[DOCUMENT] Fashion Product Design and Development Assignment

The provided document is a comprehensive assignment that delves into the world of fashion product design and development. It begins with an analysis of market trends, highlighting the importance of understanding consumer behavior and preferences. The target audience is identified as women aged 25-40, with a focus on their lifestyle, preferences, and purchasing habits. The product features are then presented in detail, including various colors, fabrics, styles, and fits. Pricing is also discussed, categorizing products into good, better, best, and premium options. The assignment concludes with an emphasis on the significance of style and fit, featuring different design concepts such as slim fit, straight fit, skinny fit, and more.

RETAIL MARKETING ASSESSMENT

Table of Contents
Section 1: SWOT Analysis of a range.............................................................................................1
Section 2. Recommendation ...........................................................................................................2
Section 3. Support............................................................................................................................4
Section 4: use of theory....................................................................................................................5
Bibliography....................................................................................................................................7
Appendix..........................................................................................................................................8

Section 1: SWOT Analysis of a range
The entire project is based upon the Marks and Spencer's apparel category of ladies jeans
in United Kingdom. Moreover, I also chosen top brand for comparison of M&S with John Lewis
& Partners and Next in which I realize the range of products for the particular category.
It is observed that ladies perceive Marks and Spencer as more trustworthy and
differentiated company as compared to its competitors. There are various range of product sold
by M & S in a year. Among all, M&S is considered the ninth most popular shop in the fashion
retailer in UK and its customers rating 4.10 out of 5 (Kerin and Hartley, 2015). For
implementing changes it is important to know the strength and weaknesses of organization. It is
well-established organization and this is main strength of M&S to implement innovation in
organization that are related to specific product of company Marks and Spencer organization is
great knowledge and high amount of capital that can help company to implement change in
pricing policy for ladies Jeans. The track record of M & S is too good and lead to its reputation
in market place as compared to John Lewis and Next.
As compared to other brands, it is realized from uk.trustpilot.com that John lewis has bad
reviews and its performance with regard to fashion industry is slightly less popular as compared
to other brands specially in online selling and even people also mark 1 out of 5 star that is
considered a bad review for John lewis (Liu, Jiang and Chan, 2019).
It is evaluated that all three department's targets the mass marketing but Marks and
Spencer and Next are the biggest player on the market of ladies fashion specially in jeans, but
they are also losing the market share due to technology which is used by Marks and Spencer is
not supporting the organization to meet demand of market. They need to make more investment
in technology and procedures that can improve production capacity of Marks and Spencer to
improve supply chain and also innovate new products. As a multinational and large organization
it is important to deal with factors that are based on the cultural diversity (Chernev, 2018).
Further, M&S did not have strong online presence as compared to Next and John Lewis.
The main challenge to M&S is the marketing policy and business strategy in new market.
The standards set by organization in the old market place are good for company but for new
target market a reform is required. Author state that M&S also closes many shops due to heavy
competition in market as it has low planning which operate only in fewer stores. That is why to
stay competitive in market, it also open an online store as a new distribution centre.
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Moreover, Marks and Spencer is smaller in volume and price as compared to other rivals
such that it offer the products seasonally, while other two competitors offer highly expensive
products. That is why, M&S have strong customer base and further by introducing new
technologies like Artificial intelligence and automation are providing great opportunity to Marks
and Spencer to improve its quality and productivity more. Organization can use various
information system and tools to gather information to make smart decision to improve the
company (Moutinho and Vargas-Sanchez, 2018). This technology can also help M & S to
introduce new range of product in market. For development of different places governments are
providing various opportunities to build new market place on different location. This will also
provide support to company in fastest emerging markets.
Apart from the others, all there companies offer regular size of jeans, but Marks and
Spencer also offer slightly bigger size such as 46 and 47. John Lewis and Next also offer regular
colours to their customers but Marks and Spencer provide different colours which attract
customers (Baker, 2016). With respect to style, it seems that Marks and Spencer did not provide
high and low rise Jeans and Bootcut jeans which is also in demand and if the company provide
the same ranges, then it will easily maximizes its financial performance.
From the above, I realized that in this era, there are more and more people in young
generation and they mostly prefer o buy the products online because it is easy and save time as
well. On the other side, Marks and Spencer faces biggest threat form the online retail store such
as Amazon, eBay, ASOS which increases their share up to 17% in a year. That is why, company
should invest in online marketing in its near future.
Section 2. Recommendation
In this section, I have suggested some recommendation which will help Mark and
Spencer to introduce its new product that is women jeans in the market.
