Business Model Of Zara In The Fashion Industry Commerce Essay

Business Model Of Zara In The Fashion Industry Commerce Essay Established in 1975, Zara is one of the most successful retailers of todays world. Their clear focus and vision has made them to tap the power of the fashion. Operating in 62 different countries it has nearly around 2500 stores all over the world. Zara under the flagship of Inditex, (a holding company located in Northwest Spain) is a fashion imitator, it comprehends what its customers desire and then designs and manufactures according to their expectations. Zaras business working model is quite diverse from the other retailers; this makes them set out in the market. It has promoted the message of high fashion at a lesser cost across all countries through its unique and different selling techniques. The Sustainability of Zara Understanding and comparing the Business strategy and the financial differences of Inditex and its major competitor will help in understanding the sustainability of Zara in the international apparel market. Gap which is one of Zaras major competitors sells the same range of merchandise with a less trendy style. HM (Hennes and Mauritz) a threatening competitor too has been quick to internationalize, which allows them to gain sales in countries outside their native Sweden. HM also is more attentive when entering new markets and tends to enter one country at a time, as opposed to Zara who multitasks globally. Furthermore its been known that HM has 85% current assets in its business where as Zara has only 50% of current assets. This shows that Zara has more of fixed assets and its current assets are quite fast moving as seen in its business model. Spains well-liked brand Zara, aims to offer the latest catwalk style at the most affordable price. Zaras women and mens collection is divided into three categories. With a unique product strategy Zara comes up with 14,000 designs per year, with new designs appearing in the stores globally, twice a week.  It generally focuses on performing key activities differently in its supply chain which is 2-2.5 months that makes it sustainable and sets challenges for its competitors. The key factor that makes Zaras design sustainable is the wide assortments of whisking budget interpretations of catwalk products as customers these days prefer spending on education, healthcare, electronics and travel, then on clothing due to recession. Another factor that makes Zara prolonged is its store location and layout. Although products are at inexpensive rates, their aristocratic stores layout makes it feel exclusive as they are large, swish and centrally located. The company doesnt spend much on advertising as it believes to give the added value to their customers rather than spending on brand promotion. While its rivals start planning their lines on average nine months before they hit the shelves, Zara has a reputation for instant reaction to fashion trends and rapid restocking of stores. Zara can make on new line, from the initial concept to when it arrives in the shop, in just three weeks. In addition the  Zara technology makes the designers in daily contact with store managers, discussing which items are most in demand and which are not. (Bmelie, 2006). Zara recruits talented young designers and trains them to take swift decision. This way it has re-thought the fashion business and developed into a concept of its own and its efforts are therefore focused on reducing the time between design and sale which means that its production cycle is entirely different from fashion sector norms. The focus on market changes means that 85 percent of products are manufactured in the season they are sold. The Retail Environment In the retail environment, the cycles of products, sales volume and analysis and direction of locations are conveyed to the designers by store manager and sals associates so that Zara designers in Spain can quickly respond to customers preferences during seasons. Moreover, no stock holding concept has seen to be the most outstanding idea of Zaras retailing strategy while rest of fashion retailer keep conducting traditional function of buying and holding stock. This strategy indicates that Zara requires a speedy interaction with current fashion trend. All new items are introduced twice a week and presented in store shelves in only two weeks. Reducing the cost by controlling stock improved Zaras earnings and retailing efficiency. In terms of manufacturing, Zara sources grey fabric to get the most flexible in-season updating, and to turn it into various kinds of garments very easily. In addition, the best benefit is that grey fabric suits for its basic black collection. Additionally, Zara buys fabric: un-coloured and semi-processed one based on the immediate their designers need which colours up close to the selling season, couple with making the clothes itself. These help Zaras manufacturing fast, no more than few days, while other competitors companies take up to months (Dutta, 2002). Thus, Zara is competent to develop a new product line within three weeks. (Michael A. Hitt, 2008)(Ghemawat, 2003). Zara has excellent international strategies both in manufacturing and retailing which been organized and conducted well leads Zara become one of most successful case in fashion industry.   