Changing times mean evolving trends, and nowhere more so than the rapid-fire world of retail. Belinda Smart quizzes Martin Raymond and Chris Sanderson, the names behind renowned UK trend forecaster The Future Laboratory, on where retail is heading.
What are some of the most exciting innovations overseas brands are bringing to the retail sector?
Globally, fashion retailers are fighting the downturn in the following ways: by ramping up the in-store experience in the form of DJs, fashion shows, vintage exchange days, free make-overs, free home delivery and exclusive designer collections; embracing and promoting sustainable clothing, work practices and a 'values' driven trading promise - in other words ensuring that all aspects of the supply chain are socially, ethically, environmentally and civically transparent. More importantly they're committing to a no-quibbles, "service is all or your money back" customer pledge. Bigger retailers like Target US, Macys, Selfridges, Mexx and Topshop are also redoubling their efforts to make stores more female-focused in terms of service and overall tone. This means more chill-out areas, a greater emphasis on helping customers instore, and sampling areas where shoppers can try, wear and discuss product with store representatives.
What key lesson could Australian retailers learn from overseas?
Simply put, stores that do not have an online sales presence matter less and less to consumers under 35. If you aren't online, and if the customer is not able to order clothes directly from your store and have it delivered directly to their home, you are a brand that no longer matters in their world. Remember this, if you are targeting customers who were born after 1984, they have no memory of the world without mobile phones or the internet, so their default method of checking and buying brands is online. An online portal then is a must. However - and this is a big however - people also shop for brands via their social networking sites. So again, it is important to have a store and a presence in all key social networks (Facebook, MySpace, Gaia etc). Also be aware that referral shopping (as in customers recommending your brand to others) and referral shopping portals such as OSoYou and Myfaveshop.com are already defining how consumers will shop online over the next decade.
Retailers also need to consider such things as search engine optimisation (SEO) as part of their overall marketing strategy. For example, when a customer types in "fab new dress for the Xmas party", have you worked with your search engine marketing company to make sure key phrases take them your site? We would expect "with-it young fashion" or some such phrase to take us to Sportsgirl, Dotti, or Glassons, or "upmarket luxe" to take us to David Jones, or "fantastic Italian style menswear" to take us to Calibre, or "fitted, urban feel-good styles" to take us to Saba, and so on. Being online is one thing, but if you haven't optimised the potential of search criteria as a way of bringing consumers to your door, you are saying no to a seven to 10 per cent increase in the opportunistic sales SEO can bring.
Finally, and more fundamentally, Australian retailers need to embrace design, designers and design departments, and forget sampling, copying, or using committee style buying teams to create watered down looks. As brands like H&M, Topshop, Zara and Miss Selfridge have shown, design pays, and having a design director is the best and most effective way to establish a brand's signature and market position. And increasingly, especially during a downturn, good design will carry the day.
What are some of the challenges Australia faces?
The market faces a more difficult future than it has seen over the last decade and there will be casualties along the way. The fight is on for the fittest, leanest, meanest businesses out there who can survive through a downturn through more means than just discounting.
Conversely, in which areas do Australian retailers excel?
With a relatively small population of around 20 million there is no way Australia should have the number of fashion and lifestyle brands that it has. But the fact that it does tells us something - that the ability to segment markets and merchandise effectively must be programmed in to the Australian DNA: in which case Australian brands and their owners need to sharpen these skills and get their brands into China, South Africa, India, South Korea, Hong Kong and elsewhere. At a time when the market is floundering, retail is uncertain, and thus looking for propositions that are coherent, targeted and more suited to the Pacific Rim mindset.
We are thinking here of brands like Country Road, Dotti, Just Jeans, Jeans West, Saba, David Jones and Peter Alexander. However, there is also a bigger share of the Pacific Rim pie to be owned by creating a new range of ultra urban, ultra relaxed, ultra sleek city to surf labels and brands that play on Australia's contemporary heritage - as seen in the work of a new generation of architects, furniture designers, interior designers, chefs and fashion designers. This version of Australia already plays very well in Europe and with very little effort can be used to create a coherent, uber-cool platform on which to launch a new range of brands that targets China's fashion starved market.
How will current financial and environmental concerns drip down into fashion retail? (Will there ever be an end to fast fashion?)
A recent study by the Council of Textile and Fashion Industries of Australia (TFIA) found that Australian women under 30 bought 112 garments a year, while a study by the Australia Institute found that $10.5 billion is spent every year on throwaway fashion. However times are changing. In the way that the media and consumers alike have turned the spotlight on food, fashion will be next.
How will the long term effects of the downturn affect fashion?
Recession is always great news for good brands. Nothing sharpens the mind like a bit of fear and consumers being careful with their money. Middle of the road, lazy brands will see their demise happen in fast-forward, while a survival of the fittest mentality will separate the wheat from the chaff. What will emerge in 18 months' time is a slimmer, leaner market place, pruned of dead wood and bursting with healthy shoots. Be prepared too for continued "tribing" amongst younger consumers; in other words extreme and eclectic fashion trends borne out of new music and underground cultures. The soft, inoffensive fashion that dominated the 1990s and early 20000s is (thankfully) coming to end. Expect to see the return of fashion mothers hate and that makes fathers fear for their daughters' respectability.