeans, and it opened the way to changes in European culture, as well as to the cultures of the discovered lands. For example, new foods such as potatoes and tomatoes transformed the European diet, and horses brought from Europe changed hunting practices of Native American tribes of the Great Plains.

Inventions result when something new is formed from existing objects or concepts-when things are put together in an entirely new manner. In the late 1800s and early 1900s, electric appliances were invented at an astonishing pace. Cars, airplanes, vacuum cleaners, lamps, radios, telephones, and televisions were all new inventions. Inventions may shape a culture when people use them in place of older ways of carrying out activities and relating to others, or as a way to carry out new kinds of activities. Their adoption reflects (and may shape) cultural values, and their use may require new norms for new situations.

Consider the introduction of modern communication technology, such as mobile phones and smartphones. As more and more people began carrying these devices, phone conversations no longer were restricted to homes, offices, and phone booths. People on trains, in restaurants, and in other public places became annoyed by listening to one-sided conversations. Norms were needed for cell phone use. Some people pushed for the idea that those who are out in the world should pay attention to their companions and surroundings. However, technology enabled a workaround: texting, which enables quiet communication and has surpassed phoning as the chief way to meet today's highly valued ability to stay in touch anywhere, everywhere.

When the pace of innovation increases, it can lead to generation gaps. Technological gadgets that catch on quickly with one generation are sometimes dismissed by a skeptical older generation. A culture's objects and ideas can cause not just generational but cultural gaps. Material culture tends to diffuse more quickly than nonmaterial culture; technology can spread through society in a matter of months, but it can take generations for the ideas and beliefs of society to change. Sociologist William F. Ogburn coined the term culture lag to refer to this time that elapses between the introduction of a new item of material culture and its acceptance as part of nonmaterial culture (Ogburn 1957).

Culture lag can also cause tangible problems. The infrastructure of the United States, built a hundred years ago or more, is having trouble supporting today's more heavily populated and fast-paced life. Yet there is a lag in conceptualizing solutions to infrastructure problems. Rising fuel prices, increased air pollution, and traffic jams are all symptoms of culture lag. Although people are becoming aware of the consequences of overusing resources, the means to support changes takes time to achieve.

Diffusion and Globalization

The integration of world markets and technological advances of the last decades have allowed for greater exchange between cultures through the processes of globalization and diffusion. Beginning in the 1980s, Western governments began to deregulate social services while granting greater liberties to private businesses. As a result, world markets became dominated by multinational companies in the 1980s, a new state of affairs at that time. We have since come to refer to this integration of international trade and finance markets as globalization. Increased communications and air travel have further opened doors for international business relations, facilitating the flow not only of goods but also of information and people as well (Scheuerman 2014 (revised)). Today, many U.S. companies set up offices in other nations where the costs of resources and labor are cheaper. When a person in the United States calls to get information about banking, insurance, or computer services, the person taking that call may be working in another country.

Alongside the process of globalization is diffusion, or the spread of material and nonmaterial culture. While globalization refers to the integration of markets, diffusion relates to a similar process in the integration of international cultures. Middle-class Americans can fly overseas and return with a new appreciation of Thai noodles or Italian gelato. Access to television and the Internet has brought the lifestyles and values portrayed in U.S. sitcoms into homes around the globe. Twitter feeds from public demonstrations in one nation have encouraged political protesters in other countries. When this kind of diffusion occurs, material objects and ideas from one culture are introduced into another.

Summary

Sociologists recognize high culture and popular culture within societies. Societies are also comprised of many subcultures-smaller groups that share an identity. Countercultures reject mainstream values and create their own cultural rules and norms. Through invention or discovery, cultures evolve via new ideas and new ways of thinking. In many modern cultures, the cornerstone of innovation is technology, the rapid growth of which can lead to cultural lag. Technology is also responsible for the spread of both material and nonmaterial culture that contributes to globalization.

Short Answer

Glossary

countercultures

groups that reject and oppose society's widely accepted cultural patterns

culture lag

the gap of time between the introduction of material culture and nonmaterial culture's acceptance of it

diffusion

the spread of material and nonmaterial culture from one culture to another

discoveries

things and ideas found from what already exists

globalization

the integration of international trade and finance markets

high culture

the cultural patterns of a society's elite

innovations

new objects or ideas introduced to culture for the first time

inventions

a combination of pieces of existing reality into new forms

popular culture

mainstream, widespread patterns among a society's population

subcultures

groups that share a specific identification, apart from a society's majority, even as the members exist within a larger society

Consider some of the specific issues or concerns of your generation. Are any ideas countercultural? What subcultures have emerged from your generation? How have the issues of your generation expressed themselves culturally? How has your generation made its mark on society's collective culture?

