Zara It System
Zara Case: Fast Fashion from Savvy Systems a gallaugher.com case provided free to faculty & students for non-commercial use © Copyright 1997-2008, John M. Gallaugher, Ph.D. – for more info see: http://www.gallaugher.com/chapters.html
Last modified: Sept. 13, 2008 INTRODUCTION The poor, ship-building town of La Coruña in northern Spain seems an unlikely home to a techcharged innovator in the decidedly ungeeky fashion industry, but that’s where you’ll find “The Cube”, the gleaming, futuristic central command of the Inditex Corporation (Industrias de Diseno Textil), parent of game-changing clothes giant, Zara. The blend of technology-enabled strategy that Zara has unleashed seems to break all of the rules in the fashion industry. The firm shuns advertising, rarely runs sales, and in an industry where nearly every major player outsources manufacturing to low-cost countries, Zara is highly vertically integrated, keeping huge swaths of its production process in-house. These counterintuitive moves are part of a recipe for success that’s beating the pants off the competition, and it has turned the founder of Inditex, Amancio Ortega, into Spain’s wealthiest man and the world’s richest fashion executive.
Zara’s operations are concentrated in La Coruña and Zaragoza, Spain. A sampling of the firm’s designs, and “The Cube”, as shown on the firm’s websites. The firm tripled in size between 1996 and 2000, then skyrocketed from $2.43 billion in 2001 to $13.6 billion in 2007. By August 2008, sales edged ahead of Gap, making Inditex the world’s largest fashion retailer1. While the firm supports eight brands, Zara is unquestionably the firm’s crown jewel and growth engine, accounting for roughly two-thirds of sales2. While competitors falter, Zara is undergoing one of the fastest global expansions the fashion world has ever seen, opening a store a day and entering new markets worldwide – 68 countries so far. The chain’s profitability is among the highest in the industry3.
Last modified: Sept. 13, 2008 INTRODUCTION The poor, ship-building town of La Coruña in northern Spain seems an unlikely home to a techcharged innovator in the decidedly ungeeky fashion industry, but that’s where you’ll find “The Cube”, the gleaming, futuristic central command of the Inditex Corporation (Industrias de Diseno Textil), parent of game-changing clothes giant, Zara. The blend of technology-enabled strategy that Zara has unleashed seems to break all of the rules in the fashion industry. The firm shuns advertising, rarely runs sales, and in an industry where nearly every major player outsources manufacturing to low-cost countries, Zara is highly vertically integrated, keeping huge swaths of its production process in-house. These counterintuitive moves are part of a recipe for success that’s beating the pants off the competition, and it has turned the founder of Inditex, Amancio Ortega, into Spain’s wealthiest man and the world’s richest fashion executive.
Zara’s operations are concentrated in La Coruña and Zaragoza, Spain. A sampling of the firm’s designs, and “The Cube”, as shown on the firm’s websites. The firm tripled in size between 1996 and 2000, then skyrocketed from $2.43 billion in 2001 to $13.6 billion in 2007. By August 2008, sales edged ahead of Gap, making Inditex the world’s largest fashion retailer1. While the firm supports eight brands, Zara is unquestionably the firm’s crown jewel and growth engine, accounting for roughly two-thirds of sales2. While competitors falter, Zara is undergoing one of the fastest global expansions the fashion world has ever seen, opening a store a day and entering new markets worldwide – 68 countries so far. The chain’s profitability is among the highest in the industry3.
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