Gap peers into the abyss
Fortune magazine has an update on Gap and its continuing struggles to regain fashion relevance. On the business side, Gap has reduced its debt and improved cash flow, but on the fashion side much remains to be done. Gap is not a fashion leader anymore. Same store sales have declined in 18 of the last 21 months. Some top talent inside the company has left. And analysts question if Gap has simply lost its customer vision.
Levi-Strauss demonstrated that rising to fashion icon status is no guarantee of permanent success. Icons can easily become relics, effectively dead, rigid and remote.
Competitors make their customers look “special”
In San Francisco (Gap’s home turf), Gap now has very visible competition from nearby H&M and Zara. Visit those stores and you’ll see what Gap could be, but currently isn’t. Both competitors flash a fashion presence that reaches out and embraces the customer right at the door. It’s as if they’re saying to the customer: “We’re here to make you look special. Everything in here is all about you.” So in you go, gazing wide-eyed at all the new self expressions you had never thought possible.
While Gap makes you look like . . . Gap
At Gap, the brand still seems to say: “We’re here to make you look like Gap. Everything in here is us.
It’s a very big difference.
Singapore outclasses Gap along Orchard Road
Having just returned from Singapore, I saw first hand just how far Gap has to travel to get back into the global fashion game. Frankly, Gap has a long way to go. The spiffy malls and boutiques on Singapore’s Orchard Road make your average Gap store look like Old Navy. At the huge Takashimaya department store, the displays, presentation, styling and variety in the different “brand boutiques” are simply stunning. Style, cut, color and detail jump out at you from every direction. The same can be said for the dazzling Esprit store in nearby Wisma Atria. Gone is the famed super-saturated sub-teen panache that characterized the classic American Esprit. Now there are carefully tailored lines of Euro-sophisticated pieces designed to be combined and recombined, capable of energizing one’s whole wardrobe. And Esprit is growing attractive sub-brands, such as the ESP “sport” line, to plumb adjacent markets.
These brands have a life to them, a vibrant immediacy, even when hanging on the racks. They aren’t just “clothes,” and they’re certainly not “inventory.” They’re an incarnation of you, inviting you to touch. It’s as if you’re surrounded by palettes of potential as you walk through the store.
Limits of the Gap look
In the end it all comes down to what a business does with its design sense. The Gap approach seems intent on creating a merchandisable look, which it wants its customers to adopt. Its competitors seem headed on a different course, creating customers who are simply more fashionable.
April 24th, 2006 at 7:02 am
[…] A brand from the bottom up MySpace does much more than simply unleash the inner customer (although that in itself is an achievement). It sets a standard for “brands from the bottom up.” It doesn’t impose a top-down brand uniformity (like Gap), control customers without their knowledge (like Sony), or lend customers a tethered toy (like GM). It simply fuels the dynamic passions of its customers, and hops on for the ride. […]