From telling stories to buying clothes, the way of leisure management of clothing Library

In the past more than 30 years, Yanai is building Uniqlo, the global apparel chain brand. "A hamburger can just be sandwiched between a piece of pie,"? Just a few minutes ago, Yanai, in the 31-storey office, said to me, "or add some kimchi or lettuce!" You'll want to put some ketchup or mustard-or something else, as long as you can think of it-you like it. The bread and Meat Loaf is certainly not enough, only add those seasoning, is a good hamburger. "Cheap, stylish, suitable for everyone, Uniqlo is overtaking Zara, H&m, GAP, become a casual fashion king." But is this the flagship of the Fast fashion brand, in 2020 to achieve 50 billion U.S. dollars sales revenue?

I don't think we're going to the gourmet square, Yanai is actually talking about the cheap sportswear of Uniqlo, and it's all of these clothes.

"Usually, it's easy to fall into the trap of making ordinary hamburgers," he said. "Yanai is aiming for a grey, loose sports suit that costs 1490 yen (about 180 yuan), which is a good example if you want to find something that makes you unattractive." "Look at this," he said, almost complacent, "this is an ordinary hamburger." There's nothing in it. This suit does not see any sense of design. We're still selling it probably because it sold well last year. He paused, then looked at me and asked: "Will you wear it?" ”

"No," I replied, "Will you?" ”

"Of course not!" "I mean I'm not happy with the suit, it's not done yet." ”

I asked him to show me an ordinary hamburger that had been improved. He thought for a moment, then hurried to a corner of the shop, far from looking like a PANTONE color card, into a look, found to be a discharge of the small lattice socks. "We started producing only a few colors," he said, "and then we thought about this crazy idea: why do we only produce 10 kinds of colors instead of 50?" These colourful knitwear are at least the famous American hep Guys hamburgers. ”

Then Yanai was thinking of a better example, quickly moving to the side of a wall of underwear. "We used to make pure cotton underwear, but we wanted to try using synthetic fibres," he said. "By working with Japan's material technology company Toray, Uniqlo has created an elastic, silky, fast-drying fabric called silky Dry, which can be seen from the name, even if the wearer is sweating, providing a dry, comfortable touch." (Uniqlo is renaming this series "Air sense underwear" (airism). "I wear this series of underwear every day," Yanai said, "This series makes the wearer happy-and makes me happy." ”

Before I could figure out what the CEO's underwear had to do with his happiness, Yanai was taking a box of black underwear off the shelf. "Is this the gift I gave you?" ' I hope you can put it on, ' said Yanai, with the passion of a foie gras burger that seemed to hold in his hand. ”

The best example of an improved hamburger may be the Uniqlo itself. Uniqlo has no stores in Tokyo 15 years ago, according to a head of Uniqlo. Today, Uniqlo opens stores in 12 countries selling socks, underwear, shirts, t-shirts, jeans, coats and skirts. Despite the rustic sports suit, Uniqlo has also boarded countless fashion charts because it has been praised for its cooperation with well-known designers, including Jil and Charlotte Rosen. It may be one of the most advanced textile fabrics in the world for mass-market retailers. The results of the use of advanced technology are also remarkable: in fiscal year 2012, Uniqlo is expected to have about 10 billion dollars in revenue and 1.5 billion dollars in profits, making it the world's fourth-largest clothing retailer, only after ZARA,H&M and Gap.

None of these results can make Yanai satisfied. He hopes that by 2020, Uniqlo's global income will be five times times the current. He is ambitious to export Uniqlo's men's, women's and children's clothing series to the world. June, excellent Richugang opened the first branch in the Philippines. It will then open its branches to Indonesia, Vietnam and India. "This is a piece of Uniqlo history. ”？ Yanai about his expansion plans in Asia and the booming middle class he aimed at.

Selling clothes starts with telling stories

Uniqlo's history is not long, in Yanai was born in 1949, his father Yanai, etc. in Sks County opened a suit shop, Sks County was a trade port, has a long history of opening up and cultural exchanges. With Japan's economic recovery, Yanai has successfully opened 22 stores. By the year 1984, Yanai took over the company and became president, opening a shop in Hiroshima the same year, known as "The unique clothing warehouse (uniquely mens Warehouse)".

Then he abbreviated the name of the store as "Uniqlo" (Uniqlo), which was not a deliberate irony. There was nothing unique about the store at first-the store was filled with sportswear from Nike, Adidas and other foreign street cards-but Yanai insisted on opening new outlets and adding more private-label products. As the chain expands, he can reduce the price by increasing the quantity of the order. By the year 1998, Uniqlo had more than 300 outlets in Japan.

