Fast Fashion Brand Performance Growth, Declining Force, Technology Breakthrough

A few days ago, many fast fashion brands announced the second quarter performance report and the 2017 annual report. Reporter combing found that many fast fashion brand performance growth slowed down or even decline. In recent years, fast fashion When the brand expands its territory rapidly, its quality problem has also been criticized for many times. In order to restore the trend of decline, each brand has its own unique strategies. With the help of new technology and black technology, it will respond to the new trend of consumption. At the same time, we must open up barriers between online and offline to achieve full channel retailing, and rely on technology to brand the brand so as to highlight the tight encirclement. However, some experts believe that only the brand effect can not support the long-term development of enterprises, the essence of clothing can not be ignored.

Multiple brand performance decline or slowdown

By the end of August, the United States Clothes & Accessories Group GAP released its second quarter performance report. In the three months ended August 4th, its sales grew by 8% to $4 billion 100 million, gross profit margin was 39.8%, net profit rose 9.59% to 297 million US dollars, exceeding analysts' expectations. However, the only recorded decline in same store sales was the GAP brand, which expanded from 1% in the same period last year to 4%. The report shows that Gap's second quarter sales decreased by 0.5% to 1 billion 225 million US dollars compared with the same period last year, while sales in Asia, including China, declined by 1% to 229 million US dollars.

Reporters learned that Fast fashion industry In China, Mango and H&M have also seen a decline in their performance. Spain's fast fashion brand Mango released its core financial data in fiscal year 2017 at the end of August, showing sales fell 2.9% to 2 billion 190 million euros over the same period last year. H&M's first half year (December 2017 ~2018 May) earnings report released in June also showed that the group's tax sales amounted to SEK 114 billion 17 million (about US $12 billion 700 million), unchanged from the same period last year, but net profit fell 33% to 7 billion 215 million Swedish Krona (about 800 million US dollars) compared with the same period last year, representing a decrease of 3.7% from 11% in the same period last year.

Apart from the decline in performance, the brand of performance slowdown is also everywhere. Among them, Zara parent company Inditex group released its 2017 fiscal year report in July this year, showing that its sales increased by 9% to 25 billion 340 million euros, a further slowdown than the 12% increase in last fiscal year. Insiders pointed out that fast fashion brands were quickly occupied by low priced, fast and colorful fashion clothes. Clothing market However, after a period of territorial division, the problem of fast fashion brand is gradually showing up in the upgrading of consumption, and the performance slowdown or even decline is expected.

Quality and design are often "groove points".

Reporters noted that fast fashion brands in recent years, there are many quality problems, Zara, H&M, GAP and other brands are becoming "black list" frequent guests. In July 9th this year, according to the safety risk information of imported industrial products released by the General Administration of Customs in July 9th, 5 batches of Gap products imported from Gapu (Shanghai) Commercial Co., Ltd. were found to be unqualified, dry color fastness was not qualified, moisture fastness to rubbing fastness was not up to standard, and saliva color fastness was not qualified, and so on, and the risk of injury to skin was found in the total of 10917 batches of imported products. In August 14th, the 7 batch of clothing of the Gap brand was discovered at the entry port customs when it was inspected and quarantined. In July and November last year, H&M, ZARA, TOPSHOP and UNIQLO were listed on AQSIQ's "unqualified information on imported industrial products".

When reporters visited the fast fashion brand entity store in Zheng Jia square and Wan Ling Hui, many people responded to reporters that the quality of clothes was getting worse and worse. Huang told reporters that she had bought a blue in H&M. Dress When I bought it, I didn't check it. When I pulled out the tag, I found it was almost 5 centimeters apart when I was going to wear it. "The price is here, the quality of fast fashion clothes can not be extravagant like big brands, but the quality of ZARA, H&M and so on is not as good as before. It has begun to pilling several times, and some of the fresh clothes are getting worse." Ms. Huang said.

On the other hand, the design of fast fashion brands has been criticized. According to the Beijing July 20th edition of the D04 version of Zara losing the "design infringement case", the luxury product company OTB's three year design plagiarism lawsuit against Zara parent company Inditex group has finally come to a stage below. According to Dentons of OTB's attorney general's office, the Milan Court confirmed that it could claim damages for registered and unregistered designs in the EU jurisdictions other than the main defendant's country.

Many brands change with technological innovation.

In the face of declining performance and endless quality problems, brands have come up with unique strategies. New technologies and black technologies have been integrated into the physical stores to cope with the new trend of consumption. At the same time, the barriers to online and offline businesses have been opened up to achieve full channel retail, relying on technology for brand empowerment.

In March this year, UNIQLO opened the world's newest concept store in Shenzhen, which is the largest store in Shenzhen currently built by UNIQLO, which has an area of about 2600 square meters. For the first time, it has launched the "digital experience Museum", which integrates online, offline and virtual entities. It has launched four typical scenes: classic quality wardrobe, healthy life filling station, Chao Yi Wen Chuang Museum and 24 hours living space. Type.

Coincidentally, ZARA in order to restore the trend of performance slowdown, but also in the store into the new technology to increase the sense of experience. It is reported that in April this year, Zara launched a two week AR experience in 137 shops around the world. Consumers will use mobile phones to store or customize their windows, and models will be displayed on users' designated clothing, and they can be purchased directly at the mobile terminal.

In addition, the addition of electricity providers is also one of the "chips" of fast fashion brands, such as H&M, which has only built its own electricity supplier for many years, and has entered the Chinese market for ten years. Finally, H&M has entered Tmall. Data show that the H&M Tmall flagship store opened more than 10000 single products online on the first day, exceeding 1 million of its fans, breaking through more than 3 million to shop visits.