What are some examples of cultural lag that are present in your life? Do you think technology affects culture positively or negatively? Explain.

Further Research

The Beats were a counterculture that birthed an entire movement of art, music, and literature-much of which is still highly regarded and studied today. The man responsible for naming the generation was Jack Kerouac; however, the man responsible for introducing the world to that generation was John Clellon Holmes, a writer often lumped in with the group. In 1952 he penned an article for the New York Times Magazine titled, "This Is the Beat Generation." Read that article and learn more about Clellon Holmes and the Beats: http://openstaxcollege.org/l/The-Beats

Popular culture meets counterculture in this as Oprah Winfrey interacts with members of the Yearning for Zion cult. Read about it here: http://openstaxcollege.org/l/Oprah

References

Greif, Mark. 2010. "The Hipster in the Mirror." New York Times, November 12. Retrieved February 10, 2012 ( http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/14/books/review/Greif-t.html?pagewanted=1).

Ogburn, William F. 1957. "Cultural Lag as Theory." Sociology & Social Research 41(3):167-174.

Rogers, Everett M. 1962. Diffusion of Innovations. Glencoe: Free Press.

Scheuerman, William. 2010. "Globalization." The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by E. N. Revised 2014. Zalta, Summer. Retrieved February 10, 2012 ( http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2010/entries/globalization/).

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This gave me the basis of what a subculture is and how they are formed

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This skills assessment showed that I am a generally motivated individual to work and scored high in areas of development which I believe is accurate as I am proactive in trying to upskill if I am not happy in a role, or confident in something.

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This gave insight into the key items of S/S 21 

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This article allowed us to identify the trends of SS21 and again, see how our brands were comparing in terms of trend & fashionability. Were they on trend or not.. This helped us what to look out for in store and understand how fashionable, and trendy is that particular brand.

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Comparing &OS to ASOS and their engagement online

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Comparing &OS to ASOS and their engagement online

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Total Visits 79.21M 4.11% Avg. Visit Duration 00:06:34 Estimated Data Verify Your Website Traffic Sources Find out which are the main sources of desktop traffic for asos.com.April 2021 analysis asos.com's marketing strategy is focused on Direct with 46.76% of traffic coming from this channel, followed by Search with 41.10% On desktop Get Full Comparison with SimilarWeb Pro Outbrain has been using SimilarWeb for over a year and it's been instrumental for our ability to analyze our competitive environment, benchmark our performance, keep track of industry trends, and generate new leads.

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Interview with COS on their store, their brand, customer & future plans

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Interview with COS on their store, their brand, customer & future plans

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This interview covered several aspects of the brand & helps me understand more of what they are about & who they are targeting, but also their plans for the brand in the future.

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Suzy Annetta, editor in chief of Design Anthology sat down with Atul Pathak of COS on the occasion of their latest store opening in Pacific Place, Hong Kong
Design Anthology : Why open another store in Hong Kong? Obviously we love the fact that you are, but I just wonder why the priority of Hong Kong as opposed to other cities in Asia, is it some kind of special connection? Or is it just the brand is doing so damn well here?

