UNIQLO Regards Apple As An Opponent

In 2015, it was a mixed blessing for UNIQLO.

On the one hand, affected by the rise of labor force, the Fast Retailing, Japan's fast selling group, has declined from 90% to six to 70% in China. On the other hand, all kinds of negative news have never been stopped.

Even so, UNIQLO gave a beautiful pcript.

Fast forward group released the first three quarters of fiscal year 2015 (September 2014 -2015 May) earnings report shows that group revenue growth of 23.9% to 3 billion 270 million dollars, profit growth of 36% to 230 million U.S. dollars.

Obviously, the Chinese market has contributed a lot.

At the same time, UNIQLO continued to expand its pace in China.

As of the first half of 2015, the number of stores in UNIQLO in China was close to 470, about the sum of H&M and GAP stores in China.

During the 2015 "double 11" period, UNIQLO won the clothing category champion with a sales of 600 million yuan.

Although the uptrend is good, many industry observers believe that XX Group will face challenges.

One of them is how to maintain profitability in the face of setbacks in the US market, thus surpassing Zara and H&M to become the number one in the world.

In 2015, when it was listed in Hongkong for one year, Xun group accelerated the globalization strategy led by UNIQLO.

According to reports, fast sales group is the largest clothing retailer in Asia by revenue.

But Xun marketing group is obviously not satisfied with it.

Liu Jing, chairman and CEO of fast marketing group, said in a media interview in Hongkong that the company can rely on its own efforts to raise the global ranking from fourth to No. 1.

Now the world's largest clothing retailer is Zara's parent company, Spain's Inditex SA.

"Fast marketing group will focus on overseas UNIQLO and accelerate its global strategy to achieve growth. It is expected that overseas UNIQLO will expand at the rate of 200 stores a year," Pan Ning CEO, a senior executive vice president of fast marketing group and global media, said.

Xun Group expects that the total revenue of the Chinese market will close to 15 billion 90 million yuan this year, and will strive to achieve the goal of 1000 stores in the near future.

On the impact of e-commerce on the sales of clothing brands such as UNIQLO, in Pan Ning's view, more are bringing new opportunities.

"The company will also focus on the operation of online stores while expanding its physical stores. At present, it is gradually forming a O2O mode of online interactive online interaction. It will build a brand image through online strong sales and expand the market by offline stores."

However, the road of e-commerce of UNIQLO is not smooth.

UNIQLO officially entered the Jingdong in April 17, 2015. Pan Ning also said that cooperation could complement each other.

Unexpectedly, cooperation was less than a year, thanks to UNIQLO.

Strategic adjustment, UNIQLO Jingdong official flagship store closed in July 20th.

In fact, Ryui Masa is more willing to define UNIQLO as a technology company than "fast fashion".

In an interview with the media, the Japanese richest man, who has been in office for many years, even said: "the only competitor of UNIQLO is not Gap, but apple.

Compared with the ever-changing products of competitors such as ZARA and H&M, the number of UNIQLO products is poor, which is similar to that of Apple stores.

According to media reports, 70% of the products in UNIQLO are basic, and the inventory units remain around 1000 annually.

Design Director

Then we compare the improvement process of UNIQLO foundation with iPhone iteration.

In other words, in the eyes of many people, the production mode of some products of UNIQLO is similar to the "small step run, quick iteration" that the technology industry is familiar with.

The "evolving" HEATTECH series is typical.

Since it was launched in 2003, HEATTECH has continuously improved its products based on user feedback, and updated it from the most basic to keep warm and warm up.

Since 2013, camellia oil has been added to the category of women's clothing to achieve moisturizing function. In 2014, the ratio increased by 30%.

In fact, UNIQLO's love for the "foundation", the way to make clothes, and even the preaching of brand stories now seem to see the shadow of technology companies.

UNIQLO attaches great importance to the development of basic funds.

"Unlike other companies that have every season's fashion theme, we are more concerned about the product itself, year after year, continuous testing, upgrading and improvement."

Katsuda Yuki, senior vice president of global research and Design Department of UNIQLO, described this.