French Connection Case Study

French connection also famously known from the logo ‘FCUK’ is a prominent global brand that caters to fashion clothing, home wear and accessories. It was founded by Stephen Marks (Chairman and the chief Executive of FCUK at present in 1972 London, UK. In 1962 he invested £25,000 capital in starting the company. His main object was to excavate the reasonably intact resources in Hong Kong that provided low cost and high quality production/ manufacturing. Little did the company know that the dilemma of the faxing that was exchanged from Hong Kong and the U.K established a influential trade mark that become one of the most famously known label in today’s world. After launching the French connection store during the 1970’s, he focused on selling
Hard Rock Café was one of the biggest support for them as they were responsible in selling the rank organization and they were the key financial bankers. Mark continued producing his products in Hong Kong, as they provide low cost manufacturing. There was a small set back that occurred during the trading process of the products from Hong Kong to the UK in the 1990’s , when the manufactures changed the logo from “FCHK’( French Connection Hong Kong) to ‘FCUK’ (French Connection United Kingdom), which was actually put forth to prevent confusion as the brand was originally from the UK. This is when they decided to make ads based on the ‘FCUK acronym, they made logos like ‘fcuk fashion, ‘fcuk boys’, fcuk Christmas’ campaigns.(Wikipedia, 2016). It increased their revenue from £83 million in 1997 to £117 million in 1999. This is when they manage to create a strong foundation in the company, it helped them in invading the U.S market and by the end of 2000 FCUK was based and well known in many different countries, they then opened 300 retail stores, and by 2004 they opened up 60 new retail shops. The company faced another big step in 2001 as Stephen Marks left the joint venture and claimed 100 percent ownership for his brand. (Smallwood Karl.
They don’t offer premium pricing and give strong emphasis on affordability. They want to position their market place by focusing more on fashion-oriented, high quality products. The main target market that the brand aspires to cater to are ages from 18-35, so they mainly focus on the youth and adulthood. French connection not only focuses on clothing, they have a wide range of products that they produce for both man and women and children. They provide accessories, including toiletries, fragrances, shoes watches, jewelry, eye wear, they also design home wear and Furniture as well. French connection is the parent of many other brands such as TOAST which provides clothing and home wear for both men and women, they also. Great plains which focuses on in-house designs that are basic and they are suppliers to many multi-brand retailers only in the UK. YMC is a fashion brand that provides trendy and contemporary fashion styles. As mentioned above each of these brands caters to a different kind of target market. They have additional contributions which include French connection ( London) limited , Contracts Limited, French connection Group Inc, French Connection UK limited, French connection ( Hong Kong) limited, YMC Limited, French Connection ( Canada) limited Toast( Mail order) . They are also a holding company for two brands which are ‘FCUK’ which caters to the youth target