The Business of Fashion

Buenos Aires: Retail explosion

Buenos Aires is a city better known as the home of the Tango, but one day it may become known as the land of the killer retail concept.

Across this metropolis of 11 million people, from the uber-cool urban jungle in Palermo Viejo to the elegant boulevards of Recolota, a retail explosion has taken place, proving that Argentina has truly bounced back from the economic crisis that virtually paralysed the country at the beginning of the millennium.

Our favourite barrio (and everyone else’s) is Palermo Soho, named for one of its urban brethren in New York. The intersection of El Salvador and Armenia is analagous to Spring and Mercer, the heart from which all the action emanates. But that’s where the similarities end.

Discreet Luxury: This is slow fashion

There was quite a bit of interest our recent post  Discreet Luxury - A Segment to watch. Stealth wealth consumers want something special and discreet and therefore reject obvious logos, product ubiquity and sameness. Though the category is dominated by thousands of small, independent brands, Bottega Veneta is the one global brand that has been emblematic of how well this can work from a business standpoint.

This video supplements a Wall Street Journal article entitled Inside a Salon that Serves the Logo-Phobic and takes you inside Yuta Powell's discrete luxury boutique in New York's Plaza Athénée Hotel (I didn't know New York had its own Plaza Athenee either!). The store stocks niche luxury brands like Boudicca, Azzaro and Kiton and each product must pass through Ms. Powell's exacting standards for quality and craftsmanship, honed during a long career at Givenchy.

Ms. Powell says "This is slow fashion; fewer but better clothes."

Rodeo and Robertson: Build it, and they will come

After having checked out some of the more up-and-coming areas of L.A, it was time to visit the king and queen of luxury and fashion here: Rodeo Drive and Robertson Boulevard.

The most remarkable thing about both these streets is that the stores really are an extension of the brands themselves. In Paris, London and even New York, most brands are constrained by existing building facades and building codes which they must work around as they design their stores. In Los Angeles, it appears that the brands have complete freedom in design, and therefore, if done well, every aspect from the sparkling exteriors, the natural lighting, the size of logos outside the building, and even the dramatic entrances off the street are messages about the brand. It was truly impressive.

Juma: Exploring contemporary-LAnd

To many die-hard fashionistas, Los Angeles has always been considered the less sophisticated, dressed-down, in your face, suburban, over-celebrity conscious little sister to New York, which has consistently retained its place amongst the world's fashion capitals.  However, our visit to L.A. has revealed an interesting mix of local designers and boutiques combined with the glossy global brands along Rodeo Drive. Driven by its native contemporary brands, L.A. is experiencing a fashion renaissance.

Yesterday, I cruised around some upcoming fashion districts here with Jamil Juma, of Juma, which he designs with his sister Alia. Juma's collections (one fashion forward RTW, one activewear) are carried at more than 30 boutiques around North America, including Fred Segal  in L.A. and Caravan in NY. Both Jamil and I were keen to get a feel for what is going on here, especially in the hot contemporary segment where his brand is positioned.

Online fashion retail: A party without the cool kids

Every week there are reports of new online fashion retailers, but some of the biggest names in the UK are noticeably absent from the space. Selfridges and Harvey Nichols have essentially no online fashion businesses to speak of, while the venerable Harrods is selling a heavily edited mix of its lower-priced collections, with an emphasis on accessories, knitwear and outerwear only.

All of this is even more surprising when you consider that many of the major American department stores, with similarly large profiles, have made heavy (and successful) pushes into the online space. Neiman Marcus, Bergdorf Goodman, Nordstrom, Bloomingdales, and Barney's all have online sites with a large fashion assortment for sale. What's more, many of the world's best known luxury brands say that their rapidly growing online boutiques are their number one or two retail sales generators, even more than their flagship stores in the world's fashion capitals.

Tom Ford in person: Go Beta First, New York

On my last trip to New York, I finally managed to see the new Tom Ford flagship store in person. After all of the hubbub about its "Hermes and Oprah" similarities, I wanted to judge for myself. Was Cathy Horyn right in criticising the high price-points as being out of reach even for the most discerning male customers? Was Horacio Silva on the mark for panning the store for its overly-exclusive environment?

I'm afraid the answer is yes. In spades.

For all of the talk about the luxurious feel of the store, I have to say it all felt quite ordinary to me. That is to say, it didn't feel different from most of the other masses of luxury stores that are out there. The grey colour palette and silver store fittings reminded me a bit of the old Gucci store formats (that are now being phased out). Sure, the furniture and materials, based on Ford's London home, were sumptuous and very tasteful. However, the store lacked that special something that makes truly unique retail formats stand out. When you walk into a Chanel store - any Chanel store -  you feel like you have truly entered the world of Chanel and all that it stands for. When you walk into Abercrombie & Fitch, there is a certain electricity in how the product and store environment go hand-in-hand to speak about the brand. 

