BRAND MARKETING AUDIT EBANY TASKER
Pages 1 - Executive Summary Pages 2 - 3 - Brand History Pages 4 - 5 - Brand Equity Page 6 - Marketing Mix Page 7 - BCG Matrix
CONTENTS
Page 8 - Consumer Segmentation Page 9 - Customer Profile Pages 10 - 11 - Competitor Analysis Page 12 - Economic Factors Page 13 - SWOT Analysis Pages 14 - 15 - Recommendations Pages 16 - 17 - Bibliography
Executive Summary Throughout my brand marketing audit about one of the biggest brands in the world, Louis Vuitton, I will be collecting valuable research to discover the brands background history, brand equity and visual Identity, Marketing Mix, Consumer Segmentation, Competitor Analysis, Micro and Macro economic factors and SWOT Analysis.
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Brand History Louis Vuitton Malletier, more commonly known as Louis Vuitton is a popular French fashion house. Over 150 years ago, Louis Vuitton was founded in 1854 by Louis Vuitton, it is one of the most luxury brands in the world. The story of this prodigious brand goes back to when a thirteen year old left home to earn his living in Paris, France. Two years after travelling on foot, he began his apprentice as a trunk-master at the age of sixteen after being taken on by Monsieur Marechal. Louis ‘’quickly became a valued craftsman” (Vuitton, 2018) and his career in an artisanal industry took off. 17 years later, Louis got married and opened his own company. Immediate success came upon him once he started advertising ‘Louis Vuitton’. Sudden popularity grew and he was known for his high innovations throughout his work, “It might be cliché but it’s true that Louis Vuitton himself was totally innovative”. (Ghesquière, 2014) in 1858, he first introduced the ‘Slat trunk’ a famous design that is still used to this day. A few years later, a new workshop was established in Asnieres sur Sein which became his family home.
son, Georges. By this time, the brand was the worlds biggest and popular store, soon becoming a registered trademark. Until then, it conquered the world over its unique designs. Initially, Vuitton was (and still is) well known for its luggage and handbags with the luxurious and recognisable monogram print including the LV logo, quatrefoils and flowers inspired by Japanese and oriental designs of the Victorian era. Thanks to Georges, this was successful in fighting to prevent the counterfeits in 1892. Since the founding of the brand, the initial product offer of Louis Vuitton has expanded to shoes, ready-to-wear, jewellery, accessories and fragrances.
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In 1892, Louis passed away and the company was taken over by his
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BRAND EQUITY Brand as a product -
Brand as a symbol -
Brand as a person -
The brand Louis Vuitton offers a wide range of products for both men and women. These vary from frangrance, ready-towear, accessories, luxury bags and luggage. The Damier Canvas is the signature product of the brand. The design was the result of the creative spark that shined between Louis vuitton and his son Georges, who invented the canvas in 1888. Nearly a century later, the icon pattern was reintroduced as the “Damier Ebene� and has proven to be one of the biggest successes of Louis vuitton. Coated canvas is used for the designer bags, printed in the monogram. This material has been a signature material used by the brand for its high quality luggage and handbag ranges
In 1896, Louis vuittons son Georges created the interlocking L and V forming the monogram that belongs to Lous Vuitton. He came up with the monogram adorned with a floral pattern. Since then, the emblem has become widely recognised as a status symbol.
Louis Vuitton has a high clientel creating solid brand relationships. I found that 67% of my responders in my Questionare would purchase a bag over any other product. Furthermore I also found that a lot of them think the brand is very expensive and feel that there are too many counterfeits around, putting them off buying the product. As Louis vuitton is a luxury brand, they cater towards a higher working class who can afford their luxurious goods.
The black and white colour scheme of the emblem is a pure example of classic simplicity and elegance, however is has been given colour in previous collaborations, these colours range from gold and browns to a rainbow colour scheme, giving the monogram in several different colours within a single visual contexts.
The brand strives to create products that allow them to be helpful to consumers as they prefer brands that enhance their self concepts.
