Project 2B- Customer X Brand Research
We were asked within groups to research into three different brands from: Luxury, High-street and fast fashion. As communication was fairly difficult, I chose the three brands for the group and set out a pages plan. It was my task to research into Louis Vuitton.
Louis Vuitton, New Bond Street - Store Visit
To gain a true understanding of the brand, it was essential to visit a store to experience first hand how it made me feel as a customer. To feel the products and see they're true craftsmanship, to smell the perfume, and maybe even listen to the music. It all plays into the brand image.
The store made it very clear to myself how the brand wants to be portrayed. As they are very historical, my thoughts beforehand of a Louis Vuitton store were luxury stereotypes. Loads of gold, chandeliers, business people inside an old looking building. But my perception was completely changed after visiting the store.
The building itself was very minimal and slightly Brutalist making it look super modern. Whilst walking into the store, we were greeted by a doorman in all black. The first thing which struck me was how contemporary the store was. From the statues in the window displays with an infinity chess board behind them, to the egg shaped chairs hanging from the ceiling. It made it feel as though I entered a gallery, and not a clothing store.
All of the furniture used inside was made by Louis Vuitton, making up living spaces throughout the store. Truly engulfing the consumer in their world of contemporary luxury, making them feel sophisticated admiring the design of everything inside. It truly does make the experience memorable, giving the brand a slightly more personal connection with the customer.
Visiting the store made me appreciate Louis Vuitton more as a brand. The reason being, they have stuck to their original image of being a high- end luxury fashion house, but they have updated their image to evolve with the times. It doesn't feel like a snobbish fashion house, which is easy when being involved with the image of luxury. They have a clear appreciation of the changing times, and remain to be modern, innovative brand. Despite being over a century old.
Website
The website is very much like the store; modern, contemporary and luxurious. The minimal look of the menu with bold text infers to the customer the brand is refined. When entering the sight, the customer is shown a preview of their most recent collection in the form of a contemporary art video. Recently they have added the sections "Art of Living" and "World of Louis Vuitton". This goes beyond Louis Vuitton as purely a fashion brand, but portraying a Louis Vuitton lifestyle. This creates a true brand image and makes the brand more inviting to customers as they feel a-part of this contemporary luxury. This creates brand loyalty as it engulfs them within the Louis Vuitton culture. The imagery is far more sensory for the consumer, making it far more memorable.
People
Marc Jacobs
From reading about his time at Louis Vuitton, it seems he really kept the brand at the forefront of fashion. He took over in 1997, a year later in '98 he released Vuitton's first ever ready-to wear collection. He collaborated with; graffiti artist, Stephen Sprouse. He was asked to graffiti over the classic leather handbag. Which had never been done before at Vuitton. He also later asked Takashi Murakami to re-design the classic "LV" logo with his pop colours. This concept of infusing luxury fashion with art and culture created a huge shift within the industry. Truly showing the world contemporary art can be luxurious. This related diversification opened up the world of Louis Vuitton to new younger customer, making the brand far more inclusive.
To me this started Vuitton's image of being not only traditional luxury, but innovative luxury, which can learn to change with the times. Involving different artists from different cultures made Vuitton far more inclusive to a younger audience. As they felt it was more relatable and was coming up with new exciting ideas.
Virgil Abloh
Virgil Abloh is Vuitton’s first ever African-American designer. He is a true inspiration for the next generation of progressive designers, he connected LV’s heritage with his own modern twist. Using stars from the hip-hop world such as; 21 Savage, Kid Cudi and Playboi Carti. Giving the brand a new futuristic image with the use of new materials.
“The Spring-Summer 2021 collection is comprised of 30 looks Louis Vuitton Men’s collection by Virgil Abloh Spring-Summer 2021 ‘Upcycling Ideology’ Paris, August 2020. 2 made from new material, 25 looks made from recycled material, and 25 looks from the previous collection, reshown and remembered.“ - https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/fashion/article/louis-vuitton-menswear-spring-summer-21-review
Focusing on sustainability makes the brand look innovative and trustworthy as their focus is for a more responsible future. Being the a the forefront of the fashion industry they are setting a good example of how other brands should focus on their impact to the world.
"Core Values" Campaign (2007-2012)
This campaign saw Vuitton collaborate with photographer Annie Leibovitz it features celebrities "like Sean Connery, Steffi Graf, Keith Richards, Angelina Jolie, Muhammad Ali and many more". It focuses on their core values of travel and craftsmanship. The brand being portrayed in various locations with celebrities dressed casually truly focuses on the lifestyle of traveling. The celebrities are from a range of different industries, widening the appeal of the campaign. As they are using people's idols in the campaign, people start to idolise the brand. It is clear from this that presenting luxury in different settings is how Vuitton portray the brand. They don't inclose the brand to any specific lifestyle, Vuitton creates the lifestyle the customer lives within.
https://designyoutrust.com/2016/02/louis-vuittons-core-values-campaign-2007-2012-by-annie-leibovitz/
“Three exceptional journeys. One historic game.” Pele, Diego Maradona and Zinedine Zidane – soccer stars' - https://designyoutrust.com/2016/02/louis-vuittons-core-values-campaign-2007-2012-by-annie-leibovitz/
People - Influence
Audrey Hepburn
Louis Vuitton has had a long history of celebrities and social figures wearing their products. Being a luxury brand this is a very important part of their image, and has always been extremely successful. Creating a feeling of exclusivity around the items makes people desire them even more, and enables them to justify paying a lot. Having a variety of people from; the music industry to film stars. It makes Vuitton a part of a culture. Creating a point of where people can feel connected to the brand in some shape or form.