Atul Pathak: There's definitely a connection and of course we are super happy with the performance of the brand in Hong Kong. It's really as simple as that, if I am honest with you. And I think location is always of the highest importance to us. Pacific Place is a mall we have really found quite desirable from day one, since we opened on Queen's Road. The opportunity to open a store here is pretty much a no-brainer. I think the aesthetic of the mall itself is stunning, it is one of the most beautifully designed malls I have seen anywhere. So the synergy between their vision of the mall and what we'd like to have for COS is very similar.
Are there plans to expand further throughout Asia?
Yes definitely! We just opened in Malaysia in December, so now we have Malaysia, we have Singapore, of course you know we have South Korea, and Japan. We are doing very well in Mainland China as well. We actually have another store opening in Beijing tomorrow, in the China World mall. So Asia for us is of supreme importance. The responses have been super positive, and of course I think there is a lot more potential for growth. But we have to be comfortable with the pace of growth, we have to feel the location is right for us, and of course more importantly there is a customer base that is interested and likes the brand.
Sure, well we have friends in Manila and other cities dying for COS to open there...just an FYI.
That's good to know. You know customer feedback is one of the things that we often refer back to because if we are not accommodating what our customers like and want then of course there's no point. We listen to a lot of what we hear and what we see, and where we take our inspiration from, and that affects how we grow.
So that leads me to the next question. How would you describe the typical COS customer, or is there a typical COS customer?
There kind of is and isn't really. We tend to talk in terms of interests and mindset more than anything else. The world that we get the bulk of our inspiration from is of course the design world overall. So things like contemporary art and architecture, product design and graphics and just design culture. So it could be film, dance, performance, all those types of environments are so inspirational to us and effects what we do in terms of the collection and the way we design the stores, the packaging, and all that side of things. So we talk about the core customer being very much interested in that world as much as we are, and not just in certain areas but it's actually kind of informs their entire lifestyle so to speak, so that they're just as concerned about what they wear on their back as what they have in their house, the type of furniture they buy, the cars they drive, and I think they have very strong aesthetic vision and I like to think we do as well. So I think that's where that kind of dialogue between the brand and the customer comes in. So we talk a lot about the core customer being interested in that world. Being culturally aware, and having that kind of, how to describe it, it's like a big city mindset, but you don't necessarily have to live in a big city to have that type of mentality.
That's interesting. I think you've actually done really well. I feel like the entire creative population of Hong Kong is constantly decked out in COS head to toe. So I guess it sort of brings me to the next question. I actually had the pleasure of meeting the two creative directors here in Hong Kong.
Yes, when we did the André Fu collaboration, that's right.
Yes, and found them to be incredibly inspiring and when they were talking about their creative process. So how do you go about making the brand or the product continually so timeless? I think that's one thing that really appeals to me, that the pieces are just such great cool wardrobe staples. You know what I mean? They are timeless in design. And that's one of the things that I love about it, that it's not going to be so seasonal. It's very refreshing to see that from the fashion world. So how do you go about doing that?
That's very flattering to hear, of course, thank you. To be honest with you, it's intrinsic to the core brand DNA, and that was really the purpose of the brand from the very start, to provide clothing that feels contemporary and modern. But also has this sense of longevity. So of course when we talk about that kind of thing, an example is the COS iconic product, the classic white shirt, and always being able to find the classics, like the chino style pant. But each season it's revisited. So it could be a type of fabric we use where an evolution happens, or it could be a specific seam or it could be the length. Each season we feature what we can see to be timeless clothing, but again we evolve, we change it as the season progresses, so that it always feel current but the white shirt is the white shirt. So you know we always talk about modernity and not just trying to be modern but actually the philosophical sense of modernity is to look at your techniques and constantly revisit them to see how they can be improved. So that's something that we do in every level of the brand, on a daily basis. We call them the round table discussions, and we will sit around the table and it's all of us, but the bulk of it is the creative team - the creative directors and the designers. But it's something we feel is intrinsic to all areas of the brand. So it could be interiors, we have our own interior department. And they design all the stores and do all the facades. I'm not sure if you've seen images of the store in Seoul...
Yes, it's quite unique and different looking...
And the one in Toronto is amazing, with the charred wood on the outside.
Yes I did see that, that is amazing.
We are always, each of us in different areas, trying to look at how the brand is perceived and how we feel we can keep evolving and create this sense of balance between the timelessness, but also with the modernity as well. But like I said its intrinsic core DNA and so again it's that something we all, when you join the brand really, when you come in house, it's part of the COS culture I would say.
