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Fashion is, by definition, perishable. Like bread, eggs and milk. Or is it?
When bread turns stale, eggs turn rotten or milk turns rancid, you do have to throw it away. Fashion is different, because its perishability is artificial, driven by popular perception that something is “out-of-date” or that something else is “the look of the day”. You dont really have to throw that blue peasant skirt out in the garbage or in the Salvation Army binbut you do anyway, because it is so yesterdayor thats what everyone else is saying.
Earlier, perceptions took time to spread, today they can be spread instantaneously through the web, TV and cell phones, and pretty quickly, even through slow media like print magazines.
So Fast Fashion is really a product of fast media and communications technologies.
Having said that, it is here to stay, and regular (mainstream) slow-coaches do need to be worried about customers being seduced away by the ever-fresh look of a Chicos or a Zara.
I cant even begin to estimate the millions of dollars that must have been spent on “studying the Zara model”. However, while Zaras model seems to scream “best practice” and everyone wants to emulate it – is it really for everyone?
Inditex (Zaras parent company) has grown over 40+ years of evolution, in a specific market and business context. It may have “exploded” on the global scene when it floated its IPO in 2001, but the business model has been brewing a long time.
It has such significant investments in production that Inditex is as much a manufacturer as a retailer.
Its people and process model are almost diametrically opposite the command and control, “buying director – driven”