Customer orientation and the paramount suppleness form the bases of Zaras business model. Its 480,000 square meter centralized distribution system is capable of handling 60,000 garments per hour. The market clothing is always in development and movement. The distribution channel is the network which links producers with users yet international distribution strategies are difficult to manage since distribution structures differ from one country to the next (Keegan Green, 2003). Below is the model depicting the factors on which one can determine the sustainability of Zara. The Win- Win Strategy Discussed below are the ways in which Zara has shown its influence on the retails brands and the fashion market. These impacts can be seen as affirmative as well as negative. In the high-speed racing with fashion industry, there is no one that is better than ZARA. So what makes Zara a true winner amongst others? The answer is: Zara has highly affected the fashion industry in a short span of time. It has fashioned a position for itself in the middle of the crammed full retail market. There are a number of key positive influences of Zaras model in fashion industry. Firstly, Zaras highly effective supply chain can get product to store in a week, whereas traditional clothing retails spend more time, usually one or three months. This provides customers with latest collections each time they visit the store and also more options to pick from. Secondly, Well-developed IT syste has certain benefits: it increases productivity, which accelerates to improve quality, increases the work intensity and the complete IT system provides the software support for the successful operation in the fashion industry. Zaras successful business model not only maximizes the profit and saves time but also they provide an excellent business example for the whole fashion industry. Finally; Zaras successful business strategy provides as a study example for the other fashion companies around the world. For example, Chinas famous fashion brand -Metersbonwe, follows Zaras model. In 2009, Metersbonwe costumes opened Terminal Direct-oriented work, which was a huge adjustment to their retail network and for which they spent nearly one billion Yuan in a nationwide purchase. As the proverb goesevery coin has its two sides, there are some unconstructive impacts of Zara in fashion industry. First of all, confronted with such a thorny issue, Zara has been accused of flagrant pricy, which it denies. And theres perhaps a certain amount of snobby in the implication that a company from an obscure corner of northern Spain has no right to ape catwalk styles (Mark Tungate, 2005). In addition, Zaras design, they directly collect and copy the new fashion information all over the world through the network. Zara might require paying a large compensation due to Plagiarism problem. This has seriously affected the integrity of the fashion industry. US market poses as a big unique challenge for Zara, as its not able to have the same impact over America as it has on the rest of the world. In the present highly fragmented nature of fashion retailing it has become necessary for Zara to differentiate itself from its competitors in the North American market. All these difficul ties oppose Zara to establish themselves in the culturally diverse background and to have an impact on the US market. Conclusion Giving a tuff competition to the luxury brands such as Dior, Channel, Armani and many others Zara is entering into the luxury brand market through its branding and marketing strategy. It dresses women, men and kids in a sexy retail environment which might appear to look quite expensive and exclusive than what it actually is. A well-known U.S publishing institution; in one of their releases referred to a very remarkable concept: fast fashion, and predicted that Zara will be the consumer trend for the next decade. Nevertheless, under the economic crunch, Zara is facing unprecedented competition and challenges in global fashion market. It truly is a global fashion brand and the day is no far when it will be considered as a fashion icon in the fashion industry. Journal Articles from electronic source Expansià ³n-Empresas. 2003. Spains Best Brands. Available at http://www.brandchannel.com/features_effect.asp?pf_id=197 [Accessed on 9th January 2010] Baiidu. 2010. Available at: http://baike.baidu.com/view/ [Access on 7 January 2010] Virki, T., 2009. World teens cutting spending on clothes, games. Available at http://uk.reuters.com/article/idUKTRE58E6CQ20090915 [Accessed on 10th January 2010] Books Jackson, T. and Shaw, D. (2001) FASHION BUYING AND MERCHANDISING MANAGEMENT. PLGRAVE Publish. Pp: 114-115 120 -127 134 174-176 Hines, T. and Bruce, M. (2007) Fashion Marketing Contemporary issues. Elsevier Ltd. pp 28-33 40-50 55-61 Keegan, W.J. Green M.C. (2003) Global Marketing 3rd edition, New Jersey, Prentice Hall. Journal Articles Ying,F., Carmen, L. 2009. Internationalization of Spanish brand Zara. Emerald Journal article, Vol.13 No. 2 Mazaira, A., E. Gonzalez, Avendano. R. The role of marketing communication on company performance. Emerald Journal Article, Vol 10 No.3 Online Newspaper Articles James.H. 2008, Zara is now bigger than Gap, Telegraph [Internet] 17th August. Available at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/2794912/Zara-is-now-bigger-than-Gap.html [Accessed on 10th January] [emailprotected] 2002 The Speed of Fashion [online]. Available from: http://www.3isite.com/articles/ImagesFashion_Zara_Part_I.pdf [Accessed 13 January 2010] CNN. 2001 a Spanish success story [online]. Available from: http://edition.cnn.com/BUSINESS/programs/yourbusiness/stories2001/zara/ [Accessed 14 January 2010] ICMrinda organization. 2006. Available at http://www.icmrindia.org/casestudies/catalogue/Operations/OPER055.htm. [Accessed on 8th January 2010] Images http://alwaysnewmistakes.files.wordpress.com/2008/06/zara.jpg http://lh5.ggpht.com/vincent.vanwylick/SBb7__KLLnI/AAAAAAAAAlo/40-BFhhw2U8/Zara%20versus%20HM.jpg publications Inditex. 2008. Annual report 2008 Zara. Available at http://www.inditex.com/en/shareholders_and_investors/investor_relations/annual_reports [Accessed on 11th January 2010] Marketing good businesss even better. 2008. The story of Zara. Published by Sister Pblications. Available at http://www.uniquebusinessstrategies.co.uk/pdfs/case%20studies/zarathespeedingbullet.pdf [accessed on 5th January 2010] http://www.shoppingnsales.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/20090624-zara-sale.jpg http://vuesociety.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/06/zara.jpg http://www.techo.com/media/gallery/original/Zara_CZ_04_001.jpg