So that brings me to the environmental side of things and sustainability. How much of that is the core part of business and how important is that to COS?
Well, it is of supreme importance, as it should be. And of course sustainability is a journey, which we have started. But again if we hark back to when we first developed the brand it's something that we felt was an important core value. It's this concept of timelessness again, and the longevity of the product.
Right, making something that actually lasts...
Making something that lasts...yes. Quality for us is huge importance to us, but it's a balance of quality and affordability. So making sure it's accessible for a bulk of people to buy into our kind of design aesthetic. Also we look into new fabrics and production techniques that will help the garment to last for a long time. And of course the aesthetic itself, as you pointed out before, that sense of timelessness. And the fact we're not so trend-led. So they can be worn far beyond what some people would consider to be a seasonal garment. You see that in the COS office a lot actually, I'll often walk in, and I'll say to one of the team "is that new?" and they'll say, "No, it's from 7 years ago." So people are constantly revisiting what we had. Actually I do a lot. I had one shirt, which is my favourite, I got it in 2010, and I wear it sparingly now because I want to keep wearing it as long as possible...
You need to get the designers to reissue it, so you can get another...
Yes! So again, it's inherent. I think from day one we talked about longevity of the garments through quality, the type of fabric you use and the making process itself. And as you know we are part of a bigger organisation where the concept of sustainability is enormously important, and our CEO Karl-Johan Persson set very high targets that all of us have to work towards in the next coming years. And our "10", I do not know if you are familiar with our 10 year anniversary collection. It's available in our Queen's Road store. We explored the concept of making as much use of the fabric as possible...
Yes I read about that. There's a lot less wastage.
It's actually more a question of the fabric we use, because the off-cuts can be recycled or used to create something else. But again, looking to the future and how we can do this in terms of technique and moving it forward, and I think the idea of using as much of the fabric as possible is something that actually is even better. I think that the idea is to keep improving, season after season.
The DA team are not only big fans of the clothing, but we're also a big fan of the magazine...
Oh, that's good, thank you.
But I'm kind of curious why you guys publish it? I think it's a very interesting insight into the COS culture. What is the decision making process behind doing it?
The magazine really came about for the very strong reason of being able to share with the customer. So as I mentioned before, again a lot of our inspiration comes from world design and again not just a specific area. It could be anywhere from art, architecture, to product, to graphics, various things, that our design team looks at all over the world. We always had a section on the website called Things which we still do, which talks about a lot of things that we see from over the place. Hopefully also it's there to share, educate and even support emerging talent. And that's really why it came about, to be able to talk about the COS inspiration, and personality to the customer, hopefully in a credible, beautiful format. We talk again a lot about tactility, and that's also a reason why we felt about paper magazine would do that...
Okay, I was just about to ask you why print not digital. The tactility is important...
All the features are available online of course, for those who aren't able to get their hands on a printed copy. It's not that straight forward, we don't just have a section called "magazine", it's all there, but it's spread throughout the site. There are interviews, and the features and the images are all represented online as well...
Well, I have managed to get a copy of the last few issues. The latest one particularly...
Yes, that one... So it's about having a direct kind of link and conversation with the customer and being able to, not just to bring them to our world, but also again help them understand and formulate the areas of design that we find interesting and hopefully they find interesting as well. Some of them are already very familiar with who we represent, and why we represent them and we always hear a lot of positive things about the magazine from Hans Ulrich Obrist from Serpentine and...
Yes, he was just here last week for the Art Basel.
He's brilliant and he often refers back to things that we've had in magazine from years and years ago. "I remember when you featured this person, and this person is now doing this" and we're all like "oh wow, that's amazing!"
Actually I just read his interview with the duo from Studio Swine.
Yes, I think it was last S/S issue that they were featured. And now of course we are working with them on the installation at Salone in Milan.
So why Salone? As a fashion brand, why participate in a design event in Milan? It's kind of interesting to see how a lot more non-design brands feel the importance of having a presence there. I'm wondering what is the philosophy behind that, and the decision making process of how you choose to work with the people that you do.
Well, it's our sixth partnership with Salone this year. So we have been there since 2011, and its incredible to see the journey of not just what we've presented, but actually Salone itself. It seems to grow each year and becomes even more special. I think the original idea behind it was going back, as you mentioned, to the D word, the design world that just runs through every aspect of what we do and the way we do it.

