GUCCI
GUCCI BRAND PROFILE
ABOUT GUCCI Written by Vogue Image by Tommy Ton
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It’s quite certain that when Guccio Gucci started out, he never dreamed that his small luggage company would grow to one carrying such cultural significance. But since Gucci was founded in Florence in 1921, the company has built a catalog of genuinely iconic trademarks. The interlocking GG logo; the bar-and-bit belt buckle; the bamboo-handle handbag; the omnipresent loafer—all of them have helped the brand penetrate mainstream culture like no other Italian label in history. The groundwork for the company’s epic expansion was laid under the leadership of Guccio’s eldest son, Aldo. A flamboyant businessman, he transformed the business into the accessories destination of choice for Europe’s emerging jet set. By the end of the 1960s, everyone from Queen Elizabeth II to Elizabeth Taylor was a patron. In keeping with the father-son tradition, Aldo’s son Paolo ushered in Gucci’s next great era, in the late 1960s, with the introduction of clothing. By the early ’70s, the lean silhouettes, fur-lined coats, and shiny satin lapels we think of today as Gucci hallmarks began to appear. The popularity of the brand was both a blessing and a curse. By the early ’80s, overzealous licensing had tarnished the label’s identity. Meanwhile,
vicious infighting led to the Gucci family ultimately losing control of the company in 1993. Paolo’s legacy became the basis upon which a young designer named Tom Ford decided to build his vision when he became creative director in 1994. The now infamous Tom Ford look—what he later called “sexy, sensual, fuck-me clothes”—oozed power and prestige and reminded customers viscerally of the company’s glory days. In short order, Gucci was a global player once again. The French holding company now called Kering, which had owned a portion of the label since 1999, took managerial control in 2004, to Ford’s extreme chagrin— and he departed, leaving the brand with a very big pair of alligator loafers to fill. Ford had taken the company from virtual bankruptcy to a value of $4.3 billion. Enter the relatively unassuming Frida Giannini, an accessories designer: She had been part of the Gucci design stable for nearly five years when she was awarded the top spot, overseeing menswear, womenswear, and accessories in 2006. Her roughly 10-year reign was marked by diminishing returns, and her onetime underling Alessandro Michele in turn replaced her in 2015. The reversal of Gucci’s fortunes has been nothing short of staggering.
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Gucci is one of the world's most beloved brands, known for its designs that are both innovative and timeless. Recently revived by a fresh new perspective courtesy of Creative Director Alessandro Michele, Gucci has taken center stage in the fashion world with a bold, maximalist aesthetic and must-have pieces. A lot has changed with the brand since Michele took the helm of the luxury label in 2015, yet its rich history is still mapped in the brand's iconic DNA. Are you familiar with Florentine fashion house's historic origins? Do you know why the brand's covetable mules and loafers have that metal detailing or how its famous Bamboo bag came to be? Want to find out just how you know about the brand fashion girls can't get enough of? We've assembled five facts we bet you never knew about Gucci below. It's time to test your knowledge. Written by Elyssa Goodman Image by Tommy Ton
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GUCCI OR BALENCIAGA: GUCCI ï‚« 6
Article Written by BOF Team Photography by Tommy Ton
WHICH WAS THE HOTTEST BRAND OF 2017? IN THE LATEST LYST INDEX, BOF REVEALS THE 10 HOTTEST BRANDS AND 10 TOP-SELLING PRODUCTS OF 2017 — AS WELL AS THE SECRETS BEHIND THEIR SUCCESS. 7
LONDON, United Kingdom — Gucci and Balenciaga dominated the fashion conversation in 2017, both amongst consumers and industry insiders. But which of the two Kering-owned fashion houses generated the most heat overall? After analysing data from over 70 million consumers, BoF can reveal that while Balenciaga scored big in the second half of 2017, Gucci triumphed overall, taking the top spot in the Lyst Index “Hottest Brand” ranking for 2017. In fact, more people entered the search term “Gucci” on Lyst over the course of the year than they did the generic terms “shoes” and “dresses.” Led by the power duo of creative director Alessandro Michele and chief executive Marco
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Bizzarri, the Italian behemoth consistently ranked in the top three brands every quarter of the year. But Balenciaga’s performance was still impressive. Search traffic to the brand helmed by designer Demna Gvasalia grew by 50 percent year over year, earning it the top place on Lyst’s “Hottest Brand” Index in the third and fourth quarters. But it wasn’t enough to outpace Gucci overall. So, what’s the secret to their success?
