Can A Fashion Brand Incubator Really Achieve A Designer In Business?

In May, Steve Hoffman, co-founder of Silicon Valley incubator Founders Space, came to China and was surprised to find that her colleagues were too many. The concept of introduction from the US Silicon Valley has been surging in recent years with the surge of entrepreneurship in China. The number reached its peak in 2014 and 2015. Net red incubation and intelligent hardware hatching are not uncommon. A very low-key category is also gradually increasing. clothing brand Incubator.

At the end of May, Magmode was newly opened in taiguli, Sanlitun, Beijing. It is a fashion integration store, and it is also a clothing incubator.

The so-called incubation is not entirely from scratch. At present, the first batch of works hatched in the first place are 3 men's clothing brands that already have a certain foundation: the independence known to the public as a result of the TV show "goddess's new clothes". Designer Masha Ma, following two women's wear lines, launched a new menswear line Mattitude with Magmode, and the other two were young designers from London and Paris, Sean Suen's newly created brand Sean by Sean and the personal brand Arc of Xu Jiazheng, a designer who worked in Hermes. And the goal of hatching is that these designer brands can independently open stores, and they can continuously incubate new brands.

One of the founders is Cai Chongda, who is more familiar with the identity of the media and bestseller writer. He has worked as editor in chief of the press and also served as the director of the Chinese version of the report. Perhaps one of his most famous works is the record of the 3 million words "drug trial".

But in the clothing industry, Cai Chongda is not a novice. He was born in Jinjiang, Fujian. This garment manufacturing industry has produced seven traditional wolves, seven brand men's clothing and other traditional clothing brands. 3 years ago, Cai Chongda founded a men's clothing brand "single farmer" with a little literary and artistic talent. According to the official website information of single farmers, there are 58 outlets in 28 cities.

The last three are red seas, but the crustal movement of clothing has begun. We are already not satisfied with the existing clothing consumption, this market is very large. Cai Chongda explained his motives in this way.

However, if you want to be a fashion brand incubator, you need to know two things first: how to make a clothing brand and how to make an incubator.

Clothing is a traditional industry, its industrial chain is long and trivial. The starting position is the designer's hand, the end is the customer's body, in which there are fabric suppliers, producers, wholesalers, channel providers, plus some brands have to consider the exhibition schedule, media and ordering matters. This complicated process is very popular.

Among them, bigger brands and independent designer brands are not the same. China's big brands in Jiangsu, Zhejiang, Guangdong, Shenzhen and Fujian, from seven wolves to Mass Phil, earn one billion of their annual income. The way they build up word of mouth is not only advertising but also a large number of channels. As Roland Begg, a consultancy, said, La Natsu Bell's advertising expenditure is zero, because it only brushes enough sense of existence in the store.

In contrast, the operation of independent brand designers is much smaller and much more beautiful. They deliver brand information by launching exhibitions and videos, and social spending and marketing expenses are indispensable in daily expenses. Products and showrooms reveal the designer's personal preferences. Brand names and designer names are often accompanied by clothing. Although the unit price of clothes is more than 1000, the annual income is far less than that of the former.

This is an independent designer Wang who has been running the same name fashion brand Vega Zaishi Wang for 8 years. In real terms, it is called "we are in an industry, but not in one dimension". Wang said in fact, big brands are like UNIQLO stores in Sanlitun. Customers who come in every day have a substantial demand for clothes, but designer brands are more like a style hut hidden in alley, and do not want to accept everyone. But just because there is no large-scale production, independent designers have no bargaining power when communicating with fabric suppliers and other intermediaries. This is the reason why the unit price is very high and the customers are hard to expand.

The latter is the designer's brand.

Take Mattitude, for example, its fabric is collected by the famous team and Masha Ma team, the factory is looked for by the famous people, and the channel is also expanded by the famous experts. After the test of the famous brand, next March, Mattitude plans to set up an independent store. In order to test the market and reduce the cost of trial and error, the practice is to release 20 items at first. The effect is good. It will accumulate to 30, 80 or even 120, and become more and more close to a brand if the number of SKU when it wants to be an independent store.

It sounds that this game with the brand's clearance is huge.

"China's former clothing industry is the traditional supply chain people who are making brand names, but the people born in the supply chain do not necessarily respect the designers themselves. He will not regard clothes as a cultural product, but a commodity. So many brands are placed in good channels, but you think there is no content. Cai Chongda, an interface reporter, said, "from elsewhere, the team that has access to the supply chain, channels, fabrics and operational capabilities is relatively small in China. So the cultural and commercial power is very weak. "

In the United States and Europe, there are quite a lot of clothing incubators and different capital backgrounds. When it comes to the plan to support New York's fashion talents, the most famous ones are the New York Fashion Association CFDA, Vogue foundation and academic incubator BF+DA, while London is a famous new designer treasure, from the British Fashion Association to Man, Fashion East and so on.

The patterns of these incubators are basically the same: attracting capital, finding studios and providing business guidance, which allows students who have not yet left the school to get on the T stage of fashion week, have a fixed studio and compete in the order competition, and accept the baptism of the market ahead of time.

At the beginning of 2016, the hatchback of China's Internet industry was endless. Many incubators in Shenzhen and Beijing were closed due to serious homogenization and financial fragmentation. In the fashion industry, the number of independent designers in China has increased dramatically in 2009, and the demand for clothing brand incubators seems to have emerged.

In the past, most of the fashion brands hatched were fashion groups that already had many brand experience. The French LVMH is a typical example. When the new designer wins the LVMH Fashion Award, he can enter the group's incubation project. The ready-made business experience and the guidance of the industry authority can run the new people.