The very first year we didn't actually even have a store in Italy when we first chose to have a presentation there. So that's actually quite interesting. But I think we genuinely felt that we were already familiar with the concept of Salone and the concept of the fair, and of course the fact that all of the Milan seems to participate. It wasn't just about the fair in the convention centre itself, it was actually that the whole city comes alive and recognises the importance of design. So that is really the principle reason that the city itself becomes such a design hub. It's not just about going to the fair, it's actually about looking at everything around it as well. And of course it's very international, and we just felt again a lot of the people who may or may not be familiar with COS as a brand would certainly be coming into that city, so again it could be an opportunity for us to, again, not just gain our inspiration, but actually be inspired enough to create some kind of partnership or collaboration and have people come and see what we can do and how we can do it and also again to generate feedback and dialogue with design people and of course the general public, existing COS customers and hopefully the new ones as well really.

It really was a talking point, sharing, giving something back as well. Hopefully you will see it next week and maybe you will feel the same vibe. But it's very much about just creating an interesting experience now more than anything else, to create that kind of the feeling the people have maybe when they are not so familiar with us and walking into the store for the first time. And hopefully they are quite pleasantly surprised, especially when their friend's told them about it or something like that. We sometimes get the feedback that "oh, we hadn't heard about COS before, but we went in, it was such a nice experience for us." So we often think of the word experience as well when we refer back to how we want the brand to be conveyed. That's really, what I like to think what we were able to kind of achieve with Salone.

I mean in terms of the partnership, again, it's of supreme important to us. We had very different disciplines over the last few years. We've worked with design studios, we've worked with architects, and even this kind of element kind of artistic involvement as well. But they are all quite different in their field...
And that's a deliberate choice?
It's deliberate in the sense that, we've always partnered with people whose work we actually looked at over the last few years. So Karin, our creative director, very much feels we should work with the people that have inspired us and have given us so many ideas. So we think if they help us, give us some inspiration, perhaps they would be able to also create something that feels like the COS experience in this environment as well. We've been very lucky because everybody we approached to say "we've been so inspired by your work, would you consider of working with us on this?" They've all come back and said "yes".
Fantastic! I wasn't in Milan last year but it was a partnership with Sou Fujimoto, right? I heard that was one of the most photographed installations. Very much looking forward to this year.
Yes, it was interesting, very much so. I think this year's collaboration with Alex and Azusa of Studio Swine will be super interesting.
I can't wait to meet them. They sound really, really interesting. Unlike anyone else. Fascinating couple. Okay, last question. COS just celebrated its 10 year anniversary, what do you see for the next ten years? I know that's a very broad question...
Well we're always looking forward as much as we are revisiting, but I think we still feel very excited about the prospect of the brand in different areas. We talked a lot about the concept of accessibility, so we still have probably plenty of areas we look into, in terms of retail growth and new markets to look into. And it's always nice to hear about that your friend is waiting for us in the Philippines! Of course we are excited to hopefully at some stage be able to go there. I think there are many other markets that we have been very fortunate enough to get some feedback on as well. So from a business perspective that's really the areas we're looking towards.

There are also so many other international creative environments that we would ideally want to participate in, and talking about accessibility, the experiences we create at Salone going further afield.

We are also our own best and worst critics, so we often look inwards to see how we're doing, how we can improve. Going back to the philosophical concept of modernity, what are we doing, how are we doing it, can we make it better. And I think when it comes to looking forward, it's about doing things the best way we can do it. And looking to focus on who we are and what we're doing. Giving the best back to the customer. And if we can do that for the next ten years we'll be very happy.

As told to / Suzy Annetta

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Suzy Annetta, editor in chief of Design Anthology sat down with Atul Pathak of COS on the occasion of their latest store opening in Pacific Place, Hong Kong Design Anthology : Why open another store in Hong Kong?

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This article supported what I saw in store in terms of store layout, design & inspiration tables & areas.

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Windows displays and in store installations for & Other Stories - amélie rousseau

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Other Stories is a one-stop styling destination filled with collections from three design ateliers in Paris, Stockholm and Los Angeles. The company grew from the wish to give women the freedom of expression through one brand. Here is few...

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This in depth report on Turkey allowed me to gain insight on how components of the PESTLE may impact sourcing from the country. It was a really detailed report & I was able to identify what I thought was the most appropriate points to include for the assignment in terms of sourcing garments, as it was generalised for trading. I learned a lot about the frictions between Turkey and other country's & its current EU membership process suspension due to human right allegations & conflict. When analysing this I considered how this may affect choosing Turkey for sourcing. It made me think that this is a generalisation for the whole country & I thought about measure that Zara could put in place to ensure that their brand could do / and are doing with suppliers to ensure human rights are maintained.

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As Zara is the main retailer for the Inditex Group, I analysed what they are currently doing with their suppliers to maintain human rights when I was conducting the PESTLE & discover how Zara overcome some of the issues Turkey has. I really appreciated the detail they mentioned & the systems & procedures that they have in place to ensure suppliers are compliant with Zara's values to the brand & to their consumer. I found it helpful also to know that they provide so much detail for consumers who are concerned about the complete supply chain of garments with the brand.

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All Inditex suppliers must meet our strict standards of social and environmental responsibility, and undergo regular audits to check compliance.

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This gave insight into the sustainability measure Zara have in place for their JoinLife collection. The garments I chose would be part of this sustainable collection by using some recycled fabrics like cotton, polyester & polyamide. This page was really helpful as they cover a range of sustainable topics like biodiversity, raw materials, suppliers, water etc. & they discussed what they were currently doing & their plans for the future which helped me for this assignment when considering the sustainability measures of the brand.

