Should Luxury Brands Imitate The "Drip Irrigation Mode" Of Chao Brand?

An early morning in early July, located at Ssense.

Outside the new flagship store, more than 50 Street Street enthusiasts woke up after queuing up overnight, and found another 250 people.

For so long, they bought a limited edition T-shirt and customized version of Virgil Abloh, a new "savior" in the street corner.

Sports shoes and Autographed posters.

Of course, there are other purposes, such as a good record on Instagram, and an opportunity to communicate closely with the Off-White founder and the new Louis Vuitton menswear art director.

This activity almost completely restored the appearance of Abloh studio, which is the latest product release of Ssense, that is, Drop. This more and more common specialties usually refer to the release of limited edition products which are strictly controlled. Rhythm is calculated on a weekly or monthly basis, and the operation cycle is faster than the traditional way. It aims to stimulate consumers' excitement constantly and ensure the continuous flow of fresh experience.

This concept of "drip irrigation" pushed into the market from time to time, first came from Hiroshi Fujiwara, a popular Japanese street spirit. Later, brands such as Supreme, Palace and Nike popularized it (Nike carried out such a system in both retail and online). (Teng Yuan Hao)

"The key is how much new ideas you can bring to people," said Bobby Hundreds, co-founder of The Hundreds, a California Street apparel brand. The Hundreds carries out "new" every week, and the weekly "new" Japanese website gains 29 times more traffic than before.

Today, Moncler, Fendi, Gucci, Burberry and Balenciaga are Europe.

In order to curry favor with Z generation and millennial consumers, the house embraces this "new" model.

The Z generation and the millennial generation who will contribute 45% of the global luxury consumption by 2025 will expect a steady stream of novelty, preferably as soon as Instagram brushes new photos.

According to market sources, C line, which is under the control of Hedi Slimane, will start to adjust the product release mode and rhythm from the beginning of this autumn to a more limited edition capsule series like "Shang Xin". In the future strategy of Louis Vuitton, Abloh is also likely to include the introduction of Limited edition products.

"I think more brands will have to start doing that too.

You can either adapt to the environment or fade away. "

Luca Solca, director of luxury goods department, said.

When he wrote "innovation or death: the future of luxury goods must be innovated" written by BoF, he pointed out that fewer and fewer new consumers have never purchased luxury goods, and that brands should really drive mature consumer groups with new ideas.

In this regard, the pace of pformation of Moncler is particularly robust.

Beginning in February this year, the Italy luxury brand ended its partnership with designer Thom Browne and Giambattista Valli for its high-end Gamme Blue, Gamme Rouge as its designer, and replaced by the joint development of Moncler and Valentino creative director, Pierpaolo Pierpaolo, Teng Yuan Hao, Mr.

In Moncler, this mode is called Genius Project (gifted program).

"This pattern is very different," said Remo Ruffini, chief executive of Moncler. "If you want to keep up with the trend of people of different ages, I feel this is the only way.

Because no matter what method is chosen, the most important thing is to become the most important topic in mind every day.

More brands will have to start doing that.

You either adapt to the environment or fade away.

In the UK luxury super brand Burburry, chief creative director Riccardo Tisci is busy planning a series of limited edition products.

The first batch of results will be "new" when he first joined the brand.

In December this year, a series of capsules co worked with fashion designer Vivienne Westwood is also coming soon.

For Burberry, the implementation of this "drip irrigation" product release mode also symbolizes the pformation from the traditional See Now Buy Now.

Since 2016, Marco Gobbetti, chief executive of Burberry, hopes to reinvigorate the past by embracing "buy and sell", pushing the brand to a more high-end market segment.

"We have upgraded the delivery cycle, and the process has become more fluid and more creative oriented," Gobbetti said. "We can deliver inspiration and inspiration to our customers throughout the year through the well planned series, the surprise cooperation and the immediate purchase of capsules."

But it will not only speed up the problem of "drip irrigation up", but also speed up the existing speed, explains Antonio Achille, global director of McKinsey & Company luxury goods. "As long as you decide to adopt this method, your whole value chain must be changed together."

"Whether it's the idea of organizational structure or logistics, everything inside the company is almost changed," says Ruffini of Moncler. "But the biggest challenge is internal culture.

You can also change the corporate culture, but for the enterprise that we started around the season when we founded in 1952, employees need time to regain their confidence, so we will take steps step by step.

For the design team of luxury goods companies, the "drip irrigation" system means creating products that are innovative and loyal to the brand image.

Besides, luxury business is, in the final analysis, a business of "cultural significance".

Luxury goods are valuable not only because of their unique design or excellent manufacturing, but because of the trend of the whole society.

Then, the discussion on this issue has evolved into how long it takes, and a certain cultural value can be condensed into a new product. Can the process be completed when the new product is on or on the line?

Admittedly, powerful brands can directly give their products certain cultural value.

But even if Balenciaga's "Daddy shoes" Triple S was first released in January 2017, it would take almost a year before it was promoted to a larger group of fashion lovers and eventually became an important driving force for brand sales.

The implementation of "drip irrigation" will also affect public relations strategy.

If a part of a capsule program includes a campaign to invite brand fans to communicate, then the traditional product marketing approach may not be the most effective way to increase interaction participation, according to Leila Fataar, founder of consulting firm Platform13. The consulting company includes Adidas (Adidas), Under Armour, etc. on the contrary, the brand must foster the relationship with key members of the community.

But luxury companies, like the world's strongest Street apparel brands, create a universal spirit, which is still a major challenge.

Hundreds cautioned that "just because the street clothes' drip irrigation" is successful, it does not mean that it is suitable for everyone.

The supply chain will also face challenges.

Even a brand like Supreme is in.

The design and production of hoodies and hats are easier.

The introduction of drip irrigation to new products is rather complicated, not to mention luxury brands.

This is one of the reasons why Supreme first accepted private equity in 2014.

For Moncler, it is necessary to increase investment in Italy and Romania cooperative factories to speed up production.

So far, luxury "drip irrigation on the new" more on the surface of the product, has not yet entered a large volume of sales.

Ruffini also admitted that the limited edition series of Moncler currently accounts for only a small part of the total sales volume, although the overall outlook seems positive.

Just because the street clothes' 'drip irrigation' is successful, it does not mean that everyone is suitable.

According to Tribe Dynamics's data, Moncler's media value (EMV) reached $1 million 100 thousand in June this year, when Teng Yuan Hao launched the first limited edition series for the Genius Project project, an increase of 43% over last month.

In the first half of 2018, Moncler revenue grew by 27% over the same period last year, reaching 494 million euros. Moncler also considered it a contribution to the Genius Project project to some extent.

Today, Ruffini plans to fully expand this new approach to the main line of Moncler.

"We are looking at the research and development of all projects, because our next goal is to launch new products in the main line every month, and the main line takes up 85% to 90% of our business," he said.

But this new model is not what everyone will look at.

John Thorbeck, chairman of supply chain analysis company Chainge Capital, said, "of course, it is valuable to win everyone's attention in the market, but if there is no strength of the supply chain to achieve it, I can see no benefit."

For Thorbeck, turning the whole business mode to weekly or monthly product delivery still has a huge impact, not only from the marketing value, but because the supply chain has been properly invested to enable enterprises to adapt better.

Signal, better match supply and demand, and ultimately reduce the biggest cost burden of fashion companies - the stock that can not be sold.

He pointed out that "these brands are constantly presenting products, presenting a new brand image rather than a real response to the market."

Indeed, if you launch products that consumers do not want to buy at all, then what is the significance of developing new products according to the speed of Instagram news flow?