The Mark & Spencer should launch a ladies jeans in the market. As per the statistics of
the percentage growth of market of women's wear was about 51 %. If we consider the buying of
jeans by adults the proportion remain stable from the period of 2006 to 2010. Women's are more
likely to buy jeans which fit them properly (Shaw, 2016). In order to overcome this issue of
women the company should introduce a jeans which will provide comfort to women. The
company will introduce a variety of categorise in women jeans which are blacky skinny jeans,
mom jeans, white strategic cut jeans, skater jeans and boot cut jeans. The company will target the
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high income group and female customer of the market. While, as per my observation, it is
recommended to the company, that it should try to avoid making use of unpopular colour and
should try to make use of colours which are in trend in the market. For example the company
should try to shift it focus on providing colours such as white, black and grey. By seeing the
trend of jeans in UK market it can be seen that graphic and strips pattern are high on demand in
market thus in my opinion M&S should try to introduce jeans of such pattern for women's.
Further, it should also focus on the decent choice of at least ten modes and their size for
customer segments. It is so because it helps to increase the variety that leads to stay competitive
in market (Klein and et.al., 2019).
The demand for women jeans of Mark and Spencer is about 5.67 %. The company
targets the middle income group of women. Thus, Marks and Spencer has the good customer
base therefore company should not increase the price of jeans. If the company will introduce the
women jeans in market with same price it will help company to gain attraction as customer will
get new product in the same price (Marks and Spencer's Women clothing, 2018). Apart from this,
it Is also recommended to Marks and Spencer that it should target middle class people or the
better category. It is beneficial for the firm and using competitive and low cost market strategy
will help a business gain high competitive market. Moreover, beside regular ladies jeans,
Company should also focus on high and low rise jeans under sub category so that it will place
Marks and Spencer in the best price segments. This idea is not to dominate the high quality
segment but to keep attracting middle and upper middle class people. In addition to this, this
action also helps to increase the short term cash flow as well as increase the goodwill of firm.
Therefore, on seeing the strategies used by its competitors I would recommend Mark &
Spencer to increase the range of women's product for example company may introduce variety in
women jeans such as moms jeans, blacky skinny jeans, culotte jeans, white strategic cut jeans etc
(Toms and Zhang, 2016). On the other side, John Lewis and Next products are not affordable
and that is why, I recommended to Marks and Spencer to use low pricing strategy with different
variety of ladies jeans. It can be seen that company major target segment is women. Similarly, in
my point of view the company should also try to make use of the latest trend of the market.
Moreover, Marks and Spencer should split the jeans into different categories so that it
will be easy for women to select one out of many. I also suggest introducing woollen jeans in
winter and skinny fit jeans in summer so that it helps Marks and Spencer to tackle the problem of
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seasonality and also assist the business to maximize the value for the firm. In addition to this, I
also recommended to Marks and Spencer to slightly increase the range up to 10 percent and it is
so because the firm is mass market retailer and there should be relative portfolio of all the
products (Liu, Jiang and Chan, 2019). It is also analysed that this strategy is beneficial for online
channel only. On the other side, firm should offer limited choice in their store as compared to
online store. This will help the firm to facilitate the buying decision of customers and increases
the brand image of firm as well.
Section 3. Support
As from the research it has found that company is facing the threat from the competitors
such as John Lewis and Next, therefore I justify the recommendation which I used in above
section.
According to the Katie Smith (2018), many stores in UK faces the problem of ageing
customers which is also considered the threat of Marks and Spencer. That is why, I focused more
towards capturing the attention of ladies and try to make the categories of jeans more attractive
for them. I believe that this is not bad idea to launch women's jeans in the market on the basis of
trend of market. Because it is not a seasonal product, as analysed that most of the women and
girls prefer to select jeans. It is so because it gives decent and classic look.
As the fashion industry of UK cost about euro 32 billion to UK economy according to the
British fashion council. Therefore, there is a huge potential of growth of this industry.
Therefore, by introducing ladies jeans, M&S should position their product for the audience at
moderate income level so that M&S can deliver the value of the jeans manufactured and styled
especially for women and target a large variety of audience which will increase their customer
base (Rashid, 2016).
I also want to be clear that Marks and Spencer did not compete with other fashion brand
such as Gucci because it is one of the most trustworthy brand and most of the people prefer to
purchase clothes from it. As per the FashionUnited.uk it is analysed that Gucci is the top
preferred brand specially in women jeans (Wang, 2016). Though the brand is not only for ladies
jeans but it is famous for all the products which capture the attention of women. It is also
analysed that while purchasing the products there are three factor that affect the buying decision
such as price, comfort and quality that is what Marks and Spencer provide.
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Also, social media can help the organization to achieve large consumer base because in
today's world millions of people spend a lot of time on social media in order to understand trends
and likings of the people across the world. Social media also changes and develops consumer
