Beyond the Aesthetics of Fashion
We’ve been reading lots about the demise in how fashion brands market themselves recently. Gill Clinton, founder of The Joneses, a creative agency in New York and regular contributor to fashion trends portal MPDClick, recently posed the question; ‘Does the fashion industry really know what brand strategy is?’ Questioning the old fashion-advertising model, she makes the point that ‘tactics are mostly differentiated only by the aesthetic and personality of a designer/retailer and their collections which, for a lot of mainstream brands isn’t actually that different’. She makes the point that rather than simply trying to out do each other with the recent must do iPhone app, or collaborating with whoever is ‘hot right now’, they should look to create difference ‘after all that is the point of marketing’.
It seems that the designer brands have a lot to learn. “The next few years will become increasingly important for the heritage fashion brands and fashion forward retailers”, says Max Reyner fashionista and trends research at The Future Laboratory, “younger fashion brands continue to emerge – with clear brand strategies – not just marketing ones”.
We believe this is true – look at some of the most successful brands to emerge of late. Take American Apparel. The brand has a clear brand point of view – Authentic garment made in LA by workers paid above the minimum wage. Similarly UK menswear brand ‘Folk‘ – ‘making clean, honest understated garments with a meticulous eye for colour, fabric selection and design detail’. These brands take all the traditional marketing values of the old fashion world – ‘creating a personality and aesthetic’ as Clinton put; combine this with a key brand characteristic of today – actually having a point of view.
Of course this makes sense when you look at current and emerging trends in how the fashion industry is beginning to market itself. Reyner reminded us that, “The blogging community has had a huge influence on the fashion industry over the past few years, we can expect it to grow”. He notes, “If fashion brands can have more of a point of view this will act as social currency amongst bloggers to talk about that brand – rather than just blog about another seasonal colour ‘change’”.
In summary Clinton reminds us about something we know a lot about at Mother; ‘A good brand strategy creatively reframes what the brand stands for in culture beyond a product description and tactical marketing ideas’. And for fashion ‘It’s a directional creative idea that drives everything the brand does, and goes much deeper than the surface aesthetics of the fashion business’.
We’ll continue to watch with interest and hopefully contribute a bit too.
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