MERGING DESIGN AND MERCHANDISING Much of the conversation regarding the success of Gucci and Balenciaga has focused on the talents of their creative directors, Alessandro Michele
and Demna Gvasalia, respectively. Each has taken the strategy of using a strong and clearly identifiable design language that evolves gradually from season to season, instead of reinventing things and starting from scratch, thereby training consumers to know what to expect from the brand while still mixing things up enough to keep them interested. However, Michele and Gvasalia are only half the story. Both Balenciaga and Gucci also boast top merchandisers in their senior leadership. Jacopo Venturini joined Gucci in 2015 from Valentino where he held the role of ready-to-wear collection director and retail image coordinator. Similarly, before his appointment as chief executive of
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Guccio Gucci began his small leather goods and luggage company in Florence, Italy, in 1921. He had previously worked at the famed Savoy Hotel in London, and this experience inspired him to bring the taste of the English nobility into the goods he created.
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IN FACT,
MORE PEOPLE ENTERED THE
SEARCH TERM
“GUCCI” ON LYST OVER THE COURSE OF THE YEAR
THAN THEY DID THE GENERIC TERMS
“SHOES” AND “DRESSES.”
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Balenciaga in 2016, Cedric Charbit worked under Francesca Bellettini at Saint Laurent — first as product strategy director and later as executive vice-president of product and marketing — helping drive the house’s sales past the billion-dollar threshold for the first time in 2015. By closely linking the design and merchandising functions, the commercial products available from Gucci and Balenciaga are not just an afterthought that comes at the end of the design process, but rather a natural outcome of the collaboration that comes between a designer and a switched-on product team that knows how to commercialise his ideas. This ability to take brand heat and translate it into sales is reflected in the Lyst data for top-selling products in 2017. Together these two brands account for the top five selling products in 2017, with four products by Gucci, the label’s “bloom slides,” logoed belt and T-shirt and its “Ace” sneakers, and Balenciaga’s Speed Boot, which landed in second place overall.
GUCCI: DISCOVERABILITY AND ACCESSIBILITY In 2017, Gucci was the numberone searched-for brand on Lyst and Google globally, according to analytics released by both companies. What’s more, the brand added 8
million Instagram followers in 2017. To build a variety of takes on its core aesthetic, Gucci has also successfully cultivated relationships with creatives such as Coco Capitan, Petra Collins and Helen Downie, better known by her Instagram
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Gucci’s first big clients were, as the brand says, “horse-riding aristocrats,” and they clamored for equestrian gear. This is where the brand’s famed horse-bit detail comes from. handle Unskilled Worker, adding idiosyncratic nuances to its brand codes and communications. The brand also appointed a group of millennial advisors, aged below 30 and described as “a committee” by chief executive Marco Bizzarri — allowing it to tap the perspective of digital natives in its product and communication strategies. However, it is how naturally Michele’s maximalist aesthetic lends itself to Instagram and other digital photo-sharing apps that gives Gucci its competitive advantage. He has the highest engagement rate of any designer on the app, according to Tribe Dynamics, with his posts receiving proportionally more comments
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and likes than any other. The Roman designer’s rich, renaissance-inflected aesthetic is “Made for Instagram.” That same aesthetic fuels Gucci’s high online engagement rates. The brand achieves strong organic traction on social media channels — with products like its Princetown slippers driving a 160 percent year-overyear increase in earned media value according to Tribe Dynamics. Scrolling consumers with ever-shorter attention spans respond to the richness of Gucci translated online, giving it the
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When Italy was under a fascist dictatorship in the 1940s, leather was difficult to come by, so the company experimented with other materials like linen and burnished cane. The burnished cane bag, also known as the Bamboo bag, became so popular that it’s still produced today.
highest rate of growth of any luxury brand. But what makes Gucci’s strategy so successful commercially is the combination of its massive digital reach combined with comparatively affordable prices, enabling consumers to buy into key products. Keeping prices accessible means Gucci can reach cohorts of consumers typically unable to afford luxury products, giving it the first, third, fourth and fifth best-selling products in the ranking — all under $500, with some less than half of that price.