This, the Tom Ford store did not have. Not yet, at least. For now, customers need to get through glass cabinets that hold many of the clothes more like museum pieces, than sumptuous articles of clothing. How is a customer going to feel the need to buy a beautiful cashmere sweater if he can't even touch it before asking someone's permission? This is akin to taking a child to a petting zoo and saying, "no petting allowed, unless you ask me first. "

The most disappointing thing for me is that Mr. Ford has completely misjudged the consumer he is going after. After having nailed it at Gucci, he has completely missed the mark here. Ford has insulted the intelligence of the customer by assuming he will pay the steep prices just because of all the frills. Frills or no frills, most luxury customers are very discerning about the product, and by making it so hard to form a judgment, the customer is forced to judge based on the store itself, not the product. The Gucci formula of glamour and sex won't work when you are asking a man to spend $5000+ on a suit. It's no wonder the store was completely empty.

My expections for this store were very high, even with the unfavourable media coverage that I had seen in advance. Mostly, this is because Tom Ford has been selling the idea of his eponymous brand to us for the past year and half.  It is also because I respect the man a great deal for his creativity, business acumen and personal style. So, you can say I felt rather disappointed than critical.

Many industry observers have been waiting with baited breath to see what he would come up with. Maybe this is another lesson learned for Mr. Ford, the erstwhile master of PR and spin. Be careful what you say (and how long you say it for, and how often you say it) about a big project in advance of its launch. You might just be setting yourself up for a different kind of high-profile PR than you had expected: the negative kind. Perhaps it would have been better for Mr. Ford to take a listen from the Internet world and go beta first, testing out the concept and honing it carefully before making the big splash.

© 2007 Copyright Imran Amed - The Business of Fashion.

Feting Fetishism, Paris

Last night, legendary Parisian concept store Colette feted London designer Giles Deacon's latest collaboration with Mulberry -- a link to Giles' S/S 07 collection of 'subtle' fetishism. The place was rammed with fashionistas (there were a couple of other events going on). The Parisians are into colour-blocking these days, there was a lot of red, purple and electric blue peaking out of black blazers, leather jackets and dresses. Even the cocktails of the night were electric blue.

Collaborations like this are good for emerging designers like Giles because they provide much needed cash to fund the business through working capital crunches, lend credibilty to designer's stature, and raise the profile of the designer on the back of PR events like this. Who doesn't like to have a party thrown in their honour? In return, the brands get cool products and street cred.

Who ever thought Mulberry could look like this?

The place was heaving.

The colour-blocking was raging.

SoHo Shopping, New York

Many emerging designers get their initial support from the myriad small boutiques around the world that are trying to give their customers something a bit different; something they won't necessarily find in a department store. High-end boutiques also differ from their department store counterparts in that they really get involved in giving their customers advice and tips on the newest designers and styles. I took a walk through SoHo on Saturday with my friend Joan, a serious fashionista, who also spends a lot of her time scouring eBay for unique pieces that speak to her individuality.

This is Joan camping out in front of some SoHo graffiti, wearing her first ever eBay fashion purchase, a shaggy shearling jacket that helps keep her warm in the frigid temperatures that New Yorkers have been struggling with over the past few days.

We visited a couple of Joan's favourite designer womenswear boutiques. The first one was Kirna Zabete

(96 Greene St., SoHo, New York 10012, near Spring St. +1 212-941-9656), which is a store selling the wares of young designers including Peter Som, Proenza Schouler, Tuleh and Derek Lam. The store is run by two very glamourous women who I have spotted at the shows in New York and Paris. You can't miss them. They are some of the best-dressed women around, and they run a good business to boot, having been flogging designer clothes for over 6 years. Many boutiques don't last even 6 months. I attribute their success to focusing carefully on their target customer and buying a tightly-edited collection that suits that customer perfectly. The store staff were helpful and smart (if not somewhat aloof), even though the security guard wouldn't let me take a photo of the store-front from the outside. We took one anyway because it seemed ridiculous to prevent people from taking photos on the street. I can understand why they want to keep people from taking photos inside, but outside too? Sheeesh.

The next stop was Curve (83 Mercer Street, SoHo, New York), a new transplant from L.A. where Curve has been pleasing West coast fashionistas for several years now. The sales staff in Curve were extremely friendly and truly excited about the brands they are carrying, including their own house label "Curve" and Fenton jewelry, mixed in with Vivienne Westwood, and some serious vintage couture pieces from Dior and the like.

What's great about New York is that it is always reflecting the zeitgeist of America, which right now is of course about the war in Iraq. Joan and I spotted an unforgettable scene of simple graffiti in a basketball court which speaks for itself. The chain-link of the fence seemed to be perfectly appropriate symbol for this.