Kid Cudi
Heritage Vs Modern times
Product Range
Known famously for their leather trunks. The product range has diversified a lot since then. An extensive clothing line for both male and female. Many different types of accessories; Digital- Watches to Passport covers. Also many lifestyle products ranging from candles to speakers. The wide range of products allows the consumer to surround themselves in the luxurious world of Louis Vuitton. It also is diversifying their customers and making the brand more inclusive. Traditionally only fairly wealthy people could purchase Vuitton, as the product range was fairly limited, and this limited product was very expensive. Making it very exclusive. The range of lower priced accessories allows consumers who have less disposable income to buy into the brand. But as they are still very expensive in comparison with other accessories in general, customers out the items on a pedestal.
Art of Living
Trunks and Travel, High-Tech Objects and Accessories, Sport and Lifestyle, Home, Books and Writing. Decorate your room and surround yourself in the contemporary luxury world of Louis Vuitton .
Social Media
Social Media advertising is extremely important for Louis Vuitton to interact directly with consumers on a daily basis. Almost becoming a part of the consumers routine, this creates a strong sense of brand loyalty, which means repeat business.
A staggering 90% of the users on Instagram are under 35 in the US, being a very powerful tool communicating with younger consumers. Especially when they feature a celebrity or social influencer on their page in almost every post. This makes the brand familiar in “popular culture”, making consumers idolise the label.
https://info.lse.ac.uk/staff/divisions/communications-division/digital-communications-team/assets/documents/guides/A-Guide-To-Social-Media-Platforms-and-Demographics.pdf
https://marketing.twitter.com/en_gb/success-stories/record-breaking-twitter-livestream-for-louis-vuitton-and-bts
For their Men’s Fall- Winter 21 collection Show in Seoul, they collaborated with K-Pop megastars, BTS, and Twitter’s luxury hub in Paris. The live-stream amassed; 36.8 million views, 6+ million mentions and 1+ followers. This gave the brand global recognition and shows their balance of tradition and innovation continues to be hugely successful. In my opinion this looks like a Market Development strategy attempting to engage more of the Asian market. The luxury market in Asia is growing at a rapid rate, and is clear LVMH have chosen to target this market. Engaging with what customers in these markets listen to is super effective. Again creating a more personal relationship with the consumer.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/pamdanziger/2021/04/18/luxury-brands-are-betting-their-future-on-china-but-it-may-be-a-risky-gamble/
Success in Embracing Diversity
In an interview with Michael Burke on Business of Fashion about Louis Vuitton's time during the pandemic and about their healthy rebound. He specifies that embracing diversity ensures Vuitton is up- to date with the environment their operating within. Having diversity within the brand makes it far more personal for customers. It makes them feel included within the Vuitton world and feel they are part of the brand's narrative.
In my opinion this is a very positive step for Vuitton and shows their willingness to change. In order for diversity to work, it needs to start from the most senior roles within the business. It sets an example of how the rest of the business should operate, especially Vuitton, who are at the forefront of the industry. Changing the way they operate internally changes how the business operates externally because the influence is coming from within the business.
https://www.businessoffashion.com/articles/luxury/louis-vuittons-michael-burke-on-hardwiring-accountability-in-a-state-of-flux/
Section 2
Develop a Brand Profile for a New Start-up
"Stallion Jeans" - Shah Shanav
The start-up business was "Stallion Jeans" by a former Kingston student, Shah Shanav. The first thing which struck me was how masculine the name sounded, it also didn't seem professional at all. The brands focus was to create customisable jeans; denim colour, fit, stitching, buttons and many other things. The brand also wanted to be sustainable innovators.
The price for the jeans would cost £70 - £150, which is very costly to the average consumer. He looked to target "fairly trendy" people, which wasn't specific at all. Yet why would a customer spend £70- £150 to have "Stallion" on their jeans. Also it seemed most of the product he had was knitwear.
Absolutely nothing to do with denim.
The brand wanted to align itself with the likes of; Abercrombie & Fitch and Ted Baker. These brands are extremely outdated, and do not appeal to even "fairly trendy" people.
The brand lacked complete focus, the main goal of the brand hasn't been chosen, meaning they can't set goals, as they don't know the mission. Why would people want to buy from the brand? There isn't anything which offers anything to the consumer. Discovering the logo is officially trademarked confused me as they're paying to authenticate an image. Even though they aren't sure of the brand image themselves.