tastes and behaviours. In that manner, social media can be helpful for the organization to achieve
new consumer base and promote its products and services on large level (Scott and Walker,
2017). Therefore, Marks and Spencer should provide the best variety especially in size of
different types of jeans at a low price. Moreover, the pattern and colour should be different but it
should more focus on trendy products. There are many opportunities which are exploiting by the
competitor and which is used by Marks and Spencer. This is the reason why company should
focus on different variety of ladies jeans to attract wide range of customers.
Section 4: use of theory
In order to conduct the research in better manner, I mostly used different theory and
practices so that it also help me to gain knowledge and improve my work as well. Mainly I used
some textbook and secondary resources in order to conduct the material in better form. In the
same way, in first section, I used SWOT analysis as a strategic management tool that helps me to
identifying an appropriate strategy for Marks and Spencer. This tool helps to determine the
strength, weaknesses and opportunities and threat that helps to determine whether the product
introduce that is ladies jeans is helpful to explore the marker of Marks and Spencer or not
(Phadermrod, Crowder and Wills, 2019). This tool help me to develop the depth knowledge
about company's as well as product strength and weak points. As I already mention that Marks
and Spencer loses market share therefore, I suggested introducing new ladies Jeans in market. I
also used the competitive analysis theory in which I made comparison between Marks and
Spencer with their competitors so that it helps me to analyses whether the ladies jeans product is
actually worth for increasing company's overall performance (Weyl, 2019).
In addition to this, I also realized the entire project help me to gain knowledge related to
retail marketing and I analysed that customer buying behaviour definitely affect the overall
business in both positive as well as negative way and there are three factor that affect the buying
decision of customer that is price, comfort and quality (Rostow, 2019). Moreover, I gain the
knowledge related to marketing activities because when Marks and Spencer introduce new
product in market, company has to generate the leads so that customers will know about the
article. Further, I also realized that in order to introduce new product, company has to first
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analyse the buying behaviour of customer so that the product did not cause to lower down the
profit margin.
Moreover, I realized that to stay competitive in the market, Marks and Spencer should
first determine other's strategy and then set the prices for new product that is ladies jeans. Apart
from this, the target market should be middle class people and upper income group customers
and also realized that innovation is necessary to stay competitive in the market and in the same
way, M&S also introduce new ladies jeans with different variety in order to fulfil the demand of
customers (Namin and et.al., 2019). Moreover, I also used textbook and secondary data
collection that helps me to determine the actual condition of the retail market. During the entire
research, I evaluated that SWOT analysis is the best strategy or model that helps to determine the
exact position of the firm in retail market. This also help to understand new trend and different
variety of products category which needs to be introduced in the future.
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Bibliography
Baker, M. J., (2016). What is marketing?. In The Marketing Book(pp. 25-42). Routledge.
Chernev, A., (2018). Strategic marketing management. Cerebellum Press.
Kerin, R.& Hartley, S., (2015). Marketing: the core. McGraw-Hill.
Klein, K. and et.al., (2019). Brand Positioning Based on Brand Image–Country Image
Fit. Marketing Science.
Liu, Y., Jiang, Z. and Chan, H. C., 2019. Touching Products Virtually: Facilitating Consumer
Mental Imagery with Gesture Control and Visual Presentation. Journal of Management
Information Systems.36(3). pp.823-854.
Lovelock, C. & Patterson, P., (2015). Services marketing. Pearson Australia.
Moutinho, L. & Vargas-Sanchez, A. eds., (2018). Strategic Management in Tourism, CABI
Tourism Texts. Cabi.
Namin, F. N. and et.al., (2019). Application of ANP Network Analysis Process Method in
SWOT Model. Civil Engineering Journal. 5(2). pp.458-465.
Phadermrod, B., Crowder, R. M. & Wills, G. B., (2019). Importance-performance analysis
based SWOT analysis. International Journal of Information Management. 44. pp.194-
203.
Rashid, M. D., 2016. Perception of Employee’s about the Human Resource Management
Practices (Talent Management) in Marks and Spencer in Waterloo, London(Doctoral
dissertation, University of East London).
Rostow, W., (2019). History, policy, and economic theory: essays in interaction. Routledge.
Shaw, S., (2016). Airline marketing and management. Routledge.
Toms, S. and Zhang, Q., 2016. Marks & Spencer and the decline of the British textile industry,
1950–2000. Business history review. 90(1). pp.3-30.
Wang, H. J., (2016). Green brand positioning in the online environment. International Journal of
Communication, 10. p.23.
Weyl, E. G., (2019). Price theory. Journal of Economic Literature.57(2). pp.329-84.
Online
John Lewis. 2019. [Online] Available through: <https://www.marketingweek.com/john-lewis/>
John Lewis and partners. 2019. [Online] Available through: <http://customerthink.com/john-
lewis-partners-rebranding-making-a-difference-to-customers-or-not/>.
Marks and Spencer's Women clothing. 2018. [Online] Available through:
<https://www.marksandspencer.com/l/women/plus-size-clothing>.
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Appendix
The data is collected on 09/08/2019
M&S
John Lewis Next
Range
(Item) 25
655
637
XXS 1 0%
XS 2 0%
S 7 0% 3 0%
M 6 0% 4 0%
L 5 0% 4 0%
XL 2 0% 3 0%
4 0 0% 3 0%
6 22 10% 279 6% 291 6%
8 23 10% 344 8% 631 13%
10 22 10% 353 8% 651 14%
12 20 9% 343 8% 669 14%
14 22 10% 351 8% 529 11%
16 21 9% 355 8% 504 10%
18 22 10% 341 8% 386 8%
20 22 10% 91 2% 25 1%
21 0 0% 0 0% 0 0%
22 21 9% 46 1% 0 0%
23 0 0% 0 0% 0 0%
24 21 9% 116 3% 103 2%
25 0 0% 118 3% 20 0%
26 2 1% 198 5% 217 5%
27 0 0% 226 5% 111 2%
28 2 1% 157 4% 140 3%
29 0 0% 229 5% 104 2%
30 2 1% 255 6% 166 3%
31 0 0% 189 4% 79 2%
8

