Unscramble The Secrets Of UNIQLO's Selling For Decades

　　 Making information generate huge profits

Liu Chi, the president of UNIQLO, raised the third generation very early. clothing Retail enterprises. The so-called third generation clothing retail enterprises not only need to manufacture and sell products, but also send information through continuous corporate activities, create new values, and further arouse customers' desire to buy. That is to say, the third generation of garment retailers is no longer a mere retailing industry.

This concept is based on Liu well's understanding of modern consumption. He believes that the key to deciding the purchase is the image of the commodity or the value of all kinds of information, rather than the attraction of the commodity itself.

What is the strongest commodity? It is to show customers the reasons for buying. Ryui said that in Modern Japan, where the consumption maturity is very high, the only way to promote consumption is information. In the retail industry, information is the biggest source of revenue.

To improve the quality, it is necessary to spend the corresponding cost, but the cost structure is generally visible, so it is difficult for the commodity to set a price higher than the cost. Information is not the same, so long as the method is right, it can create huge profits almost without cost.

In 1998 and 1999, when the UNIQLO cashmere products were sold in a series of goods, uniqo consciously offered to TV stations, newspapers, and all kinds of magazine media to provide high quality news releases with both topic and originality.

Pay attention to sales site

Because of the importance of "information", Liu well is most concerned about store sales sites directly contacting customers, as well as the store manager who is responsible for managing the store's work. He explained, "the salesmen of the shop know more about the customers than the people at headquarters, so all the correct answers are in the front line of the shop's sales."

Liu well denied the tradition of "headquarters decision and branch compliance". Chain store Theory. In the era of shortage of goods, this system can provide goods to consumers at the lowest price and the fastest speed, creating the myth of retail business.

But in the era of supply exceeding demand, this mode is becoming more and more inefficient. The reason is that "neat and unified commodities and large supply" are difficult to cope with the diversified needs of individuals in the era of oversupply, and this system will also produce the biggest drawbacks of centralized centralized system, namely, big business diseases and bureaucracy, and the most sensitive strain and flexibility of the retail industry will be buried.

The traditional way of management is to instruct the operator to sell the site only if he obeys the order. UNIQLO does not adopt such a one-way approach, but lets the staff at the sales site think independently and act autonomously, while the operators should be good at listening to their opinions and requirements. In this way, judgment is a two-way street.

There will be a lot of dissatisfaction in the front line of traditional chain stores, for example, the first line can not display goods according to the habits and characteristics of the region, nor can it introduce new products according to the actual customers' trend.

UNIQLO attaches importance to the attitude of the sales site, giving full play to the strength of each branch and improving the satisfaction of employees and customers. Therefore, enterprises must decentralize their branches, respect employees in branch offices and reuse them, not just to work as workers.

In order to carry out this reform, we switched from uniformed headquarters to "shop oriented", and Liu Qiang, who had a strong sense of crisis, had a very intense high-level exchange. The result of the big change is that Liu well replaced 5 of the 7 directors, and almost all the "behind the scenes" heroes of the first growth period left UNIQLO.

After that, Liu announced some specific measures: including the operation expert group system composed of Liu Jing's dictatorship system to new directors, including restructuring the supply chain, setting up more flexible, more productive and meticulous adjustable production system during the sales period, executing shop single management, and implementing shop order system in some stores.

At the same time, Liu well advocated the concept of "full staff management", and even the ordinary staff should strive to be a "knowledge worker". Knowledge worker is a concept put forward by Drucker, a leader in management and management. It refers to a worker who thinks according to his own knowledge and knowledge and voluntarily does something written in his work guidebook, which is not written by his boss, and can be done well.

Knowledge workers in the staff increase, and the way of business will change. This will not only improve the efficiency of retail enterprises, but also provide employees with opportunities for development, meaning of work and meaning of life.

The reform has brought unexpected results. The sales growth of UNIQLO has stopped abruptly, and the existing stores have set a new record for the 34 consecutive months of growth in about two years. {page_break}

 

Reasonable price hikes

"UNIQLO abandoning low prices" is a full page advertisement published by UNIQLO in September 2004 in Japan's main media. This slogan has brought great impact to people. Because at that time, people's impression of UNIQLO was "it's just because UNIQLO is cheap enough to sell." Liu Chi, the president of UNIQLO, is unable to bear this view.

