To meet the changing demands of consumers, production, and supply networks, fashion retailers need to rethink their strategy and optimize operations. Our fashion consulting team lives and breathes fashion, bringing decades of experience with major-brand clients.
Fashion consumers have responded to the pandemic by shifting to value, buying online, and breaking longtime loyalties to try new brands that meet new priorities. We help you respond to this consumer-driven environment, finding bold ways to reduce cost so you can invest in essential digital capabilities.
Taking a broad view of your core business and supply chain, we partner with you to identify the right use cases, first proving the benefits before transforming a specific customer experience or operational process—covering brand, product, pricing, store concept, and store execution.
Like many players in the larger retail industry, fashion companies need to reduce the immediate gap in earnings before interest and taxes. They must then prepare for the future by focusing on aggressive cost management end to end—for example, by pursuing programs for the cost of goods sold, right-sizing corporate headquarters, creating more agile merchant teams, and increasing suppliers’ share of risk. These efforts are critical to funding the investments needed to remain competitive, such as digitizing production, resetting the distribution footprint, and creating new digital consumer pathways. To ensure success, we help clients attract the tech talent who will drive change and heighten the customer experience across digital channels.
Most of the fashion industry is still catching up with digitizing core processes. Selecting technology solutions is important, but attention to the people whose work must adjust to those solutions is equally critical. This balanced approach intertwines new technologies with human creativity to ensure that your talent continues to drive fashion innovation.
Our team is ahead of the curve in helping clients create compelling designs that capture the next trend while also operating faster and more efficiently. By customizing our approach to your business and employing BCG X, our tech build and design unit, we selectively optimize processes in both the back and the front of the house, including:
BCG’s fashion consulting teams have conducted more than 850 projects globally in the past five years in the fashion industry and luxury market. Some examples of our client work with fashion retailers include the following.
Turning Around a Global Jewelry Giant
BCG worked shoulder-to-shoulder with leading jewelry company Pandora to launch a transformation program that reignited passion for the brand and helped Pandora get closer than ever to its customers.
An Analytics and Demand Prediction Journey for a Global Fashion Retailer. Together with our client, we created a custom data and digital platform to align purchasing and allocation with demand, optimize stock, and equip store associates with customer analytics and tools. Delivering double-digit profit uplift, the hub optimized inventory across more than 3,000 stores; forecast sales patterns and prices for over 10,000 products; and sent more than 500,000 automated personalized emails. The project scaled from less than 5% of the global business to more than 70% in nine months.
Overhauled the Sustainability Strategy for a High-profile Luxury Brand. We used BCG’s proprietary benchmark methodology to reveal key environmental and social impact levers and areas for differentiation. Employing those insights, we crafted a strategy and end-to-end roadmap for execution within the organization and supply chain, including target setting, cost estimates, and corporate governance.
Transforming Product Creation E2E for a Major Global Fashion Brand. We began by defining a target digital operating model and implementing agile to reduce the complexity of collaboration. To enable 3D creation from design to factory to sell in, we leveraged our digital partners and Asian supplier network to create a state-of-the-art ecosystem that achieved massive operational acceleration: a reduction of up to 40% in time to market, a reduction of up to 70% in sampling cost, and the potential for a reduction of up to 20% in workload.
Commercial Allocation by BCG X offers an integrated transformation experience. Leveraging BCG’s deep expertise and transformation capabilities, Commercial Allocation optimizes marketing and commercial budget allocation across salesforce and direct-to-consumer touchpoints.
Fashion for Good
The global initiative that is here to make all fashion good. It's global platform for innovation, made possible through collaboration and community.
Sustainable Apparel Coalition
An industry-wide group working to reduce the environmental and social impacts of products around the world.
Highsnobiety
Focuses intently on culture, its role in shaping the future of luxury, and what brands can do to connect with the new fashion and luxury consumer.
Altagamma
An Italian association that includes many of its country’s most prestigious fashion and luxury brands.
Higg Co
A technology company with a suite of tools—the Higg Index—that enables retailers to improve their sustainability performance.
Council of Fashion Designers of America
A not-for-profit trade association devoted to supporting emerging design talent.
Follow BCG on Consumer on LinkedIn
Companies operating in today's Fashion industry must optimize performance, tap into new opportunities and transform to meet consumers demands. Follow BCG on Consumer on LinkedIn for the latest industry insights and news.
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