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This report gave me an insight to the trends for the upcoming Autumn/Winter season. Based on this report, I originally selected the trend 'Peak Performance' for my trend report, however I found it difficult to build upon this report and find extra information on this trend for 2022, as it was an already popular trend in 2021, done by brands such as Miu Miu.

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Trendstop Pantone Colour Palette & Swatches A/W 22/23

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Trendstop Pantone Colour Palette & Swatches A/W 22/23

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I used this to gather information on the colour palette for the AW 22 season. I discovered that bright colours and neutral colours are the most popular for the upcoming season

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WGSN Womens Footwear Key Items A/W 22/23

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WGSN Womens Footwear Key Items A/W 22/23

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Once I had chosen my new trend of 'Cozy up' & 'Supreme comfort', I wanted to look at the key items for different product categories to see if any related to my trend. I found here that the slipper silhouette was a key item for A/W 22 as well as being relevant for my trend

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WGSN Women's Soft Accessories Key Items A/W 22/23

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WGSN Women's Soft Accessories Key Items A/W 22/23

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Once I had chosen my new trend of 'Cozy up' & 'Supreme comfort', I wanted to look at the key items for different product categories to see if any related to my trend. I found here that the balaclava's, hoods and padding were key for A/W 22 as well as being relevant for my trend

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I used this to gather information on the colour palette for the AW 22 season. I discovered that bright colours and neutral colours are the most popular for the upcoming season

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Once I had chosen my new trend of 'Cozy up' & 'Supreme comfort', I wanted to look at the key textiles for the season to see if any related to my trend. I found here that the brushed wool was a key textile for A/W 22 as well as being relevant for my trend. It also introduced me to RMS Mohair, which is a sustainable alternative to mohair wool which comes from the Angoran goat and has ethical issues

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I looked at this review for my comp shop to see if my brand or if any of its competitors were keeping up with the colour trends for the season, the main ones being dopamine brights, and neutral whites

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I looked at this review for my comp shop to see if my brand or if any of its competitors were keeping up with the trends for the Spring/Summer season which would currently be in store as I completed my comp shop

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I looked at this to compare it to my EDITED pattern analysis for my brand and its competitors to see if the patterns they currently have on their website are on trend

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WGSN Women's Denim Key Items Pre-Summer 22

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WGSN Women's Denim Key Items Pre-Summer 22

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I decided on the flared jeans as my trend item for my comp shop and decided to go on WGSN to see if they mentioned anything about the flared jeans. WGSN mentioned flared jeans being an emerging trend for pre-summer which is the time we are while the comp shop was being carried out

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WGSN Women's Jackets & Outerwear Key Items Pre-Summer 22

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WGSN Women's Jackets & Outerwear Key Items Pre-Summer 22

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I decided on the black blazer as my core item for my comp shop and decided to go on WGSN to see if they mentioned anything about the blazer. WGSN mentioned blazers being a trend for pre-summer, which is the time we are while the comp shop was being carried out, despite being on a decline compared to last year

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WSGN Women's Outerwear Core Items S/S 22

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WSGN Women's Outerwear Core Items S/S 22

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WGSN noted the blazer as being a core outerwear item this season which was great as I used the black blazer as my core item for my comp shop

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I used the ACORN website to help identify the target customer for ZARA. I knew that ZARA targeted both Gen Z and Gen Y, so I found a profile that I believe best describes them both

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I created a survey and placed it on my Instagram in hopes of gaining an insight into the ZARA customer. I asked that people who shop at ZARA fill out the survey and I got 22 responses in a 24 hour period. I asked demographic questions, as well as other questions including how they like to shop at ZARA, how they find the website, sustainability and the features of the ZARA app. I believe that the results could with information for my customer profile and my SWOT analysis

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I looked on EDITED for their trends for A/W 22 and discovered 'Cozy up' which I chose for my trend report as I believed that it would be a good match for my brand and I felt more confident about this choice as researched further. WGSN also mentioned this trend but under a different name 'Supreme Comfort'

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The ZARA website was used to gain information for the brand report and comp shop. They had links to their sustainability page also which provided an insight on the stops they taking towards a more sustainable future

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I looked at the ASOS website as a competitor for ZARA

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ASOS | Online Shopping for the Latest Clothes & Fashion

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Discover the latest fashion and trends in menswear and womenswear at ASOS. Shop this season's collection of clothes, accessories, beauty and more.

