Lululemon Case Study

Lululemon’s strategy is not only sell the product, they also offer healthy life style and targeting very specific segment which is customers who do yoga. Their competitive advantage is they offer benefits except a good product such as physical

Economic: Continued economic struggles, especially within the European Union, have the potential to negatively affect Lululemon’s international expansion(Thomas

Dennis Wilson had been in the skate, surf, and snowboard business for over 20 years when he took a commercial yoga class that was offered in Vancouver. Wilson found the results to be thrilling. He quickly was immersed in the idea of making his yoga experience the best possible. He believed the clothes that were being used for yoga were not the most appropriate. They made him sweat and weren’t very easy for the maneuvers yoga required. This would lead to the beginning of Wilson’s success.

Lululemon is a rapidly growing company with a different niche for its products. Its philosophy as well as their business model has allowed them to increase revenue over the past years. The dilemma they faced is how to continue expanding without losing their special niche, grassroots and a nontraditional feel of the brand that sets them apart from their competitors.

Lululemon was founded by Chop Wilson in Vancouver, Canada in 1998. Lululemon itself is described as a yoga inspired athletic apparel that is both for men and women. The company has apparel for yoga, training, running and fashion. It has shaped the way people dress to go workout. Society finds themselves purchasing consumer products for no reason. Lululemon is recognized for its high quality and pricy products. They buy these things that fill a void they have inside of them. But in the end they will keep wanting more. Consumers today have depended on money and how consumption brings negative outcome behind materialism. In the essay Two Cheers for Materialism by James B. Twitchell, he defines us American as materialists and how we are a nation of consumers. While Lululemon is a popular consumer choice, many aspects influence the consumption of such a product such as when Lululemon first started out, When I first came across the brand and the expatiations it has for consumers.

This report has been created with the intent to analyze the athletic apparel industry with a specific focus on Lululemon Athletica, Inc., further refered to as Lululemon. In this report you will find that the strengths and weaknesses of Lululemon’s current strategies and future goals are analyzed and compared to that of its closest competitors. In conclusion to the analysis, recommendations have been made to potentially guide Lululemon Athletica, Inc. in a positive direction in regards to its future endeavors. The following

Lululemon is a large company, making clothing for athletic activities, not only are they in the women’s athletic range, but they have hit the men’s market and youth range as well. A SWOT analysis will be used to break down Lululemons strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats to the business. Strengths which Lululemon have achieved include multi-faceted and community-based approach strategy, making customers feel part of a community through marketing strategies like there “ambassador program, social media, in-store community boards and grassroots initiatives” (Lululemon, 2016 Annual Report, 2016, p. 3). Touchpoints which have been a part of this multi-channel include Lululemons websites www.lululemon.co.nz and ivivva.com which is based around female youth active ware. With Lululemon having 12,500 full-time employees worldwide (Lululemon Athletica Inc. (LULU), 2017) with 406 stores (Lululemon, 2016), their large market capital of $8.33 billion (Lululemon Athletica Inc. (LULU), 2017), shows the total value of Lululemons shares of stock. Lululemon having $581.1 million in net revenue, this is an increase of 13% while their gross profit increased by 17% rising to $297.4 million. (Lululemon Athletica Inc. Announces Second Quarter Fiscal 2017 Results, 2017). This shows a steady increase in profit for Lululemon for 2017 which is a strength for them.

Lululemon is one of the Canada’s best retailers of technical athletic yoga apparel. Lululemon’s yoga inspired apparel is marketed under the two brand names Lululemon Athletica for more mature women and Ivivva Athletica for younger girls. Lululemon primary target customers are educated and hard working women, who understand the importance of healthy and active lifestyle. Majority of these women are Caucasian who are mainly urban and have higher income, since Lululemon is an expensive brand .Most of their products are design to offer fit, performance and comfort while incorporating both style and function. On another hand, American Apparel

The main issue the company faced is quality control issue impacting brand image. There is narrow focus in both consumer segments and product line. There is also limited brand recognition and limited geographic market such as America. The quality of yoga pants were not good because customer companied about sheer Luon Yoga Pants and the fabric is so see through.

Lululemon Athletica’s (LULU) competitive advantage hinges on the company’s use of the four management pillars; efficiency, quality, innovation and responsiveness to clients (Tsang et al, 2013). LULU achieves unrivalled efficiency through outsourcing and technological advances. Even though LULU continues to design their merchandises in Canada, the manufacturing is outsourced from countries such as Bangladesh, China and Indonesia. The company has benefited from technological advancements by allowing customers the comfort of buying merchandises online, through the company’s website, which comprises of free shipping straight from the manufacturing plant, and thus saves on shipping costs, time, as well as retail store resources like signage and employees.

Able to diversify its product range to meet market demand including women’s wear, men’s wear, accessories and home wares.

Therefore it makes it hard for companies like Nike, Adidas and Under Amour etc. to be able to have power over the customers. If a buyer is dissatisfied with any company in the industry; that buyer can easily switch to another company to acquire the products that they need.

American Apparel, is an American multi-national clothing manufacturer, distributor and retailer since 1988based in Los Angeles, California. Dov Charney, a Canadian business man was a founder and former CEO of the company. He was involved in nearly every part of the business process from design and manufacturing to marketing. The Ernst & Young named Charney Entrepreneur of the Year in 2004. He was also termed "Man of the Year" by various fashion

Rivalry among existing competitors: The apparel industry is highly competitive with a great number of both local and global competitors. As the market is mature, its growth is small. Accelerated growth and expansion to new markets are not easy goals to achieve. The barrier to get out of the industry is quite low for distributors, but high for producers. Most fashion manufacturers moved their production base to low-cost countries like China as wage and raw materials in developed markets like Western Europe are high. Besides, there is no great discrepancy in terms of quality of products, so customers make their purchase choices based on price and brand recognition.

This work is an introduction to the fashion industry of Pakistan which has made quite a lot of progress in just a few years. Ten to fifteen years from now, this industry was still unknown to actually exist to the masses. Later with the formation of fashion councils and education centers under the enthusiastic few who wanted to make a difference and promulgate this very institution of fashion, did the very fashion industry took its concrete contour from the old tailor culture that formerly existed. Today it is one of the most progressing industries in the country.