Fast Fashion: Unique Aspects of Forever 21's Strategy - Essay Sample

1. Refer to Figure 1.1 from the Textbook (Identifying a Company's Strategy-What to Look For) - What is Unique to Forever 21 Today?

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Being a fast-fashion retailer, the unique aspects of Forever 21 are in terms of its operation strategy, brand management, and prices. From figure 1.1 and comparing with the most recent developments in the market, it can be seen that Forever 21's strategy is to manage research and design, production, sales and marketing, finance, and other key activities. Forever 21 plans to file a bankruptcy case, a move that can enable it to restructure its operations through rebranding and manage its surging debt levels.

Additionally, with over 800 outlets around the globe, Forever 21 appeals to about 75 per cent of the millennial who feel that physical shopping is better than online. On the other hand, with 16 million followership on Instagram, the company can apply influencer marketing to compete with the emerging crop of e-commerce in the fashion industry (Archer, Gonzalez, Lee, Gandhi & Herrera, 2010). Forever 21 tries to make products that are popular with a wide variety of age groups, therefore, not limiting its brand penetration in all segments of the market.

2. What is the 'Customer Value' Proposition for Forever 21?

Forever 21 aims at offering a wider product mix to expand the selection choices of its customers. It further proposes to make the information about its products widely available through advertisement missions and offer dedicated products in the line of fashion and apparel that will appeal to different age groups. Above all, the company promises customer value by ensuring the provision of quality, fairly-priced and stylish products within reach of the consumers through both the physical stores and e-commerce integrations (Comunale, 2008).

3. What Basic (Generic) Strategic Approach Forever 21 has taken to build a Competitive Advantage? And why have they chosen this Strategy?

Forever 21 applies several strategic approaches in its bid to attain a competitive advantage in the market. To begin with, the firm operates only about 800 outlets worldwide and has its manufacturing plant located in China. This move allows its products to easily make inroads in the large Asian markets and benefit from cheaper manufacturing costs, therefore, giving it an edge among other fashion firms. It further ensures that its presence is limited to only the targeted age brackets and market segments hence saving the company a lot of operating costs and ensuring smooth operation (Comunale, 2008).

Secondly, Forever 21 focuses on the provision of the twenty-first century, fairly priced, and fashionable products that are of high quality for all the age groups with much emphasis on the 25-35 age bracket. This makes the firm stand out among large groups of people hence boosting its market share and dominance. A combination of the two methods enables Forever 21 have a large revenue base due to the broader target market, efficient administration, and improved research and development to explore new trends while enjoying lower production and translation cost risks.

4. What Basic (Generic) Strategy would you advise for Forever 21? And why?

At this point, Forever 21 can adopt two basic strategies to bounce back to its leadership role in the fashion sector. First, it should consider restructuring and rebranding that will enable it to consider product differentiation. At the moment, the company targets several consumer age groups with no specific one, and this is not working to its advantage. Wu, 2014). There is an opinion that Forever 21 should choose one line of products and target a single market segment, say the millennial of ages between 18 and 35 so that it can exhaust the opportunities that it presents first. Lastly, the company should consider the integration of both physical and e-commerce models. Being rigid on the traditional physical model could be a reason that makes the business lose revenue from the tech-savvy groups who prefer online shopping and respond well to online influencer marketing.

References

Archer, N. A., Gonzalez, A. L., Lee, K., Gandhi, S., & Herrera, D. (2010). The garment worker centre and the 'Forever 21'campaign. Working for justice: The LA model of organising and advocacy, 154-164.

Comunale, A. (2008). You are who you wear: A conceptual study of the fashion branding practices of H&M, forever 21, and urban outfitters. Journal of the Re-tail Image.

Wu, J. (2014). Consumer response to online visual merchandising cues: a case study of Forever 21.