Burberry

Luxury CEOs get even more pessimistic

October 11, 2012 4:09 pm by Vanessa Friedman

Today Ledbury research is publishing their “CEO Sentiment Indicator,” an exciting document in which they chart the words of luxury execs as they reveal the thoughts of said execs about how things are shaping up for the future. They gave us an exclusive peek at it before release. And guess what? They are not feeling the love.

 Read more

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in China, Fashion, Financial results, Luxury goods, Recession |

Burberry and Topshop go tech-to-tech

September 13, 2012 12:56 pm by Vanessa Friedman

New York Fashion Week? What’s that? This morning – the last of NYFW — London was in the news, as both Burberry and TopShop announced major new technology initiatives. Though they are generating a lot of buzz around the brands, I can’t help but wonder about the direction all of this is taking. Read more

Tags: , ,
Posted in Fashion, Luxury goods, Marketing, Shows, Womenswear |

Luxury industry Chicken Littles

September 12, 2012 1:11 pm by Vanessa Friedman

The sky is falling! The sky is falling! This tends to be the reaction lately every time a luxury brand reports worse-than-expected earnings. It happened last June with Mulberry, and now it is happening with Burberry. Yet I am not convinced it’s time to call the end of luxury. Read more

Tags: , ,
Posted in China, Financial results, Luxury goods, Recession |

Google and Microsoft follow fashion

August 10, 2012 2:09 pm by Vanessa Friedman

Reading my newspaper over coffee this morning, I almost fell out of my chair while perusing a tech story on Google, Amazon et al, which ended with the following observation: “Google, Microsoft and Amazon all have the potential to adopt Apple’s vertical model of combining software, services and hardware to gain complete control over the design and function of future mobile devices.” Because the thing is, dear reader, it’s not “Apple’s approach” exactly – or it is, but Apple got it from somewhere else first. And where would that be? Fashion, of course.
 Read more

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Fashion, Financial results, Internet, Luxury goods, Marketing |

Lane Crawford breaks out

July 30, 2012 2:08 pm by Vanessa Friedman

You know all that talk in the luxury world about what Asian brand will be the first break-out brand to take Europe, thus providing a riposte to all the European brands currently focused on milking the Asian consumer dry? Well, hot on the heels of Bosideng, the Chinesd down-specialist launching in London, comes some more provocative news out of the East. And though it’s courtesy of a brand, it’s not quite the designer brand everyone was expecting. It’s a department store brand. Specifically, it’s Lane Crawford, aka the iconic Hong Kong luxury department store.
 Read more

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in China, Internet, Luxury goods |

Are the Olympics really a shopping opportunity?

July 23, 2012 1:55 pm by Vanessa Friedman

Yesterday the relaxation of the UK’s Sunday trading laws during Olympic season (aka until sept 9) went into effect. Now stores can stay open AS LONG AS THEY WANT (OMG! OMG!). I just can’t quite see how the Olympics, or Olympic fever, or whatever you want to call the emotion that is gripping London, will lead to a great surge in consumption of handbags and denim. Read more

Tags: , , , ,
Posted in Fashion, Internet, Marketing |

The meaning of Romeo Gigli’s return

July 16, 2012 1:48 pm by Vanessa Friedman

I come back from holiday, only to find the news that Romeo Gigli has also returned: today Joyce, the fashion-forward Asian boutique, announced a new autumn/winter collaboration: JOYCE by Romeo Gigli. So will it work this time around? Can he be an example to designers everywhere (Herve Leger, for example) who lost their name and their business, and dream of a return. Read more

Tags: , ,
Posted in China, Fashion, Womenswear |

Rulers of their own domains

June 20, 2012 2:35 pm by Vanessa Friedman

Here’s a tip: go poke through the applications for ICANN’s new top-level domain name program – you know, the one that will allow companies to have their own .whatever denomination, instead of just .com or .org or .fr. It makes for fascinating reading. You’d think this would get luxury and fashion all a-lather, given their obsession with brand control and intellectual property protection and all that, but it seems not.
 Read more

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in Fashion, Internet, Luxury goods |

It’s the outlets, stupid

June 15, 2012 1:21 pm by Vanessa Friedman

Buried amid all the Mulberry hoo-ha over the last day since shares tumbled one comment stood out to me. It was from Godfrey Davis, Mulberry’s chairman, who blamed the fall in profits, which led to the fall in shares, on a bad performance in his outlets. Outlets? In luxury goods-land? Well, yes – of course. We all know about them. But who knew they could have that much of an effect on a brand’s bottom line?
 Read more

Tags: , , ,
Posted in Fashion, Financial results, Luxury goods |

Georg Jensen and Smythson in the headlines

May 1, 2012 3:48 pm by Vanessa Friedman

Things are heating up on the luxury front. Yesterday I was talking to Ulrik Garde Due, chief executive of Danish silver brand Georg Jensen, and he acknowledged that the recent stories about brand’s private equity owners, Axcel, considering their exit strategy after 11 years were true. They have hired Rothschilds as advisors, and started meeting with potential buyers. Meanwhile, Smythson has just lured Andy Janowski, Burberry’s former COO and Senior Vice-President of Supply Chain (now, that’s a sexy title), over to their side to mastermind the brand’s expansion. Get ready: the heritage accessories brands are on the move!
 Read more

Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in Accessories, China, Fashion, Luxury goods |
BackOlder entries
Newer entries