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This article helped me when considering what I would change going forward when sourcing in the future. 3D printing is more sustainable for the future as it reduces waste, can accommodate small batch orders efficiently which might benefit trial orders & alleviate cost which may help with margins further down the line. However these systems are expensive and they are still in their infancy but I find it really interesting for the future that this could be in place. However the economic state of many country's cannot support these technologies so for now, many retailers will have to continue to use large factories to mass produce garments.

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Imagine you have an event with nothing to wear. Forget panic shopping - you simply calmly open your computer and download a digital file for a cute dress. After loading up your 3D printer, you send the file and it prints your dress to your exact measurements (all within a few hours).

Sounds too good to be true? There are quite a few innovations bringing us closer to 3D printed apparel being an everyday occurance. Plus, many large and small brands are incorporating this waste-free technology into their manufacturing. Not only would 3D printing have great benefits for both consumers and brands, but it has impressive potential in terms of sustainability.

In this article by guest author Laurice Wardini, dive into the future of 3D printing.

3D printing could help reduce (or even completely eliminate) many negative environmental aspects of the fashion industry...

11.1 million tons of textiles were thrown into landfills in 2017

On average, textiles take 200+ years to break down in landfills

Textiles emit methane while they break down (a harmful greenhouse gas)

In regular tailoring methods, 15% - 30% of fabric is wasted

On average, 2,700 liters of water are required to produce one cotton t-shirt

An estimated 20% of overall water pollution comes from the textile industry

Fast fashion factories cause damage to nearby communities (i.e. polluting drinking water and damaging ecosystems)

How could 3D printing help?

It eliminates waste and could use materials that are less water intensive than cotton (as well as other natural and synthetic fabrics). The material used would typically be recyclable and easily reusable, helping reduce the amount of clothing thrown into landfills. Additionally, at-home printers can help reduce the impact of large factories.

Danit Peleg - a capsule collection of 3D printed garments made at home

Benefits for Brands

Small batch sizes - Eliminate the need to wait weeks (or even months) for inventory shipments from overseas.

Quicker to market - Typically, new brands have to go through quite a rigorous process before they're ready to start shipping orders. 3D printing can help make this a much quicker and easier process (easier to create samples, no need to wait weeks for inventory shipments, etc.)

Customisation - 3D printing allows for much easier customisation (such as specially tailored sizing).

Quick printing - Out of stock? No longer a problem. Print your garment in under 24 hours (many startup 3D printing brands create the garment after you place your order).

Minimal inventory - On a similar note, brands can eliminate the need to purchase huge orders of inventory and could keep a minimal amount of products on-hand.

Improved fabrics - Fabrics are in production that will be more breathable and easier to move around in (plus, no wrinkles).

Recyclable clothing - 3D printed apparel will likely be much easier to recycle and reuse than current materials.

The Flyprint trainer from Nike tested by Eliod Kipchode in Kenya

Big Brands Currently Using 3D Printing

Although it might sound like a fantasy, there are quite a few large brands already utilising 3D printing.

Nike - Created the first 3D printed upper, plus they are already using the technology in smaller components [ read more on the Flyprint here]

Adidas - Designing 3D printed midsoles

New Balance - Created the first mass-produced 3D printed midsoles

NASA - Experimenting with 3D printed chainmail to protect astronauts

Victoria's Secret - Using the technology in lingerie runway shows
Nike's Flyprint uppers on the printer ready to be sewn up

Innovative Designers + Brands

Danit Peleg - Created the world's first purchasable 3D printed fashion collection in 2015, all from her own home. She also has an online course to teach the world about using this technology

Julia Daviy - Designs commercially available clothes and bags made using 3D printing

Sylvia Heisel - Designs purchasable, custom, made to order 3D printed coats ($12,000) and dresses ($4,000) that can also be composted [ read more on that project here]

Sylvia Heisel 'Minnie' BioDress

Ice & Kostika - This startup brand shows that, despite the current fabric restrictions, incredible wearable products can be created using 3D printing. Although their shoes look like something of the future, you can purchase them now ($500 - $5,500 per pair)
Close ups of Danit Peleg's flexible 3D printed clothing

Ministry of Supply - Uses a more affordable combination of 3D printing and 3D knitting in their business wear, resulting in 35% less waste ($45 - $300 per item)

3D Knitting vs 3D Printing

Another innovative technology that's becoming more widely used is 3D knitting. These similar terms often get confused, but 3D printing and 3D knitting are two different things.