Researching further into the brand was fairly shocking. Upon googling in images "Stallion logo", I discovered the exact same logo as a free png on a random website. It comes across as very lazy, the logo should have been designed from scratch, but much like the rest of the brand, it wasn't thought through.
https://imgbin.com/png/iqbfDLVY/mustang-stallion-black-png
As communication wasn't very strong from my team, I decided to re-brand "Stallion jeans" completely, focusing on sustainable responsibility. This was the only factor from the original brand I thought was important.
Researching into what jean brands consumers buy most of would give me a much better idea of how the market prefers to typically shop. This will enable me to identify the customers who should be targeted to tackle sustainable responsibility. A fact which wasn't very surprising was the majority shop at fast fashion retailers. With the market of consumers who typically pay £75+ for jeans very minimal. Furthermore enforcing the "Stallion Jeans" product would be extremely unfavourable in this market.
“Of all the clothing stores that sell jeans, the low-cost Irish fashion retailer Primark (natively known as Penney’s) had the greatest number of users in Great Britain, with an estimated 2.7 million. This is unsurprising, given that the majority of the British public tend to spend under 25 British pounds on a pair of jeans. In comparison, only an estimated one million people spent 75 to 150 pounds.” -
https://www.statista.com/statistics/312990/leading-jeans-brands-in-the-uk/
My first concept was exchangeable children't clothing targeted at parents, the idea being they can exchange clothing after the child has grown for one set price. Meeting the needs of parents of buying new clothes when they're children grown, through exchanging clothes with a reliable company. But after discussing the idea with my mum, I discovered the idea had already been thought of, and was on Dragon's Den the week before. The brand called "Little Loop" was very successful in the Den, and was invested by two of the Dragons. Which shows this is a very innovative idea and could possibly be the future.
This gave me motivation to think of another idea with clothing exchange at the heart of operation. As in my eyes it does tackle the problem of consumers ending the product cycle. Instead it pro-longs the products life if it is exchanged back to a company. Where the life of the product is ensured to be used in a positive way.
https://thelittleloop.com
Discovering Rent the Runway gave me much more confidence within the idea of exchangeable clothing, proving it can be a viable option for consumers. Proving that exchangeable clothing as a business can be successful. Rent the runway have the largest dry-cleaning facility in the US, ensuring every item which gets sent back is cleaned and mended to the best of their abilities. Ensuring the customer is receiving the best product.
Looking at Rent the Runway it seemed they were targeting young (23-30) professional females. In my opinion this is a very effective audience to target as on special occasions garments are only used for a short term period. This inspired me to think of other consumer segments who want fashion items for short-term use.
https://jilt.com/blog/rent-the-runway-logistics/
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/25/business/rent-the-runway-clothing-covid.html
After seeing this statistic from The Guardian, it gave me a focus point of who the brand should target for sustainable responsibility. The cycle of products typically ends with the consumer, perfectly shown here. It is obvious this consumer looks for a product with a cheap price, as they want the product for short-term use. Therefore offering an alternative to fast fashion retailers, to purchase clothes at a cheap price would be hugely successful in the current market.
https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2019/jun/21/fast-fashion-is-on-the-rampage-with-uk-at-the-head-of-the-charge
https://www.teenvogue.com/story/abercrombie-and-fitch-is-making-its-comeback-tiktok
From reading this article it showed me how effective using influencers on Tik Tok can be for brands who want to change their image to appeal to a younger consumer. Abercrombie and Fitch has a very outdated image in younger consumers eyes. But with this new marketing strategy the brand has been able to market its new product range very successfully. Focusing on basic clothing items with little to no branding, starting the #abercrombiestyle and #abercrombiehaul has made the brand go viral. Creating a sense of community around Abercrombie and Fitch. Their collaboration with Tik Tok star Andy Lobos gained over a million views when previewing the new logo less hoodie, which went on to sell-out on the website soon after. Clearly this re-brand has resonated with younger consumers and has given Abercrombie a new lease of life.
As this concept is introducing a new service to an existing market, Tik Tok seems like a good way of penetrating this specific market. It was clear from looking at these statistics that Tik Tok would be a very suitable platform for reaching a younger consumer. The younger audience which uses Tik Tok are far more engaged than any other platform, ensuring the brand is able to communicate messages far more effectively. Meaning consumers are more likely to react, this would be good for brand awareness as they may spread the positive message of sustainable responsibility. Influencing the next generation to change their shopping habits in my opinion is a key step towards a less harmful fashion industry.
https://backlinko.com/tiktok-users
Logo
The logo is meant to be fun and minimal to give the brand a modern look. Using the word "Function" instead of "party" as it resinates more with a younger consumer, specifically Gen Z- Millenial. Drawing a character as part of the logo makes it far more memorable for consumers in my opinion. Using bold lettering was important to grab people's attention, and to maintain a modern brand image.
Brand Overview
Short video advertising the brand concept with "Going Out" visuals. The video could be posted to Tik Tok, or eve used within an Instagram Ad. The video needed to be short and snappy as the target customer when using these social media platforms don't have the longest attention span. Therefore it is important to portray the message quickly and clearly.
