Fast fashion is a term used to acknowledge the move of garments from catwalk to store in the fastest time to capture current market trends. Fast fashion collections are based on the most recent fashion trends presented at Fashion Week. These trends are designed and manufactured quickly and cheaply to allow the mainstream consumer to take advantage of current clothing styles at a lower price.
The primary objective of the fast fashion is to quickly produce a product in a cost efficient manner. This efficiency is achieved through the retailers’ understanding of the target market's wants, which is a high fashion looking garment at a price at the lower end of the clothing sector.
Key points from reading The Value of Fast Fashion by Cachon and Swinney
in support of fast fashion
• (Quick Response, Enhanced Design, and Strategic Consumer Behaviour. April 2011, pp. 778-795)
• Quick response to consumer desires
• Enhanced product design capabilities
• Minimal production lead time to match supply with uncertain demand
• Generally speaking, a fast fashion system combines at least two components:
1. short production and distribution lead times, enabling a close matching of supply with uncertain demand
2. highly fashionable (“trendy”) product design
• Short lead times are enabled through a combination of localized production, sophisticated information systems that facilitate frequent inventory monitoring and replenishment, and expedited distribution methods. For example, Zara, primarily a European retailer, produces the majority of its designs in costly European and North African factories (rather than outsourcing to less expensive Asian facilities)
• The second component (trendy product design) is made possible by carefully monitoring consumer and industry tastes for unexpected fads and reducing design lead times. Benetton, for example, employs a network of “trend spotters” and designers throughout Europe and Asia, and also pays close attention to seasonal fashion shows in Europe (Meichtry 2007)
• Enhanced design capabilities result in products that are of greater value to consumers and hence elicit a greater willingness to pay. Consequently, firms may exploit this greater willingness to pay by charging higher prices on “trendy” products than on more conservative products. Enhanced design capabilities are costly, however: there are typically fixed costs (a large design staff, trend spotters, rapid prototyping capabilities, etc.), and there may be greater variable costs (e.g., because of more labor-intensive production processes or costly local labour)
• Quick response reduces the chance that inventory will remain to be sold at the clearance price (because quick response more closely matches supply and demand)
•Enhanced product design, on the other hand, gives customers a trendier product that they value more
• Postponement creates variants from a base model (e.g., different color panels for the same phone), whereas enhanced design creates significantly different product variants from component inventory (e.g., a skirt or dress from the same material)
• According to the reading, there are four operating systems:
1. A traditional system, represents a typical firm with long production lead times and standard product design abilities
2. A quick response system, does not employ enhanced design capabilities, but does yield significantly reduced production lead times
3. An enhanced design system, employs enhanced design capabilities (and hence greater consumer willingness to pay) but maintains long production lead times to avoid the kind of radical supply chain overall necessary to achieve lead time reduction
4. Finally, a fast fashion system, employs both quick response and enhanced design capabilities. The fast fashion system resembles the mode of operations increasingly found in retailers such as Zara, Benetton, and H&M
Source: http://www.stanford.edu/~swinney/FastFashion.pdf
After researching fast fashion, I'm not actually sure if this is what I want to focus on anymore. I thought that it would be relevant, but in essence, it appears to focus on the sole idea that stores cheaply copy and reproduce designer's garments for the low end market. I am designing for the middle market from my original (more expensive) designs, and therefore my garments do not need to be quickly made or copied. Fast fashion garments are also frowned upon due to their disposable and unethical practices.
I don't really know where to go from here.
• Enhanced product design capabilities
• Minimal production lead time to match supply with uncertain demand
• Generally speaking, a fast fashion system combines at least two components:
1. short production and distribution lead times, enabling a close matching of supply with uncertain demand
2. highly fashionable (“trendy”) product design
• Short lead times are enabled through a combination of localized production, sophisticated information systems that facilitate frequent inventory monitoring and replenishment, and expedited distribution methods. For example, Zara, primarily a European retailer, produces the majority of its designs in costly European and North African factories (rather than outsourcing to less expensive Asian facilities)
• The second component (trendy product design) is made possible by carefully monitoring consumer and industry tastes for unexpected fads and reducing design lead times. Benetton, for example, employs a network of “trend spotters” and designers throughout Europe and Asia, and also pays close attention to seasonal fashion shows in Europe (Meichtry 2007)
• Enhanced design capabilities result in products that are of greater value to consumers and hence elicit a greater willingness to pay. Consequently, firms may exploit this greater willingness to pay by charging higher prices on “trendy” products than on more conservative products. Enhanced design capabilities are costly, however: there are typically fixed costs (a large design staff, trend spotters, rapid prototyping capabilities, etc.), and there may be greater variable costs (e.g., because of more labor-intensive production processes or costly local labour)
• Quick response reduces the chance that inventory will remain to be sold at the clearance price (because quick response more closely matches supply and demand)
•Enhanced product design, on the other hand, gives customers a trendier product that they value more
• Postponement creates variants from a base model (e.g., different color panels for the same phone), whereas enhanced design creates significantly different product variants from component inventory (e.g., a skirt or dress from the same material)
• According to the reading, there are four operating systems:
1. A traditional system, represents a typical firm with long production lead times and standard product design abilities
2. A quick response system, does not employ enhanced design capabilities, but does yield significantly reduced production lead times
3. An enhanced design system, employs enhanced design capabilities (and hence greater consumer willingness to pay) but maintains long production lead times to avoid the kind of radical supply chain overall necessary to achieve lead time reduction
4. Finally, a fast fashion system, employs both quick response and enhanced design capabilities. The fast fashion system resembles the mode of operations increasingly found in retailers such as Zara, Benetton, and H&M
Source: http://www.stanford.edu/~swinney/FastFashion.pdf
After researching fast fashion, I'm not actually sure if this is what I want to focus on anymore. I thought that it would be relevant, but in essence, it appears to focus on the sole idea that stores cheaply copy and reproduce designer's garments for the low end market. I am designing for the middle market from my original (more expensive) designs, and therefore my garments do not need to be quickly made or copied. Fast fashion garments are also frowned upon due to their disposable and unethical practices.
I don't really know where to go from here.
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