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PRIMARY RESEARCH 5
Marketing Mix Price -
Promotion -
Product -
Place -
Louis Vuitton uses esteem based evaluating in its advertising blend for its products. Since clients see the organisation’s items as high esteem items, the clients will pay the amount. Louis Vuitton pays extraordinary regard for the nature of the material, the plans and make of the items. The cost of the items in the end goes high. Since the objective clients of the brand are tip top and upper working class clients, Louis Vuitton uses premium evaluating approach to value its items. The brand and its item are a style explanation and clients effortlessly pay the excessive prices. Furthermore, the company does not believe in cutting the cost or off shoring production to countries such as China where the labor cost is cheaper. Louis Vuitton places its significance on the value of the products, not price. Each of these elements make up the brand cachet and make the brand the well known luxury brand in the world.
Being the company of Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy group (LVMH) Louis Vuitton has a well known reputation. The budget for marketing campaigns keeps increasing rapidly in order to maintain the prestige image of the brand. Louis Vuitton employs famous celebrities to feature in their campaigns, some of these personalities are Kate Moss, Jenifer Lopes and Jayden Smith. By being a luxury brand, celebrities create a better emotional connect with Louis Vuitton. Furthermore, the company uses high quality print advertising in high fashion magazines such as Vogue. Also, the use billboards in major cities. The exclusiveness of the Brand is portrayed through fashion magazines that the elite class reads. Louis Vuitton does not use television as a medium of promotion primarily because it chooses to remain as a luxury brand and there by wants to be seen by a certain class of people. It reaches out at its target audience directly rather than using multiple channels. Hence, this covers the Louis Vuitton marketing mix.
As a luxury brand, Louis Vuitton sells the finest products. It make 100% leather products and pays extreme care to not let the designs of the products to be easily counterfeited. Louis Vuitton has always chosen to offer something totally different, to only make handmade products of good quality and attention to detail. Since being founded in the 19th century, manufacture of the brand has always aimed for perfection, hiring the finest craftsmen to ensure the product is completely unique. Products such as the luggage and bags are made out of high class fabrics and materials to ensure durability. The idea of high quality is placed at heart of Louis Vuitton marketing strategy, prompting its consumers to insist on the brand or nothing.
Louis Vuitton sell most of its merchandise through its own stores. Bags from the brand are only offered through limited distribution channels, its own stores around the world and a series of high end departmental stores. The company believes in having their own stores, which allows the control over product quality and pricing. With a total of 450 stores located at prime venues in major cities, Louis Vuitton has total control over their distribution channel which can provide the perfect buying experience to customers and to add to that, prevent counterfeit products.
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cash cows
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BCG Matrix
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CONSUMER SEGMENTATION
Louis Vuitton segments the market demographically based on the consumers age, gender, income, occupation and social class. Their target marking consists of individuals who have a higher income, as the higher the income, the higher the propensity to purchase luxury goods. Consumers are posited to take action and buy products in order to follow the ideas consistent with their ideal-self image. Also, products can be purchased for personal use or just as a gift. Therefore for this segmentation, the targeted clients of Louis Vuitton are both sex, aged 25-50 years old who earn an yearly income between 50,000 and 200,000. Louis Vuitton uses psychographic segmentations such as lifestyle to further identify their target market. For example, they aim to target jet setters, trendsetters and consumers who pressure in prestige.
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TRAVEL
CUSTOMER PROFILE
WEALTH
UPPER CLASS
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Hermes and Gucci are just two of the competitor brands of Louis Vuitton. Both of these brands have been listed as the top three luxury fashion brands along with Louis Vuitton.
HERMES Hermes is a fashion brand that is renowned for its apparel, quality luggage and accessories. It started out as a manufacturer for premium leather harnesses for horse carriages. Now, Hermes has developed into a luxury goods manufacturer with nearly 15 categories of products. Some of these being men and women apparel, watches, footwear, stationary and perfume. The company has 315 stores around the world and is still majority owned by its founder, Thierry Hermes. The company strives on family ownership and high quality craftsmanship. After more than 170 years of history, Hermes has earned a reputation for offering superb designer fashion products to cater for the rich and the premium segment of the market. It is also renowned for its creation of unique customised products. Their skilled designers and craftsmen will put their full effort into these customised products to fulfil customer requests. Even though these orders are pricey, just like Louis Vuitton, customers are willing to pay for the unique limited edition product no body else will have. The brand targets a significantly different set of consumers, these being men and women ranging from young adult to seniors with a income of 5,000 or above per month, as well as high net worth individuals who earn up to 1 million. Typically, the target consumer of Hermes has a keen eye for fashion and trends, will not say no to paying 10,000 for a customised suitcase or any other luxury item, they will always be willing to pay for something that exudes class and quality.
