Mission Statement Ezra
Inedited itself is a huge fashion retailer company which owns 8 brands namely Ezra, Pull &Bear, Misaims Duty, Berserk, Strabismus, Shoo, Ezra Home and last but not the least Torque (Inedited, 2014). Manioc Ortega is the founder of Inedited, which was established in 1963 (Inedited, 2014). Manioc Ortega adapted a unique business model, which was innovative and flexible. This made Inedited one of the biggest retailers in the world. In 1975 Inedited established Sara’s first store in downtown A Corona, Spain (Inedited, 2014). Ezra offers fashionable designs for men, women, and kids.
They also sell accessories to complete their product lines. Mission Statement Ezra states that Its Nilsson Is that “Through Sara’s business model, we alma to contribute to the sustainable development of society and that of the environment tit which we interacts” (Ezra, 2014). Their mission statement clearly and firmly emphasizes their purpose, which is to be an environmental-friendly company and contribute to society development. The mission statement, combined with its corporate culture, produces a positive organizational climate for achieving their objectives.
Ezra as a determined company, with the purposes of being a fast fashion company that concern its environmental-friendliness, combined with their long-term objectives that are derived from their mission statement, create somewhat a clear tankard of their cost, time, and performance assessment, and it has been working well so far.
They like to follow the trends that the western culture currently has and adapt those trends in their country.
In the fast-fashion industry, an excellent team of designers is crucial to ensure they meet the need to change products every 2 weeks. Ezra also strives to have a good reputation of being an echo- roundly company, but since most consumers do not care about the echo-friendly issue, the weight of this opportunity is not that high. The most important fact for Ezra is international recognition because this is the key for a successful expansion.
One of the biggest threats to Ezra is fierce competition because of new and affordable products from different stores such as H and Forever 21 . This may harm Ezra in terms of consumers’ loyalty. Ezra has also faced a lawsuit due to sweatshops, but due to the cases not being highly publicized and because the company has created a ointment to stop the practice of sweatshops in every factory; this is not much of a threat (Alexander, 2013).
Imitation of goods is a risk of Sara’s, either by their competitors or by counterfeiting.
Since Ezra targets the middle-upper class and customers are brand loyal, this is not much of a concern. Ezra must ensure to implement strategies to increase brand equity. Based on the FEE Matrix result, we see that Ezra has a score of 3. 45 which indicates a strong response from Ezra towards the opportunities and anticipation of threats. INTERNAL ASSESSMENT The Internal Factor Evaluation (FIFE) Matrix Key Internal Factors Weight Strengths Global Outreach 0.
08 0. 24 Strategic Location Distribution Strategy 0. 12 0. 48 Store Image Fast Changing collection 0. 09 0.
36 Responsive Employees 0. 3 Brand Image 0. 15 0. 6 Weaknesses Limited Stocks 0. 16 Price Brand image closely tagged to competitors Lack of Marketing Total STRENGTHS Inedited, as the head company, expands Ezra in a large amount of scale.
Currently they have more than 2,000 stores in exactly 88 countries around the world (Indexed, 2014). This condition is one of a good strength that Ezra has because as an international brand company, especially in apparel industry, Ezra should reach every part of the world. In addition, reaching global market is a foundation to step for an international brand to dominate the industry.
Ezra chooses where to locate their stores carefully because they are aiming for a direct communication strategy to promote their products. They have a unique approach in locating their store in each countries, and even cities. Consumers will like it if they can find good products available at their beloved shopping centers.
In the distribution system, Ezra controls cost of the supply chain and distribution of its products from the headquarters. 50% of the products are produced in Spain, 26% in the rest of Europe, and the rest 24% percent is outsourced in Asia and Africa (Somewhat ; Noon, 2012).
The products are transferred to Sara’s distribution centers located in Spain to be exported to Sara’s stores around the world. Sara’s distribution strategy is vertically integrated (Somewhat & Noon, 2012). This requires a high concentration and control form the headquarters in Spain, and that is exactly what Inedited does.
Since the distribution tragedy is integrated, combined with their high technology, the products can be distributed globally in Just a short amount of time. This is the uniqueness of Ezra.
They are able to adapt to the latest trend in limited time, using the Hybrid Communication system, then produce those latest trend with available materials to cut production time and cost, and after that the products are immediately transferred to all the stores. Ezra is a trendy yet exclusive fashion store. This is the image of Ezra from around the world.
A unique concept of fast fashion might become a trendsetter in international fashion industry. A good store image also drives people to consider Ezra when they want to purchase fashion items. In addition, their excellent customer in-store services result a loyal behavior from consumers.
The fast changing product collection is one the specialties and uniqueness of Ezra. Every 2 weeks Ezra publishes brand new fashion items (Somewhat & Noon, 2012). This strategy exists to stimulate and refresh consumer’s curiosity about Sara’s products.