Yanai has always admired retailers such as Martha's in the U.K., Italy, and Gap in the United States. Why doesn't Japan have similar retailers, he thought? His close friend said: "He never hides his dream, although he feels a little arrogant." This is not like the Japanese style. "As early as 1990, he told his friends that Uniqlo would surpass gap."

Yanai is humble and ambitious, not afraid to turn to others. Uniqlo was its first Japanese customer when Chinese-American Jay in Tokyo opened Veco advertising branch in the middle of the 1990. Yanai said: "I owe a lot of Jay." He spends a lot of time helping us explain what genes we have and what kind of ideas we need. ”

Jay, who worked for more than 20 years at Bloomington Dai, a former creative director and marketing director, sent Uniqlo's polar fleece shirts to New York to have colleagues do street research. "They spent two days in Soho looking for someone to try them on," he recalls. It's luxurious! Very light! We asked, ' How much are you willing to spend to buy? They replied: ' It should be 50 to 75 dollars. Some even say 100 dollars. But in fact that one is just 19 dollars. ' I showed the tape to Mr. Yanai and told him, ' This is your future. ’”

At that time gifted Uniqlo know how to make clothes, but do not know how to show to consumers. Jay and his team helped Uniqlo better show men's shirts, and they rolled up their sleeves. "It's normal for us, but it's an eye-opener," Jay said. Rolling up the sleeves subtly hints at the lifestyle of the target population. They realized it was a way to tell a story. ”

With the help of Veco ads, Uniqlo began to tell a new story and set up a brand image. They first printed a full-page ad in the paper, introducing Uniqlo's 2900 yen (more than 200 yuan) of jeans, and explaining how it could make high-quality jeans at such a low price (mass-produced and manufactured in China according to Japanese standards).

Every subsequent ad emphasizes the quality and democracy of Uniqlo. A series of advertisements that show people from all walks of life have hit Japanese society with obvious class barriers. Jay said: "The professor's status is considered higher than the child, but we want to eliminate this status difference." Everyone has 30 seconds to show time. The product is the link point. The most radical thing we've ever done is to give regular customers 30 seconds of valuable TV play time. ”

Ordinary customers are the ones who buy things. By 2000, Uniqlo had sold its polar fleece shirts to nearly one-third of Japanese. Jay's work is so remarkable that it conflicts with other major clients of Veco advertising, such as Nike, which also produces High-tech clothing. Veco advertising has to give up Uniqlo, but it has made the Japanese brand a good wind.

Cheap”

On a breezy afternoon in April, I was interviewing customers at the back door of Uniqlo's flagship store in the luxurious Ginza of Tokyo, which was just completed one months ago. The first question I ask is always: when it comes to Uniqlo, what is the first word you think of?

"Yasui. ”

"Yasui. ”

"Yasui. ”

Asked 28 people, the answer is the same Japanese word, the meaning of the word is not "cool", but "cheap."

Maybe all the commercials are good: Uniqlo is never cool in Japan. But in recent years, it has enriched its own brand story to ensure that "cheap" in Uniqlo means affordable, not poor quality or vulgar taste.

To understand how the brand image rooted in the clothing, I visited the Uniqlo design director of the company Ze straight. "Cool is good, but too bad." "In his work-shop, he said. It was a three-storey space made of L-shaped by many windows, just below Yanai's office. The workshop shelves were filled with hundreds of samples and two headless models in tennis suits. "In addition to trendy, consumers also have a demand for the functionality of the product." The product should be strong enough to be convenient for daily wear. Everything needs fashion elements, but fashion is just embellishment. ”

From the side of the shelf, long ze straight has taken a 2012 autumn winter coat Parker overcoat, between dark green and light brown color. It's dotted with a vertical chest zipper bag, echoing the 2012-Autumn Burberry-Burberry Prorsum and Marc (Marc Jacobs) crossover style. But more interesting is the evolution of the product. He pointed to the left side of a single seam and said: "Two-line seam is much more complicated." The single line is simpler and takes less than 20 seconds. ”