GUCCI Gucci is one of the worlds leading fashion brands founded by Gucci Gucci in 1921. It is recognisable for its icons heritage; the green and red stripe. For the past nine decades, the brand has been focusing on the quality of its products and has seen growth in 2012 with a 30 percent jump with its online sales and a increase of 15 percent in China. Gucci has over 370 stores directly operated as a strategy to control its distribution processes as well as ensuring its consistency of the value of the brand. Aldo Gucci quoted, “Quality is remembered long after the price is forgotten� showing that Gucci emphasises on quality of its products. All of Guccis products are manufactured in Italy which has become a symbol of elegance, desirability and sophistication, enabling Gucci to become one of the worlds most desirable luxury fashion brands. The target market of Gucci is again similar to Louis Vuitton and Hermes. Gucci target both men and women of the upper class. Furthermore, they cater for individuals who seek for quality products. Gucci offers personalisation and made-to-measure services which is great for consumers who are willing to pay for the product. Unlike other brands in the fashion industry, Gucci puts great emphasis on its product line for kids. It targets parents who want to be fashionable and seen carrying a Gucci product even with their child. Products such as a Gucci diaper bag and baby carrier are included in the products.
Louis Vuitton, Gucci and Hermes are all similar in their target segment, targeting customers who seek for status and quality, however each brand differentiates themselves with the core values and promotion tactics.
COMPETITORS Unlike Hermes and gucci, Louis Vuitton has a very exclusive distribution channel which protects the brand identity and image. It only sells a range of selected products online. As well as that, Louis Vuitton does not believe in having sales or giving discounts. This is a form of assurance that the value of a product from Louis Vuitton will always remain close to market values. Furthermore, it maintains the exclusivity of each product to maintain customers satisfaction. 10
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ECONOMIC FACTORS Political Factors: The fashion industry faces problems regarding the import duties when operating internationally. Countries such as china suffer from high import duties which is causing customers to purchase luxury items overseas to take advantage of the enormous price difference. As well as that, outside of Europe and the United States there are 33% of regions involved in the luxury goods market, which means government stability is heavily dependents in this industry (Marshall, 2018). Furthermore, the ownership of business enterprises by the government, the goods and services that the government can provide, the degrees to which any government can recommend subsidies to the company and its precedence in regard to supporting the business along with the effects of the policies and decisions on other areas governed by the government can affect the operations of the company (Istudyhub.net, 2018).
Economic Factors:Â The main economic factor that may affect Louis Vuitton is the tax rates being placed on luxury goods. This is impacting the regions without a reputation in luxurious goods so countries such as Indonesia have scraped this taxation policy to be able to boost consumption. In terms of the brand Louis Vuitton, a potential price gap may cause uncon-
trollable issues. Social Factors: The luxury industry has assorted services such as luxury travel experiences displaying one of the most contributing social factor in the fashion industry is the shift change in customer preference. Organisations such as Louis Vuitton face issues shifting to consumer preferences as they can achieve luxury status by their lifestyle and experiences. Technological Factors: The present times having significant advancements in the field of technology, countries that are technologically advanced would have lower costs of conducting business, remarkable quality of products and a self-effacing surrounding of more improvements that benefits both the company and the consumers. Louis Vuitton requires understanding of the market well before initiating its business in order to appropriate the technological advancement successfully. Environmental Factors: These contain the regular variables like changes in the climate and atmosphere. Normal catastrophes, for example, surges, dry spells and quakes may affect any nation and this the organisations in that
nation as well. The temperatures and the natural approaches in any nation may influence the requests of a few items, especially items related with form. Louis Vuitton needs to fathom all the natural factors in any market and their conceivable consequences for the organisation. Legal Factors:Â Louis Vuitton has turned out to be a standout amongst the most counterfeited fashion brands in the world. In light of its high cost and lavish item, individuals can not afford to buy it. In the current years, almost certainly there are various items bearing LV initials in the roads everywhere throughout the world, however just a little level of these items are honest to goodness. There has been an ascent in forging extravagance items in light of the fact that various assembling has been moved to nations with poor protected innovation rights and with the open door gave to those nations by innovation. The organisation has taken different activities to battle against fake yet there are as yet various fakes out there. Along these lines, to prevent this from happening, the organisation has setup a group of individuals mindful completely on hostile to falsifying with the assistance of exceptional examination offices and legal advisors.
