Analysis of Primark's Retail Strategy within the UK Fashion Market

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RETAIL THEORY AND
PRACTICE

Contents
List of figures...................................................................................................................................3
Introduction to retail........................................................................................................................4
Introduction to the company............................................................................................................5
Key relevant changes within the UK fashion retail.........................................................................6
Relevant changes within the micro environment.............................................................................9
Suggest and discuss strategies and tactics that could be used.......................................................11
Recommendations..........................................................................................................................14
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................15
References......................................................................................................................................16

List of figures
Figure 1: Primark outlet...................................................................................................................5
Figure 2: Business factors................................................................................................................6
Figure 3: PESTEL............................................................................................................................7
Figure 4: Role of micro and macro environment...........................................................................11

Introduction to retail.
Retail: The word “Retail” was derived from “Retaillier” which is a French word which means to
cut in a piece or to break down. It is a type of business or industry in which goods or services are
provided to the customer in the form of small shops or offices. It consists of some important
points such as consumption of goods, data collection of usage, calculation of profit, etc. (Grewal,
Roggeveen & Nordfält 2017). The person who is handling this retail business is called “Retailer”
who sell different goods and service to the customer in a small amount.
Fashion retail: It is a type of retail business or industry in which goods are purchased from the
fashion designer or manufacture and selling those goods to the consumer both online or offline
with the help of media, technology, T.V advertisements and others (Yeung & Ang 2015).

Introduction to the company.
In this assignment, a fashion retailer of the UK named “Primark” has been chosen as a case study
of the retail industry in the field of fashion.
Primark: It is one of the fashion retailers of UK and ABF (Associated British Foods) is the
owner. It is known as one of the top fashion retailer of UK region in the clothing sector which is
most popular for the low price of goods with high value. It has a large amount of market share in
comparison with the other retailers and mostly deals in store-purchase (Hendriksz 2017).
It has approx. 174 outlets in the UK region and still growing with new branches in different areas
of the UK region. According to the latest report of the year 2018, Primark has increased its
revenue to £7.1 billion with a net profit of £735 million. It deals in the fashion clothing for both
men and women have more than 80 experts in the management system in order to check the
quality, sustainability, training of workers and ethical fashion. Currently, Primark has started two
new programs named “Cotton Connect” and “Self-Employed Women’s Association” to provide
help and support to over 1100 females who are working in cotton farming in India. It has the
objective of vocal communication about the commitments and latest fashion products in the
Primark.
Figure 1: Primark outlet
Source: (Primark - Store: Shrewsbury, 2019)

Key relevant changes within the UK fashion retail.
In the current world, the fashion industry is one of the leading industry in the clothing sector as
well as employment sector which providing a large amount of employment to fashion designers,
workers in the manufacturing of latest fashion clothing, engineers and others. It consists of four
major components in the fashion business or industry which are given below:
 Raw material production for fashion clothing.
 Designing of fashion goods and products.
 Awareness, promotion, marketing and advertisements of fashion clothes.
 Selling of fashion clothes at retail outlet or e-commerce website.
The overall business of fashion clothing depends on different factors in order to achieve success
in the fashion business and to maintain good relationships with customers of fashion clothes.
Different factors are given below:
 Marketing environment.
 Internal environment.
 Microenvironment
 Macro environment
Figure 2: Business factors
Source: (Chavan, 2018)
Macro Environment: All the factors and practices such as social, economic, technical, etc.
which are a present in a large society or globally in the fashion retail and have an effect on the

microenvironment of the fashion retail are known as Microenvironment (Krause 2013). It plays
an important role in the fashion retail business and industry from the last decade and resulted in
major revolutionary changes in the fashion retail of the UK region. Macro environment of
fashion retail affects profit and competition in the retail sector of fashion clothing. The changes
in the microenvironment of a business or industry can’t be changed by the fashion retail instead
they started practice to adopt those changes in order to increase the sell and profit. The key
factors of the macro environment of fashion retail are also known as PESTEL (Chavan 2018).
PESTEL: It consists of key factors of the macro environment of a business or industry. The
different terms of PESTEL are given below:
 Political
 Economical
 Social
 Technological
 Environmental
 Legal
Figure 3: PESTEL
Source: (Chavan, 2018)
Political factors: It consists of political factors such as government activities, policies, political
activities, etc. which affects fashion business, the industry as well as fashion retail. It has one of
the major impacts on retail as well as business in the UK region. In order to grow the fashion

business or retail, all the policies and rules for the marketing must be designed in accordance
with the political factors.
Legal factors: It consists of all the rules and regulations such as health & safety rules, consumer
rights, the safety of the product, labeling of the product, etc. which are developed for the fashion
retail in the UK region to deal with all the activities of retail in a legal way.
Technology factor: It consists of technical factors such as technology, application, and software
used in the field of fashion retail to increase the productivity, promotions, advertisements, and
others. It has a severe impact on the growth of demand in fashion retails.
Environment factor: It consists of different factors such as materials used, health hazards and
different impacts on the environment. These play an important role in the fashion retail business
because of the bad impacts of different activities and practices in the fashion industry on the
environment and causing pollution and other impacts.
Social factor: It consists of factors such as the growth of population, conscious about health,
distribution of age, etc. plays an important role in the fashion retail and also helps in
understanding different concepts of the customer in the fashion business or retail. The social
trends have a large impact on the fashion industry as well as retail.
Economical factor: It plays an important role in the business of retail fashion and their profit
which includes different factors such as interest rate, disposal, inflation, the growth of the
economy, etc. All these factors are divided into sub-categories of micro-environment and Macro-
environment.

