Fashion and Social Media Essay

Due to the changes in technology British luxury brand Burberry has changed its global product and marketing strategy. Burberry is using social media to reposition and better market its product. For small fashion companies like 3. 1 Phillip Lim the use of social media to generate business internationally can be harmful to its reputation. I will discuss the pros and cons each company could face while using social media to generate business internationally. Burberry was founded in 1856 by Thomas Burberry, who opened his first store in Basingstoke, Hampshire, England. By 1870 the business had established itself by focusing on the developing of outdoor attire. Burberry is most famous for its trench coat. The company has branded stores and franchises around the world, and also sells through concessions in third-party stores. Queen Elizabeth II and The Prince of Wales have granted the company Royal Warrants. Royal warrants give companies the right to advertise the goods and services that they provide to the royal family. According to Business Weekly, Burberry is one of the most valuable brands in the world. For Burberry to maintain its presents in the fashion industry they have to be the forerunner when it comes to marketing. Today fashion designers are currently working on their spring collection for 2013. Technology has changed the way the fashion industry markets products. A collection of clothing that is presented by a company is created two years before it hits stores. Before a collection makes it to fashion week, samples of the designs are made and approved by the staff of the designer. A company would then showcase the designer’s collection at small private venues for a critique from potential buyers. Finally, The Fashion Company presents its collection to the world at fashion week. The response from the fashion show determines where that product will be placed, the price point and its exclusiveness. The problem with this way of marketing is forecasting. Fashion week occurs in New York, Milan, Paris and London. If you do not have a ticket to the fashion shows in any of these countries you can forget about a sneak peek at the â€Å"the future fashion†. Those who attend fashion week determine the look of the â€Å"masses†. Based on the response from the audience and press’s feedback fashion companies would have to predict how many units of each product would be produced. This number is determined one year before the product is placed on shelves. The decision of how many units of a product a company should make is vital to a fashion company. The last thing any company would want is to have inventory from a previous year on hand. Today, Burberry has come up with the perfect solution through social media. During Burberry’s Spring/Summer 2012 Fashion Show that aired September 19, 2011, Burberry also launched their first â€Å"Tweetwalk. The company premiered every look on Twitter moments before the models hit the runway. This action created a huge amount of interest on Twitter, both â€Å"#Burberry† and â€Å"Christopher Bailey† (Chief Creative Officer) trended worldwide. Conversations about the brand peaked shortly after the show began hitting number two on the global trending charts and breaking Burberry’s personal mentions-per-minute record (Indvik 2011). Instead of dictating the trends, brands are throwing the ball into the consumer’s court. Burberry now participates in crowd-sourcing. Crow-sourcing allows your audience to decide on your product through the use of social media, forums, and high-tech web customizing programs. This action illuminates the prediction of the amounts of units to produce as a company. Broadcasting a runway show through Twitter gives instant feedback to Burberry about what their customers want. Not only are they finding out what their customers want and providing that need, they are allowing their customer the opportunity to dictate the future of fashion with the option of customizing the products that are produced. The customers can begin placing orders during the fashion show. Earlier this year, for a show in Beijing, Burberry introduced a 3D holographic runway. Christopher Bailey states, â€Å"Burberry is now as much a media-content company as we are a design company. † Baily believes that the online experience Burberry has developed on its own behalf doesn’t detract from or diminish the role of traditional media, but provides another channel for consumers to experience the brand. He believes a brand is not a product, it’s and experience as well, and experiences need to come from the center of a community. Burberry uses all those platforms to communicate to all of their different communities around the world about what they are doing (Indvik 2011). Burberry believes that digital communication and technology are part of the way everybody lives. Burberry is a 155-year-old company with a very young team, for any company to last that long they would have to accept and adapt to the changes in technology. For small companies like 3. 1 Phillip Lim the use of social media to generate business internationally can be harmful to its reputation. . 1 Phillip Lim was a global company from day one. The first collection for fall 2005 womenswear, was sold in 20 countries. Within six months, sales reached $2. 8 million. Today, there are 60 full-time employees and retail flagships in New York, Los Angeles, Tokyo, Seoul, and Singapore. A Hong Kong store is in the works. His New York headquarters has outgrown its Garment District digs and will move, in November, to a 25,000 square foot SoHo loft (Chang 2011). Lim states, â€Å"I want my work to speak for me. He is elusive, shy and distant as a person and he wants his brand to represent him. He isn’t caught up in the red carpets, paparazzi or social media. His main focuses are his designs and presentations for fashion shows. The company has a profile on Facebook that only post upcoming events and a brief history of the company. There aren’t any wall posts or comments on designs from consumers. The page isn’t maintained or up dated daily with posts. Burberry posts something new every week, you can shop from their page and they allow they’re friends to comment. . 1 Phillip Lim is still new to the fashion Industry compared to Burberry. 3. 1 Phillip Lim can’t afford negative press. Any negative press can affect their position in the market. The company is still growing and they’re not where they want to be. Indulging in social media sites like Facebook and Twitter isn’t the company’s focus. Whereas, Burberry has the leverage to do what they want because of the relationships they built with their customers. If Burberry had negative press it would not outweigh the positive.