Analyzing Ralph Lauren's Brand: Marketing Concepts and Strategies

This report provides a marketing analysis of Ralph Lauren, a leading luxury brand, focusing on its marketing concepts and strategies. It examines the company's sourcing and design strategies, promotion through print media and fashion shows, and expansion through direct consumer reach. The analysis covers how Polo Ralph Lauren's women consumers make purchasing decisions, considering factors like price, quality, and brand value. The report highlights the company's revenue, manufacturing locations, and the importance of technology upgrades for improved marketing and production. It concludes that Ralph Lauren should enhance its marketing by integrating new technologies to improve production and appeal to its target high-income demographic by focusing on quality and brand value.

Running head: MARKETING ANALYSIS OF RALPH LAUREN’S BRAND
MARKETING ANALYSIS OF RALPH LAUREN’S BRAND
Name of the Student
Name of the University
Author note

1MARKETING ANALYSIS OF RALPH LAUREN’S BRAND
Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Literature review..............................................................................................................................3
The marketing concept used by the Ralph Lauren Corporation..................................................3
How Polo Ralph Lauren women consumers make their buying decisions when purchasing
Polo products................................................................................................................................4
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................5

2MARKETING ANALYSIS OF RALPH LAUREN’S BRAND
Introduction
Ralph Lauren is the leading luxury accessories brand with a strong global presence. This
leading accessories brand generally gratifies the premium segment of the society, and they
broadly provide the four categories of the product line in the market that are the apparels
includes Polo Ralph Lauren t-shirts, formal wear, tees, denim, pants, coat, jackets and other. The
fragrances include Ralph Lauren black, Lauren, Ralph Lauren blue and other. The home
accessories include Blankets, bathrobe, bath towels, lightings, frames, comforters and other. The
other accessories involve bags, ties, gloves, sunglasses, wallets, leggings, eyeglasses and other.
They initiated their production of the brand with menswear, and there are varieties of product
ranging from t-shirts to trousers and have catered the kids market. Their focus was on the
menswear then they have come up with the women’s product. Ralph Lauren was able to increase
the market share and reach every people level by providing a wide variety of products (Uggla
2014).
This brand needs to advocate the beliefs of the customers than just relying on brand
values. They need to focus more than using one logo as when any customers think of the brand
value they mostly think of the whole set of the visual icon rather than the single logo — the
offering of the unique services and rituals for the customers (Kim and Hall 2014). The
organization should treat all their stores as the temple as this will make them pay attention that is
more special for the production of the innovative product. The brand needs to make their
customer exclusive and push product towards them (Toldos-Romero and Orozco-Gómez 2015).
This study will focus on the marketing concept and the marketing strategies used by the
Ralph Lauren Corporation. This study includes the identification of the marketing concept of
Ralph Lauren Corporation and involves how the customer make buying decision while

3MARKETING ANALYSIS OF RALPH LAUREN’S BRAND
purchasing the product. This study will help to analyze the business strategy of this leading
brand.
Literature review
The marketing concept of the Ralph Lauren Corporation
The marketing concept that the company inherit by using the sourcing strategy by
outsourcing the product manufacturing to the third parties and does not owns any of the
production facility. The effortless and clever design strategy helps the brand to strengthen its
brand identity and allow strengthening the equity in a different market and product segments.
Their marketing concept mainly depends on the promotion strategies, they invest an ample
amount of money for the promotion of the products. Their main mode of advertisements is
through the print media and by taking part in the most famous fashion shows help to reach too
many customers.
According to Kessous, Roux and Chandon (2015), Ralph Lauren uses the long-term
strategy in expanding the brand’s global presence by extending its direct consumer reach,
diversifying and expanding the apparel and the accessory portfolio by investing in the
operational structure. The company’s apparel is produced over the 700 different manufacturers.
This is found out in fiscal 2015, more than the 95% of the products are produced outside of the
US that is primarily in Asia, Europe and Latin America. This company produces both the
finished products and the raw materials. The balance of class and simplicity helps the customers
to represent their personalities. The company averagely estimated the revenue of around
7.4billion dollars at the year-end — the marketing concept that this company is using by

