Luxury Men'S Clothing Zegna CEO'S Brand Vision And Future Development Plan

This year is in Italy.

Group Ermenegildo Zegna (Zegna, hereinafter referred to as Zegna) CEO Gildo Zegna steering company 20th anniversary, but also the same.

Enter the 10th anniversary node of India market.

Recently, Gildo Zegna talked about Asia in an interview with the US media.

In addition, he reviewed his views on Zegna brand and his future development plan in the past 20 years.

According to the world clothing and shoe net, last year, Gildo Zegna began to implement a brand new strategy. The creative director Alessandro Sartori began to act as the new post of art director of the company since its return in June 2016, leading the brand to the direction of innovative design.

Photo source: Ermenegildo Zegna official website

Two challenges

Gildo Zegna uses "persistence" to describe her own experience of steering Zegna for 20 years.

He said that the general enterprise CEO usually works for 5~8 years, just like a private fund going through the general procedure of takeover and cash withdrawal. But being a member of a family business is another matter.

He said: "the global market is changeable. You have to deal with all kinds of changes flexibly and have the ability to foresee the future. All yesterday's decisions do not represent tomorrow.

At the same time, you need to work with a team that is quick and responsive to respond to the market faster.

I think the biggest challenge for Zegna is to maintain brand positioning and gene positioning as quickly as possible.

How fast is the fashion industry changing? Gildo Zegna cites an interesting article from McKinsey, a consultancy, at the beginning of this century. It compares the fashion industry to the computer industry (now replaced by IT, mobile and digital industries). The common feature of both is "fast changing speed and high elimination rate". He thinks this is very suitable for describing the recent situation in the fashion industry.

Today's fashion industry is constantly changing and innovating. It needs to join hands with the digital industry to maintain the most smooth communication with the millennial consumers.

Gildo Zegna sees retail distribution as another challenge.

He said: "the past is nothing more than wholesale, retail, department stores, independent stores, such as these channels, there is no online, tourism retail is only a small number of duty-free shops.

At the same time, a brand should at least have five horizontal distribution platforms at the same time, and take different models and methods according to different markets.

Focus on the millennial generation of consumers

Gildo Zegna emphasizes that Zegna will continue to focus on millennial consumers in the future.

He said that in the new autumn series of Zegna, art director Alessandro Sartori tried to integrate the millennial consumer's aesthetic into the 117 year old Zegna classic style. The goal is to really reach the group of consumers and meet their new needs.

According to the official schedule of 2018/19 autumn winter Milan men's clothing week Milano Moda Uomo released by Italy Fashion Association, Zegna will lead the opening show next January 12th.

He said that for some brands, the proportion of millennial customers even accounted for 50%, which shocked him. He called this a kind of "subversion".

In response to this change, Zegna needs to adjust its direction in time to integrate brand DNA into the elements that resonate with young consumers. Otherwise, it will mean being squeezed out of the market in just a few years.

Above: Ermenegildo Zegna advanced handmade series 2018 spring and summer fashion show

Global and regional strategy

China

When it comes to global and regional market strategies, Gildo Zegna believes that the two are mutually reinforcing.

At a certain stage, the global strategy is better than the regional strategy, and sometimes the opposite is true.

At the same time, Zegna is pursuing a global strategy. It is also focused on laying a regional strategy in line with local conditions. This is mainly due to the rapid rise of cross boundary tourism and the rapid growth of consumers and consumers.

Gildo Zegna explains: "for example, when we talk about the Chinese market now, we no longer refer to the business of Zegna in the domestic market of China, but we need to look at the proportion of Chinese consumers in the global market in a global perspective.

And when you implement the retail business in a specific market, you must have a deep understanding of the intrinsic nature of the market and win the market with localization strategy.

Gildo Zegna introduced that the brand has experienced two years of recovery in the Chinese market, and is now in the process of business integration and has established a very strong team organization.

In response to the luxury market downturn in the market (especially in Hongkong, China), Zegna has taken a very strong and vigorous approach to innovate its stores and adopt a brand new strategy.

At present, the Chinese market has resumed growth.

In the Zegna fiscal year 2016 data released in April this year, China is still the largest market for Zegna, accounting for 1/3 of total sales.

Zegna promptly adjusted China's preferential policies to meet the needs of local consumers. The performance of the Chinese market has improved in the last quarter of 2016.

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Asia and emerging markets

When it comes to the current situation of Zegna market, Gildo Zegna said that Asian market accounted for about 48% of total Zegna sales this year, close to 50%, and the United States and Europe accounted for 20% and 30% respectively.

He highlighted the important position of emerging markets: "China can not be called an emerging market, but a very mature market.

In recent years, the speed of China's development is far beyond my imagination.

Chinese consumers have an open mind to accept new things. Gildo Zegna laughs that if Zegna can't produce new products and new ideas at any time, it can't attract Chinese consumers: "every time we try to put in some new products, our first choice is China."

If we can work here, we think we can succeed in other countries around the world. "

Other fast growing markets include Russia and St Paul, Brazil.

The process of globalization has led to the blurring of market boundaries and cultural interchanges, bringing more emerging markets to rise, and they are more pparent and predictable.

From a global perspective, business and consumption are becoming more convenient.

India

In the industry view, the luxury environment of India market is not mature enough.

Gildo Zegna admits that Zegna has been too quick to expand its stores in India, modeled on the development of Brazil's market.

Previously, Zegna opened 6 stores here, and then reduced to 3.

When introducing brands to the India market, the brand takes a large number of customized service forms.

But the climate, culture and the very distinctive dressing styles of localization are much stronger than those of other markets.

He said, "there are many skilled tailors in the area. They create luxury goods, but they belong to the local luxury goods and rarely have the color of international luxury goods."

But apart from India, Zegna has a large number of orders from India guests in other markets overseas, such as London and Dubai.

In addition, Gildo Zegna talked about the unique advantages of the India Market: the wedding market.

He believes that Zegna is famous for its custom customization, which means huge opportunities for the original brand. But because of the lack of shopping centers in India market, it can not be well operated.

He said that at present, there is no good shopping environment in India. Zegna in the city without shops is to provide a pair of fixed services.

Looking ahead, there are two points for Gildo Zegna to see in India Market:

Strengthening the retail infrastructure: finding the right shopping center, the right retail environment, and large scale real estate development projects will become the key.

Reducing trade barriers: in the past, the import cost of the India market was very high. Zegna hoped that the India market would reduce trade barriers, tariffs and service taxes, so that the market would be more competitive internationally.

Looking back at the Centennial brand history of Zegna, Gildo Zegna summed up an old experience: "there are always opportunities in the luxury jewelry industry, the key is to learn how to manage these opportunities and conform to the trend of development.

Sometimes such an attempt is not necessarily 100% correct, but the courage to try is a truth. "

About Ermenegildo Zegna

Italy's luxurious men's wear and accessories brand was founded in 1910 by the founder of the family name. The 18 year old father bought several textile machines from his father and began to run his own woolen clothing business.

So far, Zegna has been controlled by the fourth generation of the family, and is still a family business.

In addition to running its own brand, Zegna also makes suits for Gucci, Yves Saint Laurent, Dunhill and Tom Ford.

As the world's largest high-end fabric manufacturer, Zegna has promoted the development of the global wool industry.

According to Wikipedia's data, Zegna is the largest menswear brand in the world.

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