This method is also popular in clothing group in Guangdong, China. IPO, who is fighting for the name of Yin man, started by the Amoy brand and acquired the clothing brands like "living on the left" and "Chu Yu". It already has a mature supply chain system and online and offline channels. In May 2015, aiming to build a support scheme for designers, PASS, which was founded by Emin group, has hatched out original design brands such as PASS and SAMYAMA through small investment and partnership establishment. According to Yin man, the scale of single brand transactions is close to 100 million yuan.

In the interview of the interface, Fang Jianhua, CEO of the Hui Mei Group, which is based by Yin man, called the project "a huge sum of money", with a specific amount of up to 220 million yuan.

"Our advantage is that years of development have given us brand experience and can be replicated and extended according to the brand positioning. We have mature platforms, resources and experience to help brands grow. Fang Jianhua said, "but every company has different situations, some are good at entities, some are good at supply chain, and resource integration is not overnight. We have seen too many ups and downs of cases, taking their short boards to compete with others, which is doomed to lose."

And it is not the first institution to have the role of buying shop and incubator. However, over the past seven years, some of the most ambitious incubators have finally become a mere buyer shop, ending the sale of brand products without participating in any production process of the brand.

"I can tell you that 99% of the Chinese buyer shops are losing money. Why? Because the selling mode is not profitable, they can't form a purchasing advantage with such a small quantity." Wang Xin, a IDG capital investment manager who has invested in the company, explained the interface.

For those buyers whose sales volume is small, they can not bring the scale advantage to the designer brand; on the other hand, it is very difficult for the buyer's shop lacking cash flow to survive, let alone become an incubator to care for others.

It also wants to solve the problem of self adaptability. The incubator brand is too young to open up the market. Therefore, apart from 60% of the retail space left to the incubator brand in Sanlitun, the remaining 40% of the space is left to the imported mature brands. With his previous contacts in GQ, Cai Chongda has won more than 20 foreign brands that were originally suspicious of the Chinese market and had great international influence, such as Discovered, the first Japanese brand to enter China.

Huachang capital is another investor in the market. They believe that the brand portfolio that they are facing can effectively reduce risks. He is still a buyer shop. His new brand has not yet been introduced. The combination of cooperation and incubation is a very flat process, which is a relatively small risk approach. Because he has a mature brand to support in a collection store, on the basis of ensuring a certain amount of traffic, his own designer brand can gradually expand, gradually expand SKU and balance the design style and market demand. Huachang capital management partner Wu Haiyan told the interface reporter.

However, even if the problem of self adaptability is solved, it does not mean that designers are always willing to be put under the door, and the requirements of incubators and designers are not always consistent.

Even the garment incubators made by foreign mature organizations have to face such problems. The initial capital of New York BF+DA is as high as 2 million US dollars. Since its establishment, it has helped 35 companies produce 20 million US dollars in revenue every year. Debera Johnson, executive director of BF+DA, once told Fashionista: "our members are growing at a speed beyond imagination and moving away from home. When people no longer participate in the gathering of members, it means that these young people no longer need the guidance of the incubator and can take the initiative. "Wei"

Nine and Qi Jiayue, the former managing director of the capital, thinks that "incubators are more capital matters". New incubators are playing capital. That's just like the kite line in their hands, and the brand's wings are hard to fly.

Shares may be able to establish a bond with the brand, which is the way of thinking at the moment. At present, three brands in the shop are involved in the investment. The share of shares depends on the current situation of the brand and the business capability of the designer. Cai Chongda said: "the joint venture between the brand and the brand is naturally integrated into the production, which is very important and starts from the stage of commodity planning."

But perhaps it is foreseen the future contradictions, and many designers refused to be hatched. At the beginning of the establishment of Vega Zaishi Wang, there were also incubators looking for Wang Zaishi, but she refused, because "it feels like a small product line under a big brand, and all resources and strength depend on others, that is to maintain a designer." Young designers must want to know if they want to be surrounded by sheep, and when you find that they are not willing to come out, the brand will suffer losses. There is no shortage of cases that join the big brands.

Of course, if you have decided to join the incubator, it is also important to pick a good one. "Incubators must first have a very successful case. If you start from scratch, the designer himself is not the same. This is Wang's real proposal. "Besides, unless you can really find a multi direction team, a charming personality can bring together eight party talents, which can be managed and managed, and even more understood by designers. Later publicity, promotion and after-sale must be considered."

It seems more natural for big groups to incubate small brands. Can they provide designers with more soft power?

In accordance with the vision of Cai Chongda and his team, apart from fashion, the hall will also provide video, text, music and other content. Cai Chongda is more willing to use the concept of "stereoscopic magazine" to locate the target. He wants to publish everything about a better life.

Cai Chongda's fame did bring a lot of additional value to the hall. At the opening ceremony, on the big advertising screen of Taigu, Sanlitun, an advertisement named "the beautiful life that I defined" appeared in the wheel, Han Han, Downing, Jin Dachuan, Bai Yansong and other 30 celebrities as Cai Chongda's friends. This is also a rare "generosity" in Taigu, Sanlitun. For the first time, it gave the rent to someone who did not have the experience of collecting stores.

These auras are in line with the standards of current entrepreneurs, and also make two investors, Huachang and IDG, loose their wallets. With a total of 30 million RMB Pre-A scale, it is willing to give an opportunity to prove the existence of the huge personality charm in Wang's real existence.

This year, there will be 6 stores in Beijing, Shanghai and Hangzhou. The hatching will continue. Time will give all the answers.