"And buy and cherish,
After that, there was no Zara in the city. ”
Recently, the Spanish brand Zara
Suddenly, the news of a large number of stores in many cities
Circulating on major social platforms,
attracted the reluctance and doubts of many fans:
Is Zara going to withdraw from the Chinese market?
Image source: Shared by netizens
On April 9, related topics rushed to the top of the hot search.
"I am reluctant to say goodbye, and there will be one less good place to go in the future. "Opening the short video platform, many bloggers posted pictures and texts of recent sweeping goods and nostalgia before Zara closed the store.
As a leader of fast fashion brands, Zara, which belongs to the listed company Inditex Group (INdustrias de DIseño TEXtil, S.A., hereinafter referred to as Inditex), dares to open stores with a unit price of about 100 yuan next to LV and Gucci, which cost 100,000 yuan, which shows its once strong popularity.
"On April 2, we closed our Baoshan store in Shanghai, and on March 31, we closed our stores in Dongguan and Huizhou. On April 7, when the reporter asked the Zara staff as a consumer, the staff inquired about the cities where the brand had recently closed stores, and said that "we now have 87 stores that are open normally."
It is worth noting that Inditex's latest FY2023 report shows that as of January 31, 2024, Zara has opened 1,811 stores worldwide. China is the country with the largest number of stores outside of Spain (261), with 118 stores. Among them, the number of stores in mainland China is 96. This means that in just over two months, Zara has closed nine more stores in the mainland market.
Regarding the rumors that "Zara will gradually withdraw from the Chinese market", Zara staff said that there is no relevant news yet.
"Offline channel-driven brands are all facing the process of closing stores, especially fast fashion brands that have been expanding wildly in China in the past few years. Luxury expert Zhou Ting pointed out in an interview with reporters.
Pang Rui, a well-known brand expert and founding partner of Zhansheng Communication, told reporters that in recent years, Inditex has adjusted its positioning on Zara, with the aim of launching an impact on the higher-end market, "which has also changed its offline store strategy.
"Open a big store" to keep profits
Zara之父蝉联亿万富豪榜
According to Zara's parent company, Inditex Group, reported its fiscal year 2023, its sales increased by 10.4% year-on-year to €35.9 billion, and net income increased by 30.3% year-on-year to €5.4 billion from February 1, 2023 to January 31, 2024. With the exception of the main brand Zara, the other brands are smaller, and the growth rate of Inditex's overall sales is mainly determined by Zara, which contributes more than 70% of the group's sales.
Zara is an important pillar of Inditex's performance Image source: Screenshot of Inditex's FY2023 financial report
Since 2019, Inditex has shrunk the number of stores globally for several consecutive years. At the same time, Zara implemented the strategy of "opening big stores" and upgraded existing stores. In 2023, the total area of Zara's offline stores increased by 4.5%, and store sales increased by 7.9%.
Closing stores while making a profit, Zara's strategy is also seen as "retreating to advance".
"Zara's online efforts have been strong, and online sales have increased year after year, which is the main reason for the increase in sales of its store closures. Zhou Ting told reporters that in 2023, Zara will start live streaming on Douyin, including displaying clothing, visiting the fitting room, visiting the makeup area, and behind-the-scenes team tidbits. "Closing small stores and opening big stores, and finally achieving one store in one city, is the main trend of brand retail in the future, and Zara will close more stores, and the remaining stores will also undergo in-depth digital transformation. ”
According to the 2024 list of the world's billionaires released in April, Amancio Ortega, founder of Inditex Group, ranked 12th with a net worth of $111.2 billion. Amancio Ortega has also won the title of the world's richest man many times.
Image source: Screenshot of the 2024 Global Billionaires List
From a poor tailor to the richest man in the world, Amancio Ortega's life is legendary. Born in Spain in 1936 to a poor family, Ortega's father was a railroad worker with nothing to do with clothing retailing, and at the age of 13 Ortega dropped out of school to work in a clothing store.
Ortega was keenly aware early on that too many middlemen were driving up the price of fashion and discouraging customers. He bought a lot of cheap fabric, cut and sewed similar styles out of rudimentary cardboard models, and sold them at half the price, only to be sold out. This can be regarded as the beginning of Zara's "mimicking" genes. In 1975, Ortega opened its first Zara store. No one could have imagined that this brand would make him a global clothing retail giant in the future.
Image source: Screenshot of Zara's official website
"Fast" is Zara's killer feature, compared with the 6-month cycle of ordinary clothing companies and about 3 months of international high-end brands, Zara's clothing is only about 12 days from design to sale, and the shortest is even only one week. Zara's designers shuttled through the fashion weeks of major brands, and the new products that LV and Chanel had just released on the runway, and a few days later, the same models appeared on Zara's shelves at a low price.
Such a blatant "high imitation" also gives other clothing brands a headache. OTB, a luxury goods operating company, sued Zara for "design plagiarism", a lawsuit that took three years and Zara lost. In 2020, Danish clothing brand Rains sued Zara for infringement, and finally lost the lawsuit.
Source: Qilu Evening News, Daily Economic News