Premium Jeans Essay

Based off of my last journal about the fashion industry and how it has an economic impact. Recently a friend of mine opened up a fashion boutique in a mall. He has always been into fashion probably the most fashion intellectual person I know. In the boutique my friend has inventory ranging from shoes, hoodies, jeans, accessories, etc. All the inventory are clothes or shoes that are either hard to find or sold out due to the demand of the product being higher than the supply. The shoe prices range from $200-$2000 depending on what shoe you are looking at. The prices of clothes are practically the same price range as the shoes. One of the clothing brands that are probably in my opinion the grail items in the boutique is the collection of clothes

Competitive Advantage and Customer Value proposition go hand in hand. “Competitive Advantage refers to what sets the organization apart from others and provides it with a distinctive edge for meeting customer or client needs in the marketplace.” (Daft, Marcic). “Customer Value Proposition is “ a well defined and persuasive marketing statement related to a specific product or service that details the reasons why a consumer would benefit from purchasing it. A business will typically use a customer value proposition as part of its marketing strategy to consumers, rather than using it internally among staff, suppliers or distributors.”( http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/customer-value-proposition.html) Lululemon’s Competitive Advantage

With other companies starting to encroach upon the Jeans market share, Levi’s decided to introduce a new product. With the goal to gain profits, Levi’s pursued diversification with the new product. This product was formal clothing for men.

First research objective was to determine whether it is profitable for J.Crew to shift their brand focus to a ‘sustainablity’ business model instead of resuming their position in the fast fashion industry.

Lululemon Athletica produces high quality active wear at a premium price. The business has attracted customers by creating an environment/culture that fitness-oriented customers enjoy and respond to. According to (Beyer, Faifman, Ho, Kezunovic, & Olian), Lululemon understands their customers as well as their target market. Lululemon provides guests with an unrivaled experience, which has created many loyal customers that are quick to tell their friends and family about the company. Employee training and product knowledge is an important element in Lululemon’s strategy because employees are able to provide relatively technical answers to guests’ questions about their products.

In analyzing the general environment of Lululemon the following factors are most important for the company to understand these factors and the trends within them: technological factors, political factors, sociocultural factors, and demographics. Through better understanding the effects of the factors in the industry and the company they can analyze the threats and opportunities within the factors and change their strategies to align them as necessary.

Just as J. Crew has begun to target lower price point markets, it has begun to also target higher price point markets. J. Crew’s “Collections” and “Wedding” lines use finer materials and more intricate designs in their pieces, but are sold at more expensive prices. Lastly, the company’s sub-brand “Madewell” focuses on American-made denim and casual styles that aim to attract teenage to middle-aged women. J. Crew immense growth throughout its years has come as result of its ability to diversify its brand into many different

Of the hundreds of named brand clothing that form part of the retail and fashion industry I chose to compare, for my analysis, Abercrombie & Fitch, Forever 21, American Eagle, and H&M. These stores are prominent, well-known for selling apparel, shoes, and accessories by the means of offering sales and promotions to their customers. This is a clever strategy for attracting customers, allowing them to believe that they bought goods at affordable, convenient prices – and not to mention the prestigious name prescribed to the clothing brands. Using keyhole.co as my main source, I obtained relevant and valuable information regarding the status of these brands. My intentions were to compare a period of 14 days, however, due to the limited access that I received from my free trial, the program only allowed me to see fewer of the dates than I anticipated. I want to take this opportunity and mention ahead of time that due to the various and distinctive products that are sold from these stores, when looking for the “spending capacity” I decided to focus on shirts/ jeans for men and women and compare the prices among them since each of these retailers carry those items and as a way to make this report easier to contrast and comprehend. Also, when approaching the section of “setting”, I screen-shotted some of the images on Instagram and made them into a collage to separate the type of clothes and trends that each of these brands sell currently. In the following modules

Competitive Advantage and Customer Value proposition go hand in hand. “Competitive Advantage is an advantage gained over competitors by offering customers greater value, either through lower prices or by providing additional benefits and service that justify similar, or possibly higher, prices. “Customer Value Proposition is “a business or marketing statement that describes why a customer should buy a product or use a service. It is specifically targeted towards potential customers rather than other constituent groups such as employees, partners or suppliers.” Lululemon’s Competitive Advantage and Customer Value Proposition is:

For decades, J. Crew has been a staple of middle-class America’s wardrobe. The company targets upper-middle class customers, selling Ralph Lauren-like designs at a lower price point. However, in recent years, the company, in addition to numerous other middle-tier American retailers, has struggled to find it’s niche in an industry often focused on the extremes. J. Crew’s executive and marketing teams have implemented new strategies to regain market share.

My interest began to grow, and I started shopping online with Ebay and Amazon, trying to find prices under retail. After getting so many pieces of clothing from Nike and Jordan, I began to get tired of the style and decided to move on to another brand, and change my style completely. That brand was Ralph Lauren, which I now own a shirt in almost every color from them. I then decided it was time to move on from him as well. This is when I started to find more and more sites and apps dedicated to selling and buying designer clothing. “But it was the slew of second-hand clothing startups that launched at the end of the 2012 that really made a point in 2013. From digital clothing swap Bib and Tuck to online consignment store TheRealReal, there

First, Zwinktopia users fit the target demographic for the UnME Jeans brand. Its users span the age range she is marketing to—teenage girls. The Forrester Research Study of Interest in Marketer Profiles on Social Networking Sites reported the following:

As we discussed in class, a threat of substitute does not necessarily just mean other high end, premium, higher priced jeans. Substitutes could include any types of jeans. There are skinny jeans that are mentioned throughout the case, as well as slim cut jeans, straight cut jeans, low/medium/high rise jeans, etc. Any type of jean poses as a threat to premium denim jeans because consumers fashion senses are constantly changing. As of late, more people have shifted towards the casual, relaxed fit jean type of lifestyle, as opposed to before the down economy started in 2008 where many were trending more towards the “fashion forward” or the “aspirational shopper” as the case described. The aspirational shopper consists of a middle class person ($75,000-150,000 income per year) who is willing to buy luxurious, high-end jeans. So the overall point here is that all jean types are a threat of substitutes. Another layer of substitutes could really be any type of pants in general. People love wearing sweat pants around the house, females tend to wear a lot of dresses and skirts nowadays, leather pants are somewhat of a trend, and everybody wears shorts at some point in the year. So these are threats of substitutes as well. Lastly, any other high-end products people could choose to spend money on pose as threats as well. Maybe consumers will choose to spend their money on high-end accessories such as a new watch, or maybe a handbag or scarf if

2. Richard M. Johns (2006). The Apparel Industry. 2nd ed. UK, London: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.. 1-124.

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.