Zara — How is it different

Zara is a global apparel brand which has been a personal favourite of mine for several years. Zara has many competitors in the apparel industry, the largest being H&M, Uniqlo, Marks& Spencer.

The biggest differentiator for Zara has been in its Experience and Effectiveness.

The brand offers delight to the consumers everytime they walk in to the stores. The store has stocks of only a few pieces of the latest trends displayed — the customer is easily able to find the hidden gem. The feedback and ideas of customers are themselves used to design new products. Zara’s sales executives are trained to have a lot of authority and knowledge about the products and behave as fashion consultants to each customer. There is a story of the brand, where a Maya went to the Zara store asking for a pink scarf but had to leave the store without it, the same week many Mayas visited the Zara stores worldwide asking for a pink scarf. Within a week a huge dispatch of pink scarves was done to the Zara stores which sold out in 3 days! Thats the kind of experience that Zara gives to the customer. The products themselves become a delight experience to the customer – them being the latest trends of the month. No other competitor matches Zara in this.

Effectiveness is again a key component for Zara. It is know for having the latest trends in store through its shorter lead times. This is possible only because it owns most of its manufacturing factories and hence the lead times from production to delivery are greatly reduced. Most competitors have outsourced production to countries where cheaper labour is available and hence arent able to match speedy dispatch times.

Thus Zara is not just working on its brand strategy, but every aspect of the company strategy is geared toward delighting the consumer.