Urban Outfitters Case Study

BUS 100
Introduction to Business

Assignment #2

Urban Outfitters Continuing Case Study Part 4: Marketing a Business

November 22, 2010 1. Explain why Sears or Wal-mart cannot effectively create a trendy counterculture image.
There are many reasons that Wal-mart cannot effectively create a trendy counterculture image. First if you look at what a counterculture image actually is, which are kinds of subcultures that deliberately oppose certain aspects of what’s is main stream for example in the 90’s grunge where teens wore flannel shirt doc martin boots where is clothes seem dirty or just rolled out of bed look. Where everyone else was wearing bright colors, and form fitting clothes for women and clean cut polo look. And in 2000’s
Urban Outfitters doesn’t even sell items identical to itself, they try to make every store unique. Stated in Big box stores could sell items similar but like I said in the previous question, it would cost them more than they make just to market a new style. Even if they did make similar items, in order to make it work they’d have to mass produce these items, something that Urban Outfitters doesn’t do. That alone would send the unique shopping experience that Urban Outfitters has out the window for the big box stores. As crazy as it sounds, knowing that only 40 or so people have the same shirt as you rather than 1,000 people is more comforting for most people. Another reason why they wouldn’t be able to sell merchandise identical to Urban Outfitters is because most of Urban Outfitters items are private labeled. Created and produced for by them for them. Trying to keep their unique image I’m sure U.O wouldn’t sell out their unique labels so they could be sold at other stores. If it so happened that similar things were starting to be sold in the big box stores, U.O would probably move on to a new market trend just to keep their unique hip image. If you’ve ever walked into an Urban Outfitters or visited their website you would see that their clothes are edgy. Most of the clothes sold there, more than likely could never even hit the shelves at a Wal-Mart or
The word exclusive by definition means not divided or shared with others. That alone is what gives Urban Outfitters and many other smaller retailers an advantage over the big box stores. Most or nearly all of the items sold at Urban Outfitters are an exclusive line of Urban Outfitters, made by them for them as I said before. Since they do not share their line with anyone else there’s no way anybody can really compete. The second reason why exclusivity is valuable is that it guarantees a market for you and your business. Since your lines are exclusive it would mean nobody else has them and your business is the only place you can purchase them. That’s a guaranteed market for your business if you do your research on what exclusive trend to go with. The final reason why I think exclusivity is valuable is that it gives you a type of distinction from others and that creates good business. People don’t want to walk around looking and dressing like everyone else so most of the time they’re going to look for a store like Urban Outfitters that sells a unique line. If your store sells an exclusive product it will never conform to the basic big box stores like Wal-Mart or Kohl’s. That alone will bring in a different and younger customer base. As long as you market your product right you are guaranteed an advantage and distinction over other