Marketing is a business philosophy or way of thinking about the firm from the perspective of the customer or the potential customer. Such a view has much merit as it focuses on the acid test for all business – if we do not meet the needs of our customers we will not survive, let alone thrive. Fashion firms depend upon customers making repeat purchases and the key to such loyalty is the satisfaction of customers’ needs with garments which are stylish, durable, easy to care for, comfortable, perceived value for money and all the other criteria deemed relevant by the buyer. For this reason, fashion design personnel should readily appreciate the need to understand the customer’s perspective.
Most designers have a mental picture of a typical customer. Fashion marketers ask, how typical is that mental picture, and does the ‘customer’ belong to a group of buyers that form a profitable prospect for the company? Notice that the notion of seeing the business from the perspective of the customer does not preclude concern for profit. Indeed, if profit is not actively sought then the firm’s ability to meet customers’ needs in the long term will be greatly diminished. Some of the best fashion design colleges in Nashik include fashion marketing in the course curriculum to help students build a foundation in this field.
Fashion Marketing in Practice
Within the fashion industry there is enormous variation in the size and structure of businesses serving the needs of customers. From a small business comprising a self-employed knitwear designer to major multinational corporations such as Liz Claiborne or Zara, diversity remains a key feature. With legislative changes and expansion of the EU, the gradual removal of trade barriers on a global scale and the growth of the Internet, the fashion industry is increasingly a global business. This implies considerable variation in the cultural, social and economic perspective of the participants. The consequence of these variations in size, experience and perspective is that the practice of fashion marketing is not uniform at a national level, let alone at an international one.
Design centred: Fashion Marketing as Promotion
According to this view marketing is seen as synonymous with promotion. Adherents of the view state that designers are the real force, and marketers should merely help to sell ideas to the public. Translated into practice this view tends to have all marketing activity carried out by either public relations or advertising departments or agencies. Customers and potential customers are seen as people to be led or inspired by creative styling that is favourably promoted. At the extreme, it is rationalised that the only people who can appreciate creative styling, in a financial sense, are the wealthier sections of society.
Marketing Centred: Design as a Research Prescription
Here marketing is dominant and it regards the designer as someone who must respond to the specifications of customer requirements as established by marketing research. Detailed cost constraints may be imposed and sample garments pretested by, for example, retail selectors who may subsequently demand changes to meet their precise needs. Several major retail stores still operate systems not too far removed from this, with merchandisers and selectors exerting considerable control over the designer. The result, according to many, is a certain blandness in the design content of garments available from such retail outlets.
How Fashion Marketing Can Help the Fashion Industry
The vast output and profits from the fashion industry come not from the designer collections seen on the catwalk but from items sold in high street stores. To put the impact of designers in perspective, one only has to note that the British Fashion Awards’ Designer of the Year will often have annual earnings that amount to less than a day’s sales for one large retailer in the Arcadia group. Even so, the designer collections are given extensive coverage in the fashion press where each season more than 250 collections are reviewed within a matter of weeks.
Reporting and promotion of these collections are suffused within hyperbole, excitement and genuine enthusiasm by many who attend, the catwalk exhibitions being viewed with a range of perceptions from incredulity to sheer entertainment. However, few people see the direct link that some less experienced commentators assert exists between the garments on the catwalk and ‘what we will all be wearing next season’. The influence of the designer collections on everyday apparel purchases is complex and will be considered in later chapters on the fashion consumer, product design and fashion promotion.
Origins of the Modern Fashion Market
Until relatively recently, fashion had always been elitist and was used by its adopters to show that they were above the common people. Even the inventions of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries; the spinning jenny, the water frame and the sewing machine have not had as great an effect on the market as have cultural changes and the explosion of the media during the twentieth century.
Recent Developments in the Fashion Market
Consumer demand for clothing is now more fragmented and discerning. Retailers are wary of carrying high levels of stock, major demographic changes are occurring, and many different styles and fabrics are available. These have all resulted in the mass market for clothing being fragmented and are eroding the advantages of long-run manufacture.
Conclusion
The goal of fashion marketing is not just to sell clothes, it is to build brand awareness, recall, and loyalty. As the global fashion industry sees an influx of AI-based marketing techniques, there will be a call for immersive customer experience and advanced industry standards. Pursuing a B.Des in Fashion and Apparel Design can help you better-understand the key features of fashion marketing and its role in the industry.