32 2 1% 228 5% 143 3%
33 0 0% 13 0% 0 0%
34 0 0% 59 1% 15 0%
35 0 0% 0 0% 0 0%
36 0 0% 0 0% 1 0%
Colour
Blue 22 39% 367 51% 350 54%
Black 13 23% 153 21% 137 21%
Grey 5 9% 40 6% 29 4%
Brown 1 2% 8 1% 7 1%
Green 3 5% 25 3% 4 1%
Red 1 2% 17 2% 4 1%
Pink 1 2% 11 2% 14 2%
White 7 13% 64 9% 51 8%
`Purple 1 2% 3 0% 1 0%
Orange 0 0% 5 1% 7 1%
Beige 1 2% 0 0% 0 0%
Cream 1 2% 0 0% 6 1%
Yellow` 0 0% 7 1% 3 0%
Metallic 0 0% 1 0% 0 0%
Neutral 0 0% 15 2% 0 0%
Multi 0 0% 7 1% 0 0%
Natural 0 0% 1 0% 32 5%
Price
Good
(£10 to
£35)
22 88% 165 24% 308 48%
Better(£4
1 to 100)
3 `12% 364 52% 246 39%
Best
(£100 to
£500)`
0 0% 167 24% 83 13%
Style
Slim Fit 1 4% 105 16% 46 9%
9