3D Knitting

This technology essentially automates the regular knitting process. While industrial knitting machines have been around for decades, newer digital machines allow you to send files for it to automatically knit. Previously, such machines were expensive and primarily used by large companies. However, new companies (such as Kniterate) are working to bring the technology into everyday households. This will help reduce waste.

While 3D knitting helps minimise waste and bring production into homes, it still requires the use of fabrics that impact the environment. That said, 3D knitting is currently more accessible than 3D printing and allows for easier, less expensive customized clothing that minimises waste. Many brands are currently utilising 3D knitting to help reduce waste.

3D Printing

These machines work by heating up certain materials, then forming objects layer-by-layer. Most current materials are various forms of plastic or metal.

The Future of 3D Printed Fashion

Smart clothes - Intel and other tech brands have created prototype smart clothing with 3D printing (incorporating technology like mood sensors, color-changing features, attention span trackers, etc.)

Download & Print Clothes At Home - Danit Peleg and other industry experts believe we're moving towards a future where we will print our own digital clothing files from home with ease.

Written and information sourced by Laurice Wardini, the founder of ClothedUp @officialclothedup
The lack of flexible and comfortable material is the only current roadblock to using 3D printing in everyday clothes. It will be much more widely used once such materials are created (many innovators are working on this, with frequent improvements).

Regardless, the technology is being used for many other purposes. You can find 3D printing in futuristic runway styles, costume design, furniture, everyday accessories, and even by big brands for small components (such as shoe brands and leather brands).

Tune in to this podcast episode from Vogue Business on how 3D tech can transform the fashion design process, and this article on how made to order business models are exploding due to the innovations in fashion tech. You can also learn more about 3D Printing and troubleshoot common issues here.

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What are the benefits of using 3D Printing in Fashion?

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Imagine you have an event with nothing to wear. Forget panic shopping - you simply calmly open your computer and download a digital file for a cute dress. After loading up your 3D printer, you send the file and it prints your dress to your exact measurements (all within a few hours).

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This report was really interesting when considering sustainable measures in terms of packaging. I learned a lot about poly bags & their use. I considered not using poly bags to reduce waste but they provide a function for protecting clothes & when considering the overall process of the garment journey, a polybag is not as detrimental to the environment that people think. It discussed that even if the garments are delivered to consumers without poly bags, that they were more than likely just removed at warehouse. I found that very interesting & I used them in the sourcing assignment to protect the clothes knowing they do not negatively impact the environment as we might think.

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This assignment shows the sourcing strategy for a basic & a trend item from 2 different countries. One short lead time & one long lead time, with a PESTLE analysis for one country & an in depth evaluation for my decisions & considerations going forward.

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Authentication Form - Sourcing Strategy Assignment 

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Authentication Form - Sourcing Strategy Assignment 

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This report showed me the colour mix of Zara's current product offering which allowed me to focus on certain colours. For example, black is second highest in the % mix for SS21 so I was able to apply this information along with WGSN to justify why black will be the dominant colour in my range for A/W21

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This report identified the categories which have the most amount of products for Zara currently. This helped me when developing the range and deciding how much product, ROS, store allocations etc of categories. For example, tops had the most number of products in the % assortment mix, so I used this information to justify why I have 10 option in Tops.

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This professional email was sent post a meeting with Blue & Co, detailing the minutes, outcomes, agreements & future opportunities between ASOS & Blue & Co.

I think this email is short, concise and the key point are visual.

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This assignment shows how I developed my range using information & analytics gathered in my trend report. I was then able to create this range through Photoshop where I could add my trend colours & show evidence of product development on some products where I wanted a desired product for my range based on my trend findings. I believe I have created a well balanced commercial range for my chosen brand, Zara.

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Range Plan - Winter Foraging - Cat Hayes

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This Excel spreadsheet details the products within my range, their description, fabric composition, COO, landed cost price, margins, number of stores items are allocated to, the cost of buying at retail etc. This helps me identify which items were going to drive the most sales & achieve margins. It also details the COO mix, colour mix, category mix etc. And also shows evidence of a comp shop of 7 retailers selling a puffer jacket - a key item in my range.

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My CV scored 89% in the CV 360 tool, some failed points were noted that I was unable to change - such as spelling mistakes, capitalisation and grammar but these are all correct so I cannot change it. I had resubmitted it several times after editing and kept to the advice recommended by the tool & Teresa to bring it up from 86%.