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BALENCIAGA: AUTHENTICITY AND EXCLUSIVITY Though Gucci beat Balenciaga by a considerable margin in both rankings, Demna Gvasalaia’s influence on the Hottest Brand ranking is still impressive, with Balenciaga and Vetements ranking second and third respectively. The Demna-effect was felt throughout 2017 thanks to the widespread adoption of Gvasalia’s engorged silhouettes and couture sensibility towards streetwear. However, his authentic connection with luxury’s youngest consumers distinguishes his output from those that emulate his work. According to the company, 65 percent of Balenciaga’s consumers are Millennials and they are responsible for 50 percent of total sales. Balenciaga was the sixth most buzzed-
about brand on Instagram (measured through comments) according to the content sharing application, even though it is not one of the top 10 most followed brands, nor is Gvasalia one the top 10 most followed designers. “The younger generation is looking for something that stands out and makes them special rather than necessarily an amazing finish that you would find with some traditional brands,” Balenciaga’s Charbit told The Financial Times earlier this year. And Gvasalia’s idiosyncratic vision has driven impressive search traffic, growing 50 percent in volume year over year, while placing two products in the Top 10 selling products of 2017: the Speed Boot and a logo tee. Consumers also typically engage with product images 15
far more than campaigns and celebrity imagery on social media. With 77,000 “likes,” the product shot of the Balenciaga Speed Boot, which sold out on numerous e-commerce sites on the first day of its release and was the number one selling product in Q3, has 10 times the engagement of its runway and campaign imagery.
WHAT WILL 2018 BRING? Though Balenciaga will likely grow at an even faster rate this year, Gucci’s pre-eminence in the Lyst Index is likely to continue in 2018. But while Alessandro Michele’s consistency has worked in Gucci’s favour to date, the house GUCCI 16
has already mined similar reference points for 12 collections. How long can it be sustained? The pendulum of consumer taste always swings. Michele and Bizzarri will need to
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The now-famous floraprint silk scarf was first made at the personal request of none other than Grace Kelly, in 1966. Gucci had artist Kris Knight reimagine the print for the Cruise 2015 collection, but its other iterations are still available.
continue to find innovative methods to maintain a sense of newness and
discovery at Gucci. Search traffic for the brand had already declined by 10 percent in H2 before the holiday season sales uptick. As Hedi Slimane and Kim Jones begin new chapters this year, competition will also be fiercer. Balenciaga is not as shackled to one particular vein of aesthetic expression, and benefits from Cristobal’s rich legacy. Interestingly however, as Gvasalia’s vision drives the Parisian house, the impact of Vetements on consumers seems to be flattening. Unless the brand’s well-received collection shown during Paris Menswear Week in January 2018 reengages consumers, a slight downward trend in search traffic to the brand may mean it exits the Top 3 brands in Q1.
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IN 2017,
Gucci loafers, with their signature horse-bit detail, were added to the collection of the Costume Institute at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York in 1985. other materials like linen and burnished cane. The burnished cane bag, also known as the Bamboo bag, became so popular that it’s still produced today.
GUCCI WAS THE NUMBER ONE SEARCHED FOR BRAND ON LYST AND GOOGLE GLOBALLY
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“FASHION IS THE MOST BEAUTFUL ILLUSION YOU CAN HAVE” GUCCI 18
- ALESSANDRO MICHELE
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DESIGNED FOR FFC403 BY TAYLOR DZIEDZIC