Before joining Uniqlo, Miyake is the chief designer of the House, where there are no cool things. He said: "In Miyake is to do addition." Here it is subtraction. Cut, cut, cut! ”？ He said, Uniqlo made this pike coat cut off for 90 seconds. The time and cost of making 600,000 pieces of Parker coats are substantial-which explains why Uniqlo's products are cheap. He said: "All that remains is what you need: let you not get wet by the rain, so that the heat can be dispersed away." In a sense, it's similar to what I've done in Miyake: It all requires a good sense of design. But this is not the same design sense. ”

Uniqlo's unique sense of touch also manifests itself in collaboration with independent designers. Like its rivals, Uniqlo enjoys the reputation and sales growth associated with a brief partnership with renowned designers. In the store where the goods are more fixed, "Our customers need some fresh feeling," Shin Odake, US chief executive of Uniqlo, said New. Will be on the shelves of the new autumn outfit with Orlat Kili (Orla Kiely) and Takahashi (June Takahashi) cooperation.

However, marketing is only second, Tianyou, senior vice president of the Global Research and Design Department of Uniqlo, Yuki Katsuta, said: "The intention of our cooperation is to find some inspiration for the future development." "Seung Tianyou (Yuki Katsuta) worked in Podolf Goudman (Bergdorf Goodman) for 10 years before joining Uniqlo. Souffey Buhai (Sophie Buhai) said: "They want to see our design cardboard-real abstract cardboard-they want to know our source of inspiration and design philosophy." That's rare. "She and Lisa Meyoc (Lisa Mayock) together for Uniqlo design vena Cava series and 2011 Spring Summer Capsule series. "They see fashion design as a spiritual symbol," she said. ”

Technology Enterprises

"We are not fashion companies,"? "We are technology companies," Yanai said. "He liked this sentence, we met three times, he repeated three times." Finally, I asked him what kind of technology he wanted to see on the shelves in Uniqlo. He looked at me in amazement and said, "one size fits all sizes," and imagine a fabric that will automatically fit the wearer's figure. "Do not need to wash the clothes." Just float in the water, take out a fling, all the dirty things are gone. He thought again and said, "or the cloth can change color according to the mood of your day." ”

At present, Uniqlo's main innovation is a synthetic material called "Heattech" that retains thermal energy. Yanai said: "People once thought that cotton underwear is the best, that synthetic materials are only suitable for mountaineering or outdoor activities, and not comfortable." The Heattech, developed with Toray, was born in Ishikawa prefecture, a coastal plain surrounded by snow-capped mountains, which has long been a textile research and development Center. There, a factory that produces carbon fiber for wind turbine blades and Boeing aircraft, Toray manufactures polyester nylon yarns for Heattech underwear, T-shirts and socks.

The connection with Boeing is important: in 1999 Yanai was reading an article about Toray's research and development for the aircraft giant. "Many people focus on superficial changes and they do not delve into real innovation," he said. If the two companies can jointly create competitive products, so can we. ”

In that factory, a technician handed me a bag of small particles like white dry pepper. These are the seeds of Heattech. Rows of neat machines are first heated up by the small particles and then spun into lines that are only one-tenth thick. It is spun into 64 yarns and shipped to China. By looking at these spun yarns with a high magnification microscope, you can see that they are cluttered circles and hexagonal stars. The thread is spun into both shapes because the circle and the stars are not well combined. When spun into a yarn, they form an air sac, and a feather jacket is a similar principle that helps retain heat and drain moisture.

The legendary Japanese business philosophy kaizen-probably means "continuous improvement"-also used in Heattech. Every season has a great promotion. 2011 This yarn is 88, to 2012 years only 64-"but more warm!" "said the workman.

Heattech is also important on another level: it is a symbol that Yanai is most valued. He believes that a good Uniqlo product is not immediately recognizable, unlike the red soles of Christian (Christian Louboutin) or the Lauren (Ralph Lauren) polo. Instead, it is fully integrated into the product. Heattech is perceived rather than seen. Yanai laughs, "We create functional products." Maybe consumers want to buy something like that. Maybe they need it. ”

In the autumn and winter of 2011, Uniqlo sold more than 100 million pieces of Heattech products.

A snow before the shame

Selling sportswear to Americans, Jay said, "is like selling rice to the Chinese." "As Yanai is seeing, jeans and T-shirts are from the United States, but we are reversing this situation." "In fact, Yanai is trying to make the Chinese like he sells more rice than his native rice."

