Strengths
Leather goods are the core of Louis Vuitton (11); this is what LVs reputation is based upon for over 162 years. (1) At the high end of the market, brands tended to compete more through product design, the buying experience and brand image rather than through price. (6) In order to achieve this, LV invested heavily in advertising to build their brand, product design and develop unique products. (6) Furthermore, to distinguish LV from its competitors many of its stores had an area reserved for the best customer to shop in privacy. In some cities, LV owned private apartments and yachts, which included amenities such as butler service, where customers would be given design consultations and could be fitted.(9) By providing an added shopping experience to the customers, it would make them feel valued resulting in them coming back to LV. In addition, all stores were designed in France to communicate their tradition and heritage as well as to provide a unique experience of opulence and luxury. This store design allowed for a common brand image across them. As a result it is hard for LV to be substituted or for companies to enter the market. Wealthy individuals expect the best quality for themselves no matter what it cost. New entrants would need to have high capital, strong reputation, the best quality, and a historic heritage which LV and other established companies nursed. LVMH competed in the global personal luxury goods industry which had projected revenues of €212
This expansion demonstrates how the luxury industry is now run by massive corporations whose focus is only on growth, visibility, brand awareness, advertising, and most importantly, PROFITS! With growth and expansion, has come a decrease in quality and rarity. The luxury garments produced are mostly not handmade but are even outsourced to large factories in places such as China and Turkey. Also, to meet quarterly turnover projections, “designers churn(ed) out increasingly trendy collections of clothes, handbags, and shoes.” (Thomas, Pg. 246) With hundreds of new stores around the globe the surplus of designer labeled merchandise is immense hence, the proliferation of outlet malls.
Louis Vuitton “was established in France in 1854 by Louis Vuitton and became known as one of the oldest French luxury fashion houses” in the industry (Pearce & Robinson, 2013, p. 14-2). The firm’s products range from high quality “leather goods, handbags, trunks, shoes, watches, jewelry, and accessories”; manufactured by highly skilled and expensive laborers in France (Forbes.com, 2016). In addition, Louis Vuitton market their products “in 50 countries with more than 460 shops and generates more than €7-billion ($9.5-billion U.S.) in annual sales” (Wendlandt, 2013).
Another challenge for Louis Vuitton is the market and brand dilution as it has already entered and successfully fit in the Japanese market. The products have already maintained the “acceptable” group, and the company has become to feel difficult to increase the revenue. The figure provided in the case showed that nearly half of the Japanese have Louis Vuitton-monogrammed items by the time of 2007. This seemed to make LV prevalent but not luxury any more. To maintain its brand image, it is
The case study Preserve the Luxury or Extend the Brand presents a fictional dilemma, based on a real company, faced by Chateau de Vallois, a prestigious and famous wine-producing estate in the Bordeaux region of France. De Vallois is a family owned and run business; part owners are Gaspard de Sauveterre - a 75-year old majority owner, and equal partial owners: Francois de Sauveterre – Gaspard’s son and the chateau’s CEO , and Claire de Valhubert – Garspard’s granddaughter. De Vallois had fallen into a slow decline under its previous owner, but Gaspard along with Jean-Paul Oudineaux, his estate manager, had restored the chateau and since then de Vallois had been steadily profitable
Today sexualizing woman is the norm especially in the fashion industry, but that will not exclude the other industries. Empowering and sexualizing two different terms that are not in necessary have any connections between each other, but unfortunately young women nowadays getting them mixed. The media creates a relationship between them where sexualizing lead to empowering, then put this thought in people’s minds. Big companies who usually set up all the fashion trends are using woman to sell their products even the ones that made for men. They are creating the sexual image to surround their models. And they are hiding behind some terms that would sell to young ladies, who might not have the enough knowledge to draw the line between what is
Most luxury brands have been family-owned or -controlled and, consequently, were single-brand firms for the most part. However, mergers and acquisitions have been growing in the industry, with LVMH leading the way. Our strategic recommendation is to follow LVMH’s lead and acquire a multitude of diverse companies to build the Gucci portfolio.