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This is my CV which has been generated for a role in buying. I have 11 years of work experience so I tried to pick out key skills and experiences that would be most suitable to a BAA.

I added 'Relevant Work Experience' above my 'Nursing Experience' even though this means it is nit in chronological order. However I thought the skills at my family business were most relevant to buying.

I think I did well in keeping my CV concise and portraying key skills that I have developed from work and at the FRA. It is completely different to any CV I have written which I am proud of from the skills & advice I have learned at the FRA.

I am always open for feedback on my CV and ways I can improve it in order to be successful searching for a job.

The CV does not match the cover letters job role as I wanted to keep it to buying.

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https://www.linkedin.com/in/catriona-hayes-46387a1aa/

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This cover letter followed the steps & guidance from the Cover Letter Builder on the FRA Careers Platform. I noted that a good cover letter is between 150 and 300 words, mine is currently 242. I think I could definitely add in more skills and experience as I went by the cover letter builder, I could only have a certain amount per section. Due to this I tried to be more concise with what I was trying to say.

I did not see any BAA roles in any luxury retailer on LinkedIn. I saw this role advertised and I would love to apply and get the opportunity to work for a luxury retailer and gain some experience.
I tried to apply the skills & qualities they wanted for the role and adapt them to what I have already. It is for a Sales Associate Role at BALENCIAGA.

Ideally I would like a role at Harrod's or Selfridge's but they had no vacancies at this time.

The link is attached below.

https://www.linkedin.com/jobs/view/2573851488/?eBP=CwEAAAF502t2Jrnmkqfiz6nlXPpuxjNcPzJoIuG1oHd6xZubxsR635ghiTeyfR18PoEQCsC-626Lgf8lUhDU0UoynODVTTEoNKrDPekSLqdMKiDKnxXAitHy29vfXgfvOGXUbKrJuP-dlYhpfOA5fTHRICnIoNuOAW9dyicmV8-WWLsD6dmHpXRYWVpkuZ40r7lXRhISmg3DLRHn7zQ7xWNCEzxjUYjjJ0erPcoRR78PLqf7HUM-Gmhtd3t6DvylgmnkzIPWyCv-dgBoSAhducmpv1aU6byLXhTyXYmdrGane1oKaAJvEUbczdkepF87pBCLe98A-ZipqLijvrn4-n8t7tVDbw&recommendedFlavor=ACTIVELY_HIRING_COMPANY&refId=DjZb8paAIygBYxwc6mUfpg%3D%3D&trackingId=JAhCisvxh2dfcrYHpG1UZg%3D%3D&trk=flagship3_search_srp_jobs

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This is an example of an interview that was poorly prepared for where the individual would not have got the job due to the way it was answered. I think this is a fairly realistic example of how an unsuccessful interview would go.

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This interview example gives detail on some of the key strength that someone could discuss at an interview in order to be successful. The individual mentions previous experience & skills that could be applied to this role. Also shows evidence of researching the brand and shows excitement for wanting the role.

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This is a SWOT analysis I undertook for ZARA. I undertook extensive research to conduct this however looking back I would consider more suggestions for product opportunities. This could be to expand their sustainable JoinLife collection where they use sustainable & recycled fabrics. They could also consider more capsule trend collections as currently I feel Zara's SS21 collection is predominately trend / print heavy  that won't see into next season.

Having the knowledge and skills to conduct a SWOT will help me for future careers and I will be able to do them for interviews etc.

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This is the PEST analysis for ZARA which I thought showed thorough research on the brand. If I was to do it again, I would expand more on the digitisation components under 'Social'. I would discuss more about online shopping & social media. For example, their online shopping sales soared during COVID-19 months which is attribute due to the ease of ordering products to your home, try on in the comfort of your home. This option is crucial for some people who are still anxious about going to brick & mortar stores, but also who have become accustomed to home deliveries & will benefit the brand to have a strong online presence. Their social media following is huge with hauls from influencers adding links & swipe ups to items which directs customers to the app.

By carrying out this SWOT has helped me become more commercially aware & developed skills & knowledge to be able to undertake more in the future.

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My Myer Briggs personality test result was Turbulent-Consul which meaning I am loyal, have good practical skills, in touch with my behaviours, enjoy being with others. My weaknesses here would be that I am vulnerable to criticism and can sometimes be too selfless.