In our modern day times, the fashion industry is a staple of western culture with constant new trends, businesses, and ideas. The company Zara is the staple brand of the Inditex group, the world's largest apparel retailer. After being founded in 1974 by Amancio Ortega Gaona in Spain, the company quickly rose in profits and popularity. Now, Zara is worth about $13 billion and was labeled 46th on Forbes Magazine's World's Most Valuable Brands 2018.
The story behind this company's tremendous success in such a highly competitive industry lies within its operations and innovative means of product design and production.
While reaching its success, Zara has also changed many aspects of the fashion industry with the newly innovative "Fast Fashion" strategy, the idea of putting out products in stores as soon as possible following their emergence on the fashion runway. Amber Graafland of Mirror Magazine says:
"I first discovered Zara 20 years ago whilst strolling along the Champs-Élysées in Paris. I literally couldn't believe my eyes when I found all the season's key catwalk trends at high street prices. It just hadn't been done before."
In order to achieve this, designers who work for Zara take inspiration from rising-in-popularity products to create new designs for products generating up to three to four a day many of which go directly into production. Overall, Zara alone produces 20,000 designs a year. Its parent company, Inditex, manufactures around 1 billion items annually. This way, Zara is known for having the newest fashion trends on sale before they even become trends.
The key to such impressive production and manufacturing lies in the business's operations. The business implements the "Just-In-Time" strategy in factories, meaning that materials for products are only ordered and received as they are needed in the manufacturing process. Additionally, the process skips storage of the newly made products. Instead, products are immediately sent off around the world to retailers. This strategy aims to cut costs of potential unused products and free up space that would have otherwise be used for storage space.
New designs from production factories are shipped at a rapid rate. Zara stores' stock is scheduled to be changed twice a week. This is one of the most important aspects of fast fashion: quick stock turnover in stores. The Inditex Group is able to deliver quality merchandise to retailers in as little as three weeks from its factories.
Store managers play an important role in the success of this process. Managers of every separate location send in an occasional report fo the most sold items in their specific stores, so that every retail delivery is unique. Meaning every separate Zara location receives a different amount of specific products depending on previous purchases and trends in the specific stores.
For customers, Zara's strategy ensures constant customer interest and sales, because every time they walk into a Zara retailer, the clothes on sale are different than they were, say, a week and a half ago. According to Mirror Magazine, employees are trained to create a sense of urgency. I remember coming in to Zara a week before New Years looking for a dress and one of the dresses caught my eye. After trying it on and loving it, I turned to my friend saying that I'll consider it and come back the next day. An employee around us heard and turned to me saying "That dress will be gone next time you come so you better get it now." I decided to test her statement by coming back to the store only two days after, and she was right. The whole inner store appearance changed and new, different products lined the shelves.
"You better get it now or it'll be gone next time."
By keeping up with all of fashion's newest trends, producing a wide assortment of products, and creating a sense of urgency in its' customers, Zara has the lasting potential to continue growing as a company and as a staple store in the fashion industry.
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