Quality over quantity: will this be the direction helping fashion retailers resist the corona virus crisis ?
Many shop owners are right now considering changing their business models to survive. And it is paramount to put into the equation the different ways in which consumers will now approach a discretionary sector like fashion.
Will customers go back looking for the latest spring-summer design, after having had essential health and groceries on top their priority list for months? The answer is: yes, they will, but most probably with a different mindset. Purchases that were supposed to be for special occasions – be it weddings, parties, holidays…- have simply been cancelled, and being stuck at home has certainly made consumers generally less excited about getting dressed.
Nevertheless, fashion devotees all over the world have surely been missing strolling along the city’s boulevards, and entering their favourites shops. But, at the same time, this long pause from our normal lives has been for many an occasion of reflection on how chaotic and excessive the modern society is, with its fast consumption patterns. These include that large segment of the fashion sector that relies on cheap, fast-changing, disposable clothing, which has already begun to show its limits before the crisis, as well as its devastating environmental impact.
With life slowly getting back to normal and fashion stores reopening bit by bit all over Europe, odds are that consumers will return to shops, enthusiastic about their reconquered freedom, but also more pondered and cautious about their purchases. The revaluation of their model of consumption, brought on by such an unprecedented crisis, will possibly materialize into the desire to invest in few valuable pieces rather than falling in the trap of impulsive and compulsive buying, that has been so much favouring the too well-known low cost fashion giants in the past decade. In other words, it is expected a consumers’ shift from quantity towards quality, benefitting fashion retailers who will be able to offer trendy products that can also stand out among others for their added value characteristics, like uniqueness, design, quality of the materials, durability. In short, customers will be now maybe buying less, but surely looking more for garments capable of becoming pieces to keep in the wardrobe for more than a season.
Sofashion 