Straight
Fit
8
32%
104
16%
41
8%
Skinny
Fit
6
24%
332
51%
214
40%
Super
Skinny
Fit
4
16%
20
3%
29
5%
Relax Fit 3 12% 0 0% 0%
Wide Fit 1 4% 30 5% 7 1%
Regular
Fit
0
0%
0
0%
99
18%
Cigarette
Fit
1
4%
0
0% 0%
Relaxed
Slim
1
4%
0
0% 0%
Boyfrien
d
0
0%
25
4%
8
1%
Bootcut 0 0% 20 3% 23 4%
Flared 0 0% 14 2% 4 1%
Tapered 0 0% 2 0% 2 0%
Loose 0 0% 1 0% 1 0%
Standard 0 0% 2 0% 0%
Crop 0 0% 0 0% 43 8%
Mom 0 0% 0 0% 9 2%
Relax
Skinny
0
0%
0
0%
10
2%
Slim
Tapered
0
0%
0
0%
1
0%
Brands`
Own
brand
25 100% 4 1% 143 22%
Other
Brand
0 651 99% 494 78%
10

Figure 2:
Recommendations
M&S Now Next Year
Range (Item) 25 70
Waist Size
6 22 10% 22 10%
8 23 10% 23 10%
10 22 10% 22 10%
12 20 9% 20 9%
14 22 10% 22 10%
16 21 9% 21 9%
18 22 10% 22 10%
20 22 10% 22 10%
21 0 0% 0 0%
22 21 9% 21 9%
23 0 0% 0 0%
24 21 9% 21 9%
25 0 0% 0 0%
26 2 1% 2 1%
27 0 0% 0 0%
28 2 1% 2 1%
29 0 0% 0 0%
30 2 1% 2 1%
31 0 0% 0 0%
32 2 1% 2 1%
33 0 0% 0 0%
34 0 0% 0 0%
35 0 0% 0 0%
36 0 0% 0 0%
38 20 44%
40 15 33%
42 5 11%
44 5 11%
11

Colour
Blue 22 39% 30 30%
Black 13 23% 25 25%
Grey 5 9% 10 10%
Brown 1 2% 11 11%
Green 3 5% 3 3%
Red 1 2% 1 1%
Pink 1 2% 1 1%
White 7 13% 17 17%
`Purple 1 2% 1 1%
Orange 0 0% 0 0%
Beige 1 2% 1 1%
Cream 1 2% 1 1%
Yellow` 0 0% 0 0%
Metallic 0 0% 0 0%
Neutral 0 0% 0 0%
Multi 0 0% 0 0%
Natural 0 0% 0 0%
Price
Good (£10 to
£35)
22 88% 25 36%
Better(£ 41 to
100)
3 `12% 10 14%
Best (£100 to
£500)`
0 0% 35 50%
Style
Slim Fit 1 4% 6 9%
Straight Fit 8 32% 13 19%
Skinny Fit 6 24% 6 9%
Super Skinny Fit 4 16% 9 13%
Relax Fit 3 12% 8 11%
Wide Fit 1 4% 1 1%
Regular Fit 0 0% 5 7%
12

Cigarette Fit 1 4% 1 1%
Relaxed Slim 1 4% 6 9%
Boyfriend 0 0% 10 14%
Bootcut 0 0% 5 7%
Flared 0 0% 0 0%
Tapered 0 0% 0 0%
Loose 0 0% 0 0%
Standard 0 0% 0 0%
Crop 0 0% 0 0%
Mom 0 0% 0 0%
Relax Skinny 0 0% 0 0%
Slim Tapered 0 0% 0 0%
Good/better/best
13

Figure 1: Good
14

15

16
Illustration 1: Better

17
Illustration 2: Best

18
Illustration 3: Visual Display