Overview of the Korean Apparel Industry
SUMMARY
Korea's apparel industry has shown steady growth over the past few years with the rapid embrace by its consumers of foreign fashions, an increasingly wider variety of apparel in the marketplace and evolving industry marketing channels. The emergence of new distribution networks for apparel has occurred in tandem with changing consumer tastes and purchasing patterns, most notably through E-commerce, TV home shopping, fashion outlets, and discount stores, which for the most part, weren't in existence before the 1997-98 economic crisis. These new channels now account for 40% of all apparel sold in Korea, while traditional channels, such as department and chain stores, comprise the remaining 60%. It is expected that these relatively new marketing options for apparel companies will become even more important in the near future, as Korean firms strive to meet their consumers' increasingly demanding preferences for a wider variety of purchasing options. At the same time, a more diverse selection of apparel has become available for consumers, especially with the larger number of Korean firms offering imported fashions. As a result, more and more Korean consumers have been switching from domestic apparel to foreign brands, while they also have shown greater interest in foreign-labeled apparel that is produced locally. In 2002, the total market size of this industry was USD 15.9 billion, up 5.5% over 2001, and it is forecast to grow by 3%, to USD 16.4 billion, in 2003. END SUMMARY
MARKET ASSESSMENT
A. Apparel Market Profile
In 1975, a "ready-to-wear" Korean clothing industry first developed, providing momentum for Korea's emerging domestic fashion/apparel industry. With the increase in Korea's GNP by the 1980's, and more women entering the workforce, this industry had developed into one which had begun to offer its customers increased choice in styles and fashions. By the mid-90's, the apparel sector had become firmly established as one of Korea's most important, with over 15% growth per year, and sales reaching USD 15 billion by 1996. However, with the onset of Korea's economic troubles in 1997-98, apparel registered a sharp decline in activity as consumer spending for clothes fell, and, as a result, many local firms went out of business. During these challenging two years, most Korean fashion companies once again redirected much of marketing focus on the middle-priced markets. However, within the last five years, the Korean fashion industry has largely recovered, and sales, especially of imported high-end luxury apparel are again spiking upward.
Overall, the apparel market had been growing steadily since 1998 until 2001, when it dropped 5.7% in dollars from the year before. The total jeans sales accounted for approximately 7% of the total $166 billion made in 2001 with 569 million pairs sold. Experts in the apparel industry forecasted an interesting year for sales in 2002, stating that most categories of apparel were going to level out or even decrease.
Cha , F., & Eun, E. (2013, November 26). How 'hanbok' is influencing biggest fashion names - CNN.com. Retrieved 5 Feb. 2014, from http://www.cnn.com/2013/10/13/travel/korean-hanbok-fashion/
The apparel industry is among the most volatile sectors in the market today. Subject to overnight changes in trends and fashion, the industry leaders must be accurate with their predictions and quick to accommodate changes. Because of these fluctuations, it is very hard to assign a competitive advantage to one company over another. While Jones Apparel Group seems to have a comparative advantage in profitability and leverage, Liz Claiborne has been historically more effective at generating revenue from its assets. While Liz is surging to eclipse Jones’ ROE numbers as of late, Jones Apparel Group holds a historical comparative advantage in return on equity and overall financial health.
As stated, “Americans dominated sales in the global tennis racket market in 2015, accounting for a share of 49.2%. The region is expected to continue leading the market during the forecast period, with an estimated 51.21% market share in 2020.” This dominance in the market make the population a perfect target to sell Pacific products. Tennis apparel market is also dominated by the Americans in sales. Pacific should target the market of the United States. The best distribution channels to connect to Americans is through online sales and product sales in retail stores. These distribution channels will help Pacific connect with Americans with more ease. Since many consumers live in the United States this strategy can potentially grow the company
2008 is the year of economic recession in the United States 7.9 million people lost their jobs in the United States (Isidore, 2010) so the demands for purchasing apparel and sports items have decreased much like any other c...