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Strengths
Weaknesses
- It is one of the oldest fashion houses with more than 150 years of history - The brand is easily recognisable because of the logo and monogram canvas on most of its products - The brand has its presence in most of the large shopping places and multi-retail brands of the world - Louis Vuitton is available exclusively in more than 450 stores in 50+ countries It makes custom tailored products for its few elite customers - The brand has a clientele including celebrities Extremely high brand recall and global presence - Advertising and marketing using celebs like sports stars, film stars are effective
- immense competition in the segment makes market share growth for Louis Vuitton slow - Far imitations affects brand reputation and hurt sales - High price points for products - Low profit margin of watch and jewellery section - Limited customer base - Limited retail market
Opportunities
Threats
- The company needs to adopt the current fashion trends to stay in business - Louis Vuitton can engage customer via online and increase business through commerce platforms - Expansion of the brand into emerging economies targeting rich people with affluent lifestyles - Tie-ups with leading hotel chains, fashion houses, lifestyle events etc can boost business for the brand - Revamping the brand image
- Counterfeit products all around the world affect the business - Economic crisis and recession can adversely affect Louis Vuittons business - Government policies on international trade can slowdown operations - wIncreasing competitor activity can lead to decline of sales.
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RECOMMENDATIONS
Even though Louis Vuitton is a successful brand, they do not provide a high custom satisfaction. By improving their customer in-store service, customers will feel more invited and welcomed. The loyalty enhancement for a branding strategy is the most important attribute to customers making purchases from their store. Focusing on improving sales performances will enhance a repeat of purchase.
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Figure 1 and 2 - CEO | Fashion Companies | SuccessStory. [online] Available at: https://successstory.com/companies/louis-vuitton [Accessed 1 Feb. 2018]. Figure 3 - Conlon,Founded,Founder,L. and Guide,S. (2018). Louis Vuitton 2017 Spring / Summer Campaign. [online] Fashion Gone Rogue. Available at: https://www.fashiongonerogue.com/louis-vuitton-spring2017-campaign/ [Accessed 1 Feb. 2018].,S. (2018). Figure 5 -Louis Vuitton Pops Up With Supreme. [online] Vogue. co.uk. Available at: http://www.vogue.co.uk/article/louis-vuittonsupreme-pop-up-london-the-strand?utm_medium=Email&utm_ source=Vogue%20Daily&utm_campaign=Vogue%20Daily_2017-0630&utm_content=Why%20You%20Should%20Care%20About%20 Irish%20Abortion%20Law [Accessed 1 Feb. 2018].
IMAGES
Figure 6 - F.TAPE | The Online Fashion Resource. (2018). Louis Vuitton SS13 Mens Campaign | FTAPE.COM - FASHION TAPE. [online] Available at: http://ftape.com/media/louis-vuitton-ss13-mens-campaign/ [Accessed 1 Feb. 2018]. Figure 7 - In,designboom | architecture & design magazine. (2018). jun aoki’s tokyo louis vuitton store features patterned façades. [online] Available at: https://www.designboom.com/architecture/jun-aoki-louisvuitton-matsuya-ginza-japan-09-12-2014/?utm_campaign=daily&utm_ medium=e-mail&utm_source=subscribers [Accessed 1 Feb. 2018]. Figure 4 - Mail Online. (2018). Kourtney Kardashian shows off taut tummy in all-black ensemble in LA. [online] Available at: http://www. dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-4582626/Kourtney-Kardashian-shows-taut-tummy-black-ensemble.html?ito=pinterest_sharefff#http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2017/06/07/22/41361E3E000005780-image-a-29_1496871059336.jpg [Accessed 1 Feb. 2018].
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