Meeting the needs and wants of the customer who is usually not the end customer at the right time, at the right place, at the right price with the right merchandise.
It is risky- because it is a critical activity and he has to take responsibility for the others like production, logistics etc.
Value addition in the fashion chain
- fashion can rise above any price level
- It can find its own outlest and level
- fastest is the bestest
Value Addition process in the garment manufacturing
Price, Fashion and value of timeliness trickles down in the following manner: fantasy( haute couture), fashion pret-e-porter (diffusion lines), Style Wear (marketing brand: contemporary classics), basic updated, basic budget
haute Couture:
It is not like a garment, it is sold as a work of art or painting. It is sensory. Sold for special occasion like wedding ceremonies etc. No designer make money by selling haute couture, except perhaps YSL.
Pret-e Porter
Like Donna Carren- designer ready to wear garments. Adopted/ changed from the haute couture. Cut down funky things and make it more pragmatic. Something like modern version of painting. It is where designer make a lot of money. It is signature brand of designers.
Marketing Brands
Brands created by marketing companies. Prices are lower than Pret and very much lower than Huate couture. Like Allen Solly. They do get influenced by designers. These are designer oriented but not designer owned. Contemporary classics : something, that does'nt change in class/cut, only colours etc. get changed. e.g. Italian Collars, Chambray
Fashion normally trickles down from Haute to basics, in case of jeans it has tricked up.
A day in the life of an export house merchandiser
- Product range development activities
- Update enquiry status
- Make Offers
- Conduct Costings
- Check Order specifications and order status
- Merchandising calendar and order planning
A day in the life of a retail merchandiser
- Collection of daily, weekly sales report
- analysis of sales report
- demand forecasting
-planning otb
- range planning for store private labels.
- vendor management and order management
- planning activities.
Types of Buyers
1. Wholeseller Importer
2. Retailer Importer
3. Manufacturer Importer
1. Wholeseller Importer
- keeps a track of fashion best sellers
- buys in bulk
- low margin selling
- buys close to season
- low risk low returns
- do not have professional skills
- very good at sourcing /quality many nto be paramount to him.
2. Retailer Importer
- buys a theme
- she comes well in advance
- Make dollars and pounds
- Factory evaluation and quality is a question
- much risk/ return
- more rewarding
- lot of research involved / developed forecasting techniques
- assortment depth is more as compared to importer wholeseller
- carries a full product line
3. Manufacturer Importer
- Supply to top end brands. Why, He makes damn good jackets
- very finicky in quality, understands quality, fabric, manufacturing process
- Why he imports- not many people with him left/ issue of workforce/ expensive to manufacture jackets/ still some people come to him
- Detailed technically oriented person.
- to you he is tough guy to handle/ harp on the technical prowess of the machine.
- margins are goods
- buys close but not as close to the season as importer wholeseller
Role of a merchandiser working for a brand
- sales analysis, store format wise
- Demand forecasting
- calculate OTBs
- settles prices for strores other than his own- Multibrand Store
- Track Inventories
- Create orders for sourcing
- negotiate the prices with vendors
- Management and development of vendors
Role of a merchandiser working for a buying office
- market information from the principal Buyer's office
- Market intelligence
- Interpreting forecasts and company directions
- vendor selection
- According approvals to vendors
- Arrange meetings of the buyers with vendors
Merchandise Planning
- Calendar plan is an important part of merchandise planning
- It is about time and activity that happen in all the departments all the time
- As merchandisers, we need to understand the activities into sequential and concurrent activities.
- While implementing time and activity chart it is important to put data into the diary and also write the variances allowed.
- The benefit of following a calender is to increase efficiency of the process, you can get time commitment from other functionaries, for delivery schedule adherance and therefore improve profitability of the process.
- Merchandise planning has the following modules: buyer handling module, order handling module, sample development and costing module, PPC module and stores and inventory system module.
Merchandising Costing
Cost Plus Approach- To under stand our cost.
Buyer Backward Approach- It is needed to
- To confirm whether something is right or wrong
- To negotiate
- to look at feasibility and infeasibility of garment: The buffer between the target price quoted by buyer and my cost plus will help me negotiate.
- It also helps in understanding the customer better
- It helps us focus on new product portfolios: If I do buyer backward of shirts and find it not profitable for me, or if I do buyer backward of knits and find it profitable then I can shift from shirts to knits.
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