The Global Apparel Manufacturing industry contains men’s, women’s, and children’s apparel. This industry includes manufacturers that purchase fabrics and make fabrics themselves with certain facilities. The key economic drivers of this industry are GDP of BRIC nations, Global per capita income, GDP, World price of cotton, and Global population. The industries that supply Global Apparel Manufacturing are Global Agriculture, Hunting, Forestry, and Fishing. The Demand Industries that feed off of Global Apparel Manufacturing are Global Wholesale and Retail Trade, Global Department Stores, and General Merchandise Stores. The main activities of the Global Apparel Manufacturing industry are winter clothes
World War 2 was the biggest war in history! And it sure did affect fashion in a huge way. During WW2 there were some laws like L-85 that rationed clothing. This had made the consumer society, which had made the fashion industry boom. The consumer society became bigger when manufacturers had figured out a way to make sure that the middle class could afford good clothes.
Analysis of sports clothing industry, including its main features, key market drivers and competition within industry.
Fashion is an outlet people use to express themselves. People anxiously wait to see what the next trends are as seasons pass by. We buy anything that doesn’t break a bank, people buy a $10 shirt just because it’s cheap and they might not even wear it, but it’s all right, since it wasn’t expensive. As harmless and normal as that scenario sounds, the fashion industry has created the harmful concept that is “fast fashion”, in which stores sell an abundance of extremely cheap trendy clothing and “where deliveries are small and often, with stock delivered twice a week, for instant-access fashion.” (Cochrane)
From Korean Pop stars to dramas, South Korea has it going on. It seems that there is not one Asian country that has not had the Korean Wave, a Chinese term given to South Korea referring to the exportation of their culture, completely wash over it. What started as an Asian sensation, the Korean Wave is now beginning to spread globally, ranking South Korea as one of the top countries known for its exportation of culture. Between music, television, and video games, South Korea’s economy is rapidly increasing as the world continues to fall in love with its entertainment industry.
The period success of GAP had taken a turn since 2002. Profits and revenue continued to decline. From 2008-2010, just in U.S, 6000 retail stores had been closed because of the financial recession; during this period, Gap closed more than fifty of its 3251 stores. The annual income of GAP had also been successively overpassed by ZARA in 2008 and H&M in 2009, which dropped down to the third in fashion industry (Liu, 2013). And continually, the company’s net income declined to $833 million in 2011, which is 17% less than it earned in 2010 (Exhibit 1) (Ciasullo, Blauvelt, & Lambert, 2012). In U.S, the largest market for GAP, the elder generation who bought Gap products in 1990s had gradually left Gap for different requirements with the increasing age, and Gap was unable to keep its success with the younger generation. In addition, although Chinese market currently has been the second largest market for GAP Inc., they still operate the GAP brand as a follower without any distinct positioning str...
In the analysis process, all the questions of six focus groups were summarised into six main themes: 1) Customers’ attitudes towards fashion brands, 2) Powerful brand evaluation, 3) Attitudes towards shopping for fashion brands online, 4) Factors affecting purchasing choice, 5) Promotion evaluation, 6) Evaluation of channels of accessing to fashion brands, 7) Challenges of building fashion brands in Shanghai. Then the discussion was developed around the seven main themes.
Thesis: From the 18th century to present time, the jean industry remains one of the largest, most influential clothing markets.
According to global industry analyst, the world sports clothing industry is anticipated to exceed $126 billion by 2015, Because of more active lifestyle, with older demographics and woman becoming more energetic, this drives the market. The entire sports clothing industry is highly filled with so many brands like Nike, Adidas, Umbro and Reebook all over the world competing, even the high leading brands have to work twice has hard in other to keep their share in the market because most of this small firm have quality products and also a very fine marketing style which has increased competing style in the industry. All over the world people demand more versatile wear, which indicates that’s retailers continue to produce new style of sports clothing for both men and women.
This country is of particular interest as it is one of the four Asian Tiger economies, whose rapid industrialisation and growth between the early 1960’s and 1990’s caused it to emerge as one of the most dynamic and fast-changing countries in Asia and the world. Much like Japan, its economic development was marked by heavy investments in foreign technology and imitation through reverse-engineering. By limiting FDI, South Korea maintained control over its industrial base and encouraged investments in R&D.