Indian or Singaporean English Essay

Indeed, language has been one of the most fundamental elements of culture. As such, culture and history brings about a language. However, in today’s society, English is slowly becoming a global language. This is to say, many people are learning English as their second language and because of this, dialects are starting to form out of English. These smaller versions of English bring to it the culture of those trying to learn it – whether they are African-Americans, Hispanics or Asians. Because each is unique and is a reflection of different cultures, the label of Standard English used by Americans is a bit inappropriate. To say that there is one standard means that the others are less formal or different from the norm. In fact, it is not the deviation from the standard that sets these apart but culture and history, which is brought about by these dialects. For me, Hispanics speaking English brings into the language the passion and intensity of the Spanish language. It should not be looked down upon as is the case of Ebonics or Black English. Some words that are not normally used by pure white Americans may be included in such dialects but it is not because it is slang or informal, but because it is a reflection of the heritage that speaks them – whether it be African Americans or Hispanics. People should be proud of how they speak even though it may not be classified as â€Å"standard† because the way they speak shows who they are. In learning English, it is not good to simply copy how the majority speaks English but to learn the language but still let our native culture and heritage to shine through. This is why I feel that it is very appalling when people think a dialect is uncultured or uneducated when in fact it is simple a different kind of culture and education that is being shown by the dialect. In fact, the assumption of a â€Å"standard† only means that the people who define which are the norms are the ones in power. They use â€Å"standard† English and therefore, they want their type of language to be the best. They themselves are proud of their way of speaking and want everybody to understand the beauty of their type of English. However, this is also the case for everyone. Now, if only minorities would see their dialects in the same way then they too can consider their dialect as, not only valid, but also equally respectable and normal. Growing up and learning English as my second language has helped me gain a respect for my Hispanic-Anglish language. It shows that even if I speak a different language than my native tongue, I am still able to hold on to who I am and still my culture and history is brought out whenever I speak. This certain kind of pride helps me to feel respected and part of the norm. However, I know that society is a tough crowd. Even though I may feel my brand of English is beautiful and at equal footing with the â€Å"standard†, officially, I know that there is a certain type of success associated with some variations of English. The language as spoken by Americans or English will still be considered as better and more educated by most people. That is why I am hoping my daughter will be given the same benefits as local Americans or naturally English speaking people because her first language and my husband’s first language is English. I do not feel there is something else I can do to change this fact, since I know it is integrated already into the mindset and system of society. It is institutionally and culturally accepted. However, for me who is learning English, I do not feel compelled to make other people speak â€Å"standard† English in order to treat them better or to look upon them with more respect and/or admiration. I know for a fact that most people learning another language puts in the time and effort that deserves such respect and/or admiration. Therefore, I am not afraid to show and give it to them. I do hope that one day, the people who are naturally speaking English, can look upon those studying and taking English as their second language at the same level. Some words may be different. Some accent may be present. But the fact of the matter is, English is just an expression of emotions and feelings and thoughts and opinions. It should not be a means of segregating people and classifying them as a lower class or a less educated class. In fact, it should be the opposite. Language should be used to connect people and to integrate different experiences and culture. The fact that people like me are studying English bringing in our experiences and culture to it means we are breathing in new life to English and enriching it. Even people who are not in America who are adopting English to their own language commands such respect. Indian or Singaporean English have become an entity of their own. They bring in new words and means of expressions while retaining English as the backbone of the new language being developed. This is a means of enriching English instead of breaking it down and destroying it. Instead of just carrying the same expressions and words, the exotic experiences and everyday lives of these foreigners are forging with English and therefore, creating a livelier language. People who speak English in their own land while keeping intact their own first languages therefore makes English a more global language and are uniting the world and making people feel closer and more connected with each other.