LBS Textiles is a firm that designs fabrics for wholesale markets in North-East America. The company has experienced a modest growth over the last three years.
LVMH, known as Moët Hennessy • Louis Vuitton, is a French conglomerate and the largest producer of luxury goods in the world. LVMH was formed in 1987 with the merger of Moet et Chandon a champagne manufacturer, Hennessy a cognac manufacturer, and Louis Vuitton a fashion house.
It is hard to imagine that after the financial crisis swept across Europe, many great transitional enterprises had to face collapse and bankrupt while the luxury goods industry become more prosperous. Recently, the French luxury goods group LVMH announced their recent business condition. The volume of the first week in October had incredibly increased by 12% the previous week. The Hermes Corporation also said that in order to meet the increasing number of market demand, it would open 15 branch stores in the latter half of the year. These aroused some fierce debates, the public held a skeptical opinion towards the questions: How can the luxury companies maintain their positions? Why didn’t they strike down by financial crisis?
Fashion has been around ever since ancient times, since the time of the Romans, it survived the world wars and is yet today a business with rapid changes. Fashion started off as an art form, a way for the riches to show their social status with unique and innovative designs that only they could afford. It was a way to separate the social classes of the society. In this paper I will include the creator of haute couture, and how the following designers developed couture, as well as having leading names in today’s ready-to-wear industry. The list is long, but I chose to focus on the three most important designers of the modern fashion industry.
Louis Vuitton is considered under the luxury goods industry. The luxury goods industry is a high profitable industry with low outside threat. There are only few large players in the industry and they server to the wealthiest people in the world. The luxury companies have high power to control the price so they have ability to grow sustainably.
In Japan, the costs of LVMH handbags cost approximately 40% more than in France. This started a growing market to distribute bags from France to Japan for resale at a cheaper price. Arnault believes that the producers of LVMH’s goods need to be unrestrained by financial matters in order to produce extremely high quality products. To keep the brand management of highly priced and high quality goods, LVMH needs to expand to the younger new money of the Asian market. The high quality is also a result of the mentality that “Made in France” is perceived as high western quality. LVMH does not want to lower the labor costs because there would be a similar direction of the quality.
In the introduction to The Fabrication of Louis XIV, Peter Burke expresses his ambition to write a study of Louis XIV 's public image as a whole and the changes it underwent throughout Louis 's reign. This book examines the relation between art and power and the official structures responsible for making – fabricating – the image, or more appropriately, the images of Louis XIV, as well as their contemporary reception. As the title suggests and as Burke himself reminds the reader, the book as a whole focuses on the ideas of royal myth and royal narrative, and the manipulation of information.
LVMH’s brand portfolio is a catalogue of the finest things money can buy. Arnault said, “A Star brand is timeless, modern, fast growing and highly profitable.”[iii] LVMH has positioned its brands strongly in the luxury segment offering more than 50 different brands under their five core competencies. LVMH has been successful through all of their various brands in their portfolio giving them each their independence and creativity. “LVMH is well known for leaving much operational and marketing freedom to the various brands it owns.”[iv] “LVMH has done an excellent job of brand positioning, says Ben Cavender, senior analyst at China Market Research Group. It has succeeded in securing the particularly enviable position of gaining a following among the top percentage of China’s wealthy. As the financial crisis stretches on, LVMH customers in China still have money to spend.[v] “LVMH’s brand imaging, which relies heavily on pushing its European heritage, is so successful that it has benefited other brands by proxy, says Paul French, one of the founders of Access Asia, a group dedicated to tracking regional consumer and marketing trends. “Everyone hangs on the coattails of Louis Vuitton’s brand imaging in China.”[vi]
Luxury product sales boost in the emerging marketing like China, which has extraordinary growth and strong potential consumers for the development of luxury goods in the China market. With gradually lower and lower increase of revenue in the European countries, Louis Vuitton (abridged as LV in the following sections) commits itself to set up more stores in China. However, LV is faced with the problems of declining profits in China, which urges it to adjust its entry strategy into the China market. In this case, this report will focus on distinguishing the factors that influence LV’s development in China and