This is also the strategy to strengthen the image of Ezra as the designer teams always work to find out what the new designs should be. The aim is to be the trendsetter of fashion business. Employees’ presence is important inside the store to control, rearrange items, and also to give information to the customers.
Therefore Ezra is also concerned about Employees’ responsiveness, especially because they claim to have direct communication as their prominent marketing strategy (Somewhat & Noon, 2012). Customer control and satisfaction sometimes depend on the service and Ezra want to optimize those satisfactions in order to get the customers’ loyalty. On the other hand, sometimes consumers do not really care about the customer service.
Sometimes they care only about the product and price. The rand of Ezra is famous for their exclusivity and trendy product. Ezra would never strong brand image is admitted around the world.
This is what helps Ezra to keep improving and reach the sustainability. WEAKNESSES Even though Ezra has a fast fashion concept, which is publishing new items every 2 weeks, many of the items are limited.
So for some items, they might not be available in every store. Even though this is actually intentional, for consumers, this can be included as a weakness as some customers will not be satisfied if they did not get the item that they want when they want it and where they want it. In its country of origin, Ezra is categorized as a low-end product.
However, Ezra is included in a high- end product in Indonesia and in many other countries. This is one of the weaknesses for Ezra as the customer will think twice to purchase if price is a big consideration for them.
This problem occurs mostly in developing countries, where the GAP per capita is still relatively low. As mentioned earlier, the problem in apparel industry is that it is very easy to copy each other’s designs. This weakness is one of the toughest to deal with. Beside Ezra, there are a lot of other brands that reach the international market hat also build an exclusive image for them self.
Therefore sometimes the public cannot differentiate a product from Ezra and their competitors. In other words, it is going to be easy for them to switch from one brand to another.
Moreover, this will affect people’s Judgment that all the brands that in the same level as Ezra is actually the same or similar in term of types and products, or in other words, no clear differentiation between those brands. As a player in this industry, Ezra needs to obtain consumer loyalty. Sara’s lack of marketing such as promotion and advertisement is a weakness. They only depend on the strong brand image that they already have.
This can be a tough weakness if the competitors keep on increasing their marketing strategy, especially in emerging countries. From all the strengths and weaknesses we come out with the result of 2.
35. This is an average result from a perfect score of 4. So it can be concluded that their effectiveness in utilizing their strengths to cover the weaknesses is satisfactory enough. STRATEGY ANALYSIS AND CHOICE The SOOT Analysts Opportunities SO Strategies WOO Strategies Increasing middle class in Asia Open new stores in developing countries in Asia (SSL, 01)
Charge products at competitive price in Asian countries’ standards (WWW, 01) Opportunity to build distribution center in developing countries to lower costs Build distribution centers in Asia to lower distribution costs for Asian countries (SO, 02) Produce a signature collection (WWW, 03) Cooperation with new designers Be the trendsetter (SO, 03) Enhance the current brand image and company’s image (WWW, 04, 05) Rising environmental issues Promote the company’s vision to be an echo-friendly company (SO, 04) International Recognition Threats SST Strategies WET Strategies Fierce Competition
Expand in new market and be the first player in the market (SSL, SO, T 1) Increase spending for marketing campaign (WWW, T 1) Lawsuit related to sweatshops Produce the new trends with higher turnover (SO, TO) Enhance Sara’s differentiation through its unique designs (WWW, TO) Possible imitations of goods Increase the brand equity through better service (SO, SO, TO) Dilution of Brand Equity the existing opportunities matched with their strengths. Many companies pursue the other three strategies first in order to be able to apply the SO strategies.
As for Ezra, they are already in the position which enables them to apply those SO strategies even their current weaknesses and threats. Currently Ezra has already opened new stores in Asia, they are also transforming into the trend-setter instead of trend- follower through its major cooperation with many designers. In addition, Ezra has promoted their echo-friendly campaign through the company’s vision and mission that is applied all the day down to the retail stores.
For example, Ezra sells t-shirts that are made from organic cotton which considered environmental friendly. Unfortunately, they currently do not have any intention to open a new distribution center in any Asian country Just yet.
However, they already have their purchasing office in Hong Kong and they are maximizing the use of this office to boost sales in the Asian region (Somewhat ; Noon, 2012). They have also invested a large amount of money in advertising to make them a much stronger competitor.
CONCLUSION One of the competitive advantages that Ezra has and its competitor lack are customer-responsiveness. Even though Ezra does not have many investments in Marketing, Ezra relies on the most important aspect of the business, the customer. They focus on their customer, listen to what their customers have to say, obtain their moments and feedbacks, and then use that information to evaluate the next production, by producing based on the information given.
Consequently, the results will be gratifying for the consumers.
Next competitive advantage that Ezra has is its business operation. Sara’s overall business operations, including the design process, production process, and the distribution process, all are so sophisticated that it enables Ezra becomes the forefront in the industry. Because Ezra will be the first one to place a certain design in the store, the customers will tend to make Ezra their first hooch in shopping or browsing for clothes.
