Zara Case Study
...concentrating sixty percent of their effort to the women clothing market. Besides retailing, Zara also designs, produces, and ships their lines of clothing to their Zara stores. Zara's corporate concept is to offer fashionable, trendy, designs at a reasonable price. The key to their corporate success is to offer the latest trends and fashions before their competitors. They believe that they are in the fashion business, not the clothing business. As part of this corporate concept, the stores try to hold very low levels of inventory, often having their entire inventory out on display, in order to sell out and make room for the next wave of fashion. Their stores are located across in the main commercial areas of cities across Europe, America, and Asia, with their base in La Coruna, Spain. The store locations are always located at prestigious, high-traffic locales. The stores are designed with wide open spaces and well defined layouts to insure customers enjoy their shopping experience at Zara.
Zara started out in 1979 with 6 stores and flourished to all major Spanish cities during the 1980's. Within the next decade, Zara's parent company, Inditex, expanded to 29 countries across Europe, the Americas, and Asia. Additionally, during this time Index acquired other big name fashion brands; each operating independently of each other. By 2002, Index had expanded to 1,284 stores in 39 countries. Zara represents 75% of Inditex sales, and by 2003 Zara had 565 stores in 33 countries.
Zara currently is experiencing a period of financial success. They are doing better than most of their competitors, have a strong share of the market, and have built a reputation of fashionable, quality products at a reasonable price. Their business is growing and expanding with more stores opening in more countries. They have maintained a competitive advantage through its...
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