With its peculiar ambitions, Yanai said: "We want to dominate the market." He also wanted to be ashamed of the snow before. Uniqlo opened three stores in the suburbs of New Jersey in 2005, but closed in less than a year. "We have learned a lesson," he said. Failure is because no one knows us, and if people don't know what store it is, they won't buy anything. ”

Although Uniqlo has opened stores in Soho, Manhattan since 2006, but its massive expansion in the United States began last autumn, when it opened a 90,000-square-foot flagship store on Fifth Avenue and then opened a large branch in 34 street, on the same street as Macy's. The opening of the two stores set off a one-month multi platform advertising campaign, highlighting the universality of Uniqlo products. The advertising campaign portrays New Yorkers in all walks of life: "Uniqlo is the constituent element of style." "," Uniqlo is definitely clothing. "," excellent Uniqlo for everyone to do. ”

Uniqlo plans to open twenty or thirty smaller outlets around its flagship stores in New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles in the next four years. The first flagship store in the U.S. West Bank, located in San Francisco, is a beautiful and spacious two-storey building, opposite to H&m's main store, two blocks away is the gap in the local flagship store. "This is a hotbed of innovation," said Yasunobu Kyogoku, US chief operating officer at Uniqlo. "He insists that it is a coincidence that near Gap and Uniqlo into the country's technology core. "It is important for us to be recognized at this point. ”

This roughly duplicates Uniqlo's model in Greater China, which is the largest market for Uniqlo outside Japan. As of July 2012, the company has 175 outlets in China, radiating outward from Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong. Unlike the American market, Uniqlo is looking at the robust economy and growing wealth of China and other emerging markets. According to the company's most recent quarterly report, 70% of international sales and 48% of overall profits come from China.

Despite this, Yanai is unable to resist the US market. In a corner of his Tokyo office, there was a big Manhattan map. It uses a Pushpin to mark the Abercrombie &fitch, Anglo Eagle, Forever, GAP, Hollister, and other direct competitor brands. There is another industry brand has been labeled: Apple. When I asked Yanai, he simply replied, "People have only one wallet." ”

It is noteworthy that Apple may be the best example of the ubiquity of individuality. "It's good to have a personality," Yanai said. But more important is for everyone. ”

The way of the store

The success or failure of Uniqlo will be determined by store sales. So, in a Wednesday afternoon in April, I arrived at No. 666 New York Avenue, the second largest Uniqlo store in the world, after the Ginza flagship store. This store is the epitome of Uniqlo-try, fail, repeat, and adjust, eventually finding a way out.

I was divided to work with Junico, looking for a specific product, and often ran into the warehouse. Juney, a senior sales officer, said: "I'm like a baby head." She is in charge of receiving the silver in the team. During her nine-month job at Uniqlo, she has risen two and received three pay increases. "For many Americans, retail is just a job to make some money." But it's different here. I don't want to say it's not mainstream, but when I first got here, I was really surprised: ' Wow, it's so tense here. ’”

Uniqlo is proud of its staff transparency. Management will share with employees and develop a sense of common responsibility. The whiteboard on the outside of the staff lounge lists sales targets: April $9.2 million-just a medium month-a little more than 150,000 dollars a day like today. (Uniqlo does not publish sales figures for the U.S. market or a store, so it's a private speculation that it probably needs 50 such large stores to reach its 2020-year revenue target.) The culture here has a shadow of Japan, but it is not dogmatic. It trains all sales specialists and asks them to hand over their credit cards and receipts to customers as a token of respect. A customer told me she appreciated these little details. "That's why I'm going to patronize again," she said. Services and clothing. ”

What surprises me most is the wide range of customer coverage. In addition to tourists-Juney also told me: "You always know when school holidays." -An accurate scan of local customers: professionals who work nearby will come over for socks and sweaters during their lunch break, grandmothers, housewives with three-year-olds, and a lot of fashionable people. A more than 50-year-old retiree came from Florida and said one of the reasons she went back to New York was to buy clothes from Uniqlo.

At nine o'clock, at the end of the day, I feel my feet ache, and every step reminds me that the last time I did retail was more than 10 years ago. When the last customer left, the music that had been filled with eardrum stopped and the shop was strangely quiet. The dozens of Uniqlo stores I visited last year-French, British, American, Singaporean, Hong Kong, Japan-are on their minds. They are alike and different. In every market, Uniqlo has turned itself into a rapidly evolving microbe, trying to infiltrate our lives.

A few months ago, when I first met Yanai, I asked him what the classic staff of Uniqlo looked like. He said without hesitation: "First of all, adaptability is strong." The lack of courage to try new things is the biggest drawback. At least even if we fail, it is solemn and stirring. At least we can say that we are brave. ”