Relevant changes within the micro environment.
Micro-environment in fashion retail: It consists of all the factors which are responsible for the
operation and functions of the fashion retail or business. It plays an important role in the decision
making of any fashion retail or business and before the development of the strategy of the
fashion retail outlet or the business. A detailed analysis of all of the micro-environment factors
needed in order to define and develop correct and progressive business or retail strategy in the
field of fashion. All these factors cannot be managed by any of the Fashion retail or business but
the best practices are used in order to control these factors within fashion retail and business
(Chavan 2018). Different key factors of Micro-environment are as follow:
 Customers
 Competitors
 Retailers and distributors
 Staff/Employee
 Suppliers
 Shareholders
 Media
 Government
 Society
Customers: It is one of the most important factors of the microenvironment as all of the
activities and business in the field of fashion retail depends on the customer and their needs. All
the decisions and development of fashion retail must be done in order to provide satisfaction and
quality service for the customers. For example, to understand the need and demand of the
customer in fashion clothing.
Media: It also plays an important role in the development of retail business and helps in
providing awareness, promotions, and advertisements for the latest fashion, design, and trends
available in the market to attract a large number of customers. For example, T.V advertisement
for new fashion clothes and retail outlets.
Competitors: It consists of taking care and knowledge about the other outlets of fashion retail
available in the market in order to design and develop marketing strategy and decisions to attract

a large number of customers and increase the profit of the business or retail. For example,
checking new plans and promotions which other retailers and outlets are using to attract
customers.
Suppliers: It consists of an individual or the person from where different materials, goods, and
services of the fashion are purchased by the retailer to sell them in their outlets at a profitable
rate and costs. It also plays an important role in fashion retail in order to select the best option for
the supply of materials, goods, and services in accordance with the latest fashion trends.
Shareholders: It consists of different individuals, companies, and investors which provide funds
to the retail outlet or the business in order to increase the wealth and strength of the retail or
business.
Government: It consists of different departments, organizations, and policies which are
designed by the government bodies to be followed by the retail and business organizations. It
plays an important role in tracking different activities of the business or the retail and their
strategies developed for marketing. For example, the policy of safety and health in fashion retail.
Society: It consists of different activities organized by the retail or business for the welfare and
development of the society in which that particular business or the retail is running. For example,
organizing awareness camp.

Suggest and discuss strategies and tactics that could be used.
Both micro and macro environmental factors play an important role in influencing growth, profit,
revenue, etc. for fashion retail or the business. Let’s discuss the effect of these factors on the
growth of Primark fashion retail of the UK.
Figure 4: Role of micro and macro environment
Source: (Yam, 2016)
Influence of Micro-environment factors on Primark: Micro-environment factors play an
import role in the development of Primark fashion retail business and their outlets at different
areas of the UK region. Some of those factors and their influence are given below:
 Customers: Primark deals with the latest fashion clothes in their outlets and provides
attractive prices which are low and have high quality in comparison with the other
retailers in the UK region, as a result, it has a large number of trusted customers including
45% women customers and 40% men customers.
 Suppliers: Primark have strong management staff and experts to check the quality of the
goods and for the selection of suppliers, manufactures or companies from where good,
products and services are purchased. It has a strong command over different suppliers of
various materials in order to provide the best quality products to the customers.
 Competitors: Primark uses its strong management team of experts to keep track of the
latest fashion design and trend in the market and provide the best available trends to the
customers in comparison with the other retailers.

Influence of Macro-environment factors on Primark: Macro-environment factors also plays
an important role in the development of Primark retail outlets in fashion clothing. Influence of
different factors are shown below:
 Political factors: Primark has developed all the documents and policies of the business
to meet all the policies set by the government and political bodies which helps in the
proper growth and development of the business.
 Economical factor: Selection of materials and the activities for the production of cloths
and goods of the fashion has been done on the basis of environment-friendly to avoid any
health and hazards for the environment and reduce pollution. It helps in trust building of
the company with their customers by saving the natural environment.
 Technology factor: Use of new technology, applications, and software also helped in the
growth of Primark retail business by increasing production of goods and services,
management of customer demands, designing of new fashion clothes, etc. It also helps in
the promotion and marketing of latest trends and goods of fashion at different retail
outlets.
 Legal factors: It also has influence in the growth and development of the Primark retail
business by following all the legal terms and policies for the improvement of business,
services, and goods to provide the best possible option for the customers.
Strategies and tactics in the retail business: It is an important factor for the development of
any business, retail or shop to stand in the market for the long period of time, adding new
customers and to create new business ideas to attract a large number of customers (Nicasio
2018). Different strategies and tactics that can be used by the retailer are given below:
 Proper use of fixture and merchant by the retailer: It helps in attracting large numbers
of customers by proper arrangement of merchant and display of different products, goods,
and services to the customer.
 Curbside and windows used by the retailer: It also plays important role in attracting
more customers with the help of unique design and structures for the retail shop or outlets
and the methods used for the display of different goods and services of fashion.