He concluded that in the past, UNIQLO did "relatively good clothing", but in the future, he would work hard to create "absolutely good clothes", that is, from cheap UNIQLO to excellent UNIQLO. Ryui said: if you sell low-priced goods, you will be involved in the price competition of cheap clothing dealers, so that UNIQLO will never win.

In 2004, the price line of UNIQLO was slowly rising after "getting rid of the low price declaration", and the price of its main commodity jeans increased at least by 30%.

However, UNIQLO is not just raising prices, it can always improve the quality of products while increasing prices, that is, increasing the added value of products. If price increases, it is necessary to provide equivalent or exceed the added value of the price increase; if the price remains unchanged, it is necessary to continuously provide the function and quality of the product.

The most typical example is its popular product "HEAT TECH" series, which is characterized by "evolution" every year. So the location of UNIQLO shifted from its low price to function, quality and design.

Create new market

The problem that plagued retailers in recent years is that things can not sell. The root cause of this problem is the ease and outmoded thinking that "goods can be sold on the shelves." Nowadays, things can not be sold as a matter of course, because society has already passed the era of insufficient supplies, and in the era of supply exceeding demand, people's desire to buy has been decreasing.

Not only that, modern people buy clothes There is one preference: don't like clothes and do not give them away. Some clothes can't be sold at a lower price. In the modern consumer industry, clothing is a commodity that is not allowed to sell at a price.

Cheap clothes are not necessarily sold out. Can a certain value of high priced clothing be sold? Not necessarily. It must be "valuable and cheap" before it can be sold. In other words, modern consumers are pursuing "cheap reason". The traditional department stores and general supermarkets only saw "no price cuts, but they couldn't sell them".

"No reason for price cuts" sometimes causes consumers' suspicion. "Why was it so expensive before?" now UNIQLO is popular because it is cheap, but the key is that it discovers the potential demand of consumption, that is, the creation of new markets.

For example, its new thermal underwear "HEAT TECH" sold 100 million pieces of terror in 2011. Why sell well? Because it has jumped out of the framework of "high quality and affordable underwear", and has created a new category -- underwear's heating function.

In the eyes of consumers today, casual clothes are "casual clothes in everyday life". This concept and market are actually created by UNIQLO. Before UNIQLO grew rapidly, the definition of casual wear was "fashion oriented, stylish clothes for young people". From this point of view, ZARA and H&M are traditional casual wear.

UNIQLO removes several key words in traditional casual clothes, such as youth, fashion and fashion, but transforms them into the necessities that are most close to daily life. To put it plainly is not to be bound by casual clothes, but to create a wider range of new leisure market.

　 Clothing for all

As we all know, speaking of the main points of marketing strategy, first of all, we should clarify our STP, that is, market segmentation, target market selection and market positioning. That is to say, first, classify the market, then sell the products to anyone, and finally decide how to separate their products from competitors and establish competitive advantages.

However, UNIQLO deviated from the modern marketing theory, and even completely deviated from the general knowledge of marketing. UNIQLO did not lock in the market, target groups and positioning, but developed products that had no personality or characteristics and were at a competitive disadvantage. But this is exactly the biggest advantage of UNIQLO. How to explain the contradictions?

The key lies in the "differential trap" in modern commodity strategy. The differentiation of market competition leads to excessive differential competition. All competitors are always differentiated, which leads to identity. Nowadays, enterprises are easy to fall into this trap. This tendency to "deliberately maintain differentiation without difference" is particularly evident in the clothing industry.

UNIQLO and the blind differentiation competition draw a clear line, but enter the "all age and gender can wear low cost basic casual wear" market. In fact, this market has existed for a long time, and the scale is very large. Perhaps because this huge market appears too early, it becomes a blind spot of other businesses.

Ryui Masa said, "the clothes we make are suitable for everyone. The idea of "down jacket for young people" and "sweater for the elderly" is wrong.