Racial Discrimination in Canadas Workplace - 1620 Words

Racial discrimination in the workplace has been a persistent theme in Canada’s history as well as present-day times. The occurrence of actions and attitudes that impose a sense of one being less equal than another on the basis of one’s race in Canada’s workplace inhibits both our nation’s ability to move forward as well as strengthen unification within our country. The belief in a more egalitarian society, where one’s race and ethnic background have little to no impact on employees (or potential employees) standings within the job market, would seemingly be reinforced by the majority of Canadians, who consistently show support for Canada’s multicultural identity. Couple that with the noticeable strides Canada has made in the past several†¦show more content†¦Studies that have been conducted to examine the level of access and employment inequity experienced by minority groups show that with equivocal levels of education and work exper ience, job applicants who have an English sounding name are requested for an interview up to forty percent more than their competing job applicants who have a Indian, Pakistani, or Chinese sounding name (TIEDI, 2011). Furthermore, the dismissal of the African-Canadian woman discussed earlier is not as surprising when one takes into account that in Toronto, arguably Canada’s most multicultural city; those of African-American descent reported one of the highest amounts of discrimination in relation to those of other visible minorities (TIEDI, 2011). The deduction that can be made then is that there still persists to be a belief that there is a correlation between one’s racial background and their perceived ability to do a job as effectively as that of their Caucasian or other dominant racial counterparts. Such a belief greatly hinders Canada’s workplace as it fails to utilize the skill-sets, knowledge, and qualifications of visible minority individuals that would otherwise benefit the community, and it largely damages one’s ability to integrate into Canadian society as a functioning member treated with equal regard,Show MoreRelatedThe Canadian Labor Market Of Canada1274 Words   |  6 PagesThere is a very strong emphasis on human rights systems and laws to address discrimination in Canada. Unfortunately simultaneously, Canadians also have a heritage of racism. 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Bullying Is Becoming More Spread At An Alarming And...

General Purpose:Bullying in schools is becoming more spread at an alarming and dangerous rate. Specific Purpose:School systems that are commonly viewed as excellent sources of receiving an education are becoming a host of parasitic bullying, negatively affecting students learning environments. Central Idea: The presence of bullying is growing. It has reached a point that as it is becoming worse in school systems and is affecting students of all ages. This calls for a need of intervention or the establishment of stricter policies towards anti-bullying. Introduction In spite of anyone at any age being a victim of bullying, children and teenagers are the primary targets.Children and teenagers are either the actual bully or the victims of bullying. Forms of bullying include cyber,emotional,verbal,physical and in some extreme cases sexual. Emphasizing the importance of addressing the awareness of bullying, school disciplinary action is a call for concern. There are little to no means of intervention to correct,nor stop the bully. This gives the bully an advantage in the school system than the school system taking action. More often than not, school systems do not want the reputation that they have a bullying problem. Therefore, this leaves many cases of bullying unattended in hopes that it will clear up on its own. This is not always the case. If intervention is not taken by the school administration, it has potentially a higher chance to escalate rather than resolve.Show MoreRelatedBullying Is Becoming More Spread At An Alarming And Dangerous Rate Essay1152 Words   |  5 Pages Bullying in schools is becoming more spread at an alarming and dangerous rate. Specifically,School systems that are commonly viewed as excellent sources of receiving education are becoming a host of parasitic bullying, negatively affecting students learning environments. The presence of bullying is presented like a disease and is growing. It has reached a point that to prevent it from becoming worse, school systems need to intervene or establish stricter policies towards anti-bullying so thatRead MoreCyberbullying : What Is It? Essay1754 Words   |  8 Pagesis â€Å"the use of electronic communication to bully a person, typically by sending messages of an intimidating or threatening nature. This type of bulling is often carried out through the use of internet. According to Dr. Martyn Wild’s quote, â€Å"Cyber-bullying is poised to turn into the biggest online concern, already affecting up to 35% of all children.† Harassing someone online by sending or posting mean messages by an unknown person is a form of cyberbullying. Cyberbullying also occurs â€Å"when a childRead MoreGeneral Electric60506 Words   |  243 Pagesselection, added performance, better service, more attractive styling, technological superiority, or unusually good value for the money. c. Focusing on a narrow market niche. d. Developing expertise and resource strengths that give the company competitive capabilities that rivals cannot easily imitate or trump with capabilities of their own. 4. Most companies realize that winning a durable competitive edge over rivals hinges more on building competitively valuable expertiseRead MoreFundamentals of Hrm263904 Words   |  1056 Pageswith the most effective instructor and student resources With WileyPLUS: Students achieve concept mastery in a rich, structured environment that’s available 24/7 Instructors personalize and manage their course more effectively with assessment, assignments, grade tracking, and more manage time better study smarter save money From multiple study paths, to self-assessment, to a wealth of interactive visual and audio resources, WileyPLUS gives you everything you need to personalize the teachingRead MoreOrganisational Theory230255 Words   |  922 Pageset al. provide a highly readable account of ideas, perspectives and practices of organization. By thoroughly explaining, analyzing and exploring organization theory the book increases the understanding of a field that in recent years has become ever more fragmented. Organization theory is central to managing, organizing and reflecting on both formal and informal structures, and in this respect you will find this book timely, interesting and valuable. Peter Holdt Christensen, Associate Professor, Copenhagen