4MARKETING ANALYSIS OF RALPH LAUREN’S BRAND
promoting through the online advertisements, hoardings, through televisions and others (Ralph
Lauren 2018).
There is the need of the introduction of the new technologies for improving the marketing
strategies as the up gradation of the technologies can improve the business operations and will
help to do marketing in the global presence in a fast way. Recently, the company is working on
the introduction of the new technologies that will improve the production strategies of the
company and also improves the marketing strategies, and the production process can bring the
desired outcome for the company. The company lacks in the technology sector as the other
luxurious brand are implementing the new technologies, and the up gradation of the present
technology is improving their business structure (Brogi et al. 2013).
How Polo Ralph Lauren women consumers make their buying decisions when
purchasing Polo products
This company mainly targets the high-income groups, so the prices are highily compared
with the competitors; this is the selling strategy that the company uses. Most of the high-income
groups consider the brand product by competing with the price of the product of another brand.
The quality and the price serves the rich, the urban people, this helps to identify and earn the
good amount of the profit, as the margin maintained is very high. This company have been
following the perspective pricing policy in the marketing mix and maintaining high prices for the
products. The consumer can buy the product relying on the brand values, but they mainly choose
the product by looking for the quality as this brand mainly focuses on the quality apart from the
fashion styles (Sheng Goh, Chattaraman and Forsythe 2013). The selling strategy they used by
placing prices over the product by competing with the other brand and the competing strategy
will help to find reach the actual customers. The rich group of the customers mainly focusses on

5MARKETING ANALYSIS OF RALPH LAUREN’S BRAND
the brand value and the prices by competing with other brands. The consumer can get the
product by visiting the store and also through online services. The products are manufactured as
per the demands of the actual customers. The promotion of collection by the online
advertisements and the fashion shows mainly provokes the customers to buy the products. The
customers mainly look for the quality product as Ralph Lauren ensured that he does not know
more about the fashion style and thus he focuses mainly on the quality of the products (Bury,
Tiggemann and Slater 2014).
Conclusion
Therefore, from the above discussion, it can be concluded that the marketing concept of
this brand needs to be enhanced by the introduction of the new technologies. The implementation
of the new technologies will bring improvement in the production process. The company focuses
mainly on the quality products apart from the fashion styles and places price range for the
product by competing with the prices of the other brand’s product. This attracts the rich group of
the customers as they rely mainly on the brand values and competes with the other brand
products.

6MARKETING ANALYSIS OF RALPH LAUREN’S BRAND
References
Brogi, S., Calabrese, A., Campisi, D., Capece, G., Costa, R. and Di Pillo, F., 2013. The effects of
online brand communities on brand equity in the luxury fashion industry. International Journal
of Engineering Business Management, 5(Godište 2013), pp.5-32.
Bury, B., Tiggemann, M. and Slater, A., 2014. Directing gaze: The effect of disclaimer labels on
women's visual attention to fashion magazine advertisements. Body image, 11(4), pp.357-363.
Kessous, A., Roux, E. and Chandon, J.L., 2015. Consumer–brand relationships: A contrast of
nostalgic and non‐nostalgic brands. Psychology & Marketing, 32(2), pp.187-202.
Kim, H.S. and Hall, M.L., 2014. Fashion brand personality and advertisement response:
Incorporating a symbolic interactionist perspective. In Fashion Branding and Consumer
Behaviors (pp. 29-45). Springer, New York, NY.
Myers, B. and Kwon, W.S., 2013. A model of antecedents of consumers' post brand attitude
upon exposure to a cause–brand alliance. International Journal of Nonprofit and Voluntary
Sector Marketing, 18(2), pp.73-89.
Ralph Lauren. (2018). Ralph Lauren UK - Designer Men's, Women's, Children's, & Baby
Clothing. [online] Available at: https://www.ralphlauren.co.uk/ [Accessed 24 Nov. 2018].
Sheng Goh, Y., Chattaraman, V. and Forsythe, S., 2013. Brand and category design consistency
in brand extensions. Journal of Product & Brand Management, 22(4), pp.272-285.
Toldos-Romero, M.D.L.P. and Orozco-Gómez, M.M., 2015. Brand personality and purchase
intention. European Business Review, 27(5), pp.462-476.

7MARKETING ANALYSIS OF RALPH LAUREN’S BRAND
Uggla, H., 2014. Make or buy the brand: Strategic direction of brand management. Strategic
Direction, 30(3), pp.1-3.