The luxury fashion business strategy model

Abstract

It is perplexing to find out that when several practitioners in the luxury goods management are questioned about their business strategies or business models, they often look puzzled. The majority of these managers perceive business models and strategy plans as documents drafted by consultants to be filed away and reproduced during the annual reporting exercise. A senior executive of a luxury brand once told me that if I were interested in evaluating their business strategy plan, he would not hesitate to send a copy of the ‘Strategy’ to me. When I asked him the main features of the strategy plan, he replied, ‘How could I know? I am occupied everyday with managing the company, I don’t have enough time to read the Strategy Report.’ It was my turn to be puzzled. For this manager, the company’s strategy, (which by the way is its lifeline), was represented by a pile of papers stored in a drawer to be retrieved when a Consultant visited. This is part of the reality of the state of luxury fashion management.

‘A stand can be made against invasion by an army; no stand can be made against invasion by an idea.’

Victor Hugo, French writer and poet (1802–85)