Clothing Brand: How To Survive Online And Offline?

Martha Marceau closes offline stores and the first "landing" online brand dies prematurely

Martha Marceau, an online brand targeting middle class white-collar people and positioned as a high-end brand, has recently closed its experience store at the World Trade Plaza, which is also the only offline physical store of Martha Marceau and was once the focus of Martha Marceau's promotion.

When the first physical store of Martha Marceau was officially opened last May, as a domestic online clothing brand, it entered the traditional clothing sales industry for the first time, which caused quite a shock in the industry. Various media have followed and reported that it once positioned itself as "first-class member image design service", which is called the first service precedent for customer image positioning diagnosis and professional shopping guidance.

Even though there is an activity of delivering goods to your home for free, online shopping clothing There is always a disadvantage that it is not as intuitive and convenient as choosing clothes in physical stores, and can not feel the physical goods. This disadvantage not only directly leads to the loss of those who believe more in traditional consumers, but also some consumers hesitate to shop online due to various accidental situations.

The establishment of physical stores not only meets the needs of some consumers for sensory awareness of products, but also can convey their own brand concept and product quality to consumers in a more direct way, so as to truly achieve the ideal e-commerce shopping mode of offline experience, online purchase, or direct offline purchase.

As the first person who dares to move from online to "reality" Network clothing Sun Hong, general manager of Martha Marceau, believes that such a decision is because the development of the enterprise needs the support of physical stores, and Martha Marceau is ready for this. "The purpose of opening physical stores is to make up for the lack of online experience of users and improve the repeat purchase rate," said Sun Hong.

Although full preparations have been made, it is the first time for online clothing brands to open physical stores in China. Martha Marceau's cross-border business has not been as smooth as expected. Destiny did not favor this e-commerce enterprise that bravely took the first step. Martha Marceau's physical store in Beijing World Trade Tianjie was closed after the Spring Festival in 2012.

Sun Hong said that the establishment of this physical store was originally given the function of consumer experience, but after two years of operation, it is now difficult to be competent for this function, and its operation no longer matches the strategic direction of the enterprise itself, so it was closed.

Mei Shan, vice president of Martha Marceau, said that Martha Marceau closed the experience store because he hoped to focus on the online business this year. In the past, the role of offline experience stores was to cooperate with online sales and provide consumers with more humanistic services. She also revealed the possibility of opening an experience store at another address. She said that Martha Marceau would not rule out opening another experience store in the future, and would choose those business circles that match the brand positioning and have a high overlap with the target consumer group.

Online brands are trying to "go offline"

The road is rugged and the future is bright

Yibang Power Research Center has investigated the distribution of offline stores of e-commerce brands. Among some well-known e-commerce brands, about half of them still have no offline stores, and some of them even cut off offline stores.

Among the 10 e-commerce brands surveyed, Mombasa, Martha Marceau Macaulin Lanmuo, Diamond Bird and Kelan Diamond have physical stores, while Macaulin has a large number of physical stores for other e-commerce brands due to the large traditional access roads. Mombasa has 19 physical stores, Kelan Diamond has 23 physical stores, Diamond Bird has 11 physical stores, and Lanmuo and Martha Marceau have fewer physical stores, 3 and 1 respectively. In the statistics of physical stores, the self run stores and franchise stores of the brand are basically covered, and some large-scale physical counters are also included. In terms of the geographical distribution of physical stores, enterprises basically spread and lay around a certain area from point to surface, or mainly lay down the first and second tier cities in China. (As of February 2012, the above statistics show that the statistical enterprises are mainly brand independent B2C, and many "Taobao brands" that have grown up from Taobao are not included.)

The debate over whether online clothing brands should open offline stores originated from the widespread rumors in the market that Vancl, a clothing B2C enterprise, would open offline stores. Previously, McCullin announced the omni channel coverage strategy to open 400 physical stores. In addition, Martha Marceau opened an experience store in the world trade, From a comprehensive perspective, the industry has begun to issue the voice of "online brands competing to open offline stores and counter invading traditional brand territory".

As a domestic American casual men's wear brand on Taobao, Spotica officially received Lenovo's round A investment on March 26, 2011.

Therefore, Spotika proposed the brand expansion strategy of "developing entity chain from online to offline"; Taobao.com Taotianxia brand "Shanghai Impression Chinese Style" cheongsam and Tang style women's clothing store also planned to be launched in the second half of 2011 in Shanghai's business circle; In 2010, Maibaobao set up its first exhibition store in its Zhejiang base. According to Fang Tianyu, the deputy general manager of Maibaobao, this kind of exhibition store will be set up in various places in the future.

The brand influence and brand image of these online clothing brands are formed in the network, and their rapid development is beyond the reach of any traditional clothing enterprise. Most of the offline stores opened are also for online sales and services, such as solving the lack of online sales consumption experience, generating interactive marketing, maintaining brand image, etc, None of them is to compete with traditional enterprises or expand traditional channels and make money.

Cao Lei, director of China E-Commerce Research Center, said that the interactive marketing model of "online+offline" is a development trend for both online brands and traditional brands. This model has already appeared in some developed countries.