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I looked at the Bershka website as a competitor for ZARA

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I looked at the H&M website as a competitor for ZARA

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H&M | Online Fashion, Homeware & Kids Clothes | H&M GB

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H&M is your shopping destination for fashion, home, beauty, kids' clothes and more. Browse the latest collections and find quality pieces at affordable prices.

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I looked at the Mango website as a competitor for ZARA

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Discover the latest trends in Mango fashion, footwear and accessories. Shop the best outfits for this season at our online store.

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The Inditex website gave me an insight into ZARA as a brand as well as what Inditex have earned with the last year. I was also able to use this website to look into Bershka as I used them as a competitor of ZARA in my comp shop

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I produced a moodpboard of all the images I took during my comp shop. I looked at the brands ZARA, H&M, Flannels, Mango, Bershka, Stradivarius and Pull&Bear

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I looked at ZARA, H&M, Bershka, Mango and ASOS's social media presence across 5 platforms. These platforms were Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Twitter and Spotify.

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This website spoke about how ZARA have entered the metaverse and launched a new metacollection with Zepeto. It features products that can be worn inside and outside of the verse. This was great to use for my SWOT analysis

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While Zara may be leading the pack on the high-street, they're far from the first fashion or beauty brand to launch into the metaverse. Brands like NARS and Dior Beauty have partnered with Zepeto to allow digital avatars to try on their makeup products, and this week, the inaugural Metaverse Fashion Week kicked off on the Decentraland digital platform, showcasing creations from designers like Tommy Hilfiger, Dolce & Gabbana, Hugo Boss, Elie Saab, Roberto Cavalli, Coach and Etro and with makeup exclusively from Estée Lauder.

While it's still early days and many of us are yet to enter the metaverse, it's becoming an increasingly appealing prospect as more and more of our favourite brands create unique experiences for the virtual world.

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Zara has launched its first Metacollection designed to be worn in the metaverse and beyond

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Zara have just launched their first metacollection in the metaverse, called Lime Glam, consisting of fashion, accessories and makeup items.

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This website allowed me to understand ZARA better as a brand and as to how and why they are so successful. It was useful information for my SWOT analysis

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The Secret of Zara 's Success an exercise in Customer Co-creation. 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 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. 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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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. 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.

Zara's future brand and business challenges

Amancio Ortega plans to spend USD $1.1 billion scaling up its digital strategy and online capabilities next year 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 later this year. 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.

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. 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, but isn't far off.

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.

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The Secret of Zara's Success - customer creation - SwiftERM

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The Secret of Zara 's Success an exercise in Customer Co-creation. 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.

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VOGUE runway allowed me to access designers RTW collections for the Fall 2022 season which have been used in my trend report

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Fashion Shows: Fashion Week, Runway, Designer Collections

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Get up-to-the-minute fashion show coverage at New York, London, Milan, and Paris Fashion Weeks. See photos, videos, reviews, and more.

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WWD runway allowed me to access designers RTW collections for the Fall 2022 season which have been used in my trend report

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This report was useful into giving an insight on different strategies to capture the attention of Gen Z. Some strategies included fast delivery and returns, easy payment methods and using the metaverse and social media. Looking at this report allowed me to see if my chosen brand, ZARA, was doing any of these things; some of which they are (entering the metaverse and indirectly using social media).

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This report showed all the advances ZARA have made digitally and technologically in order to future-proof their company. It showed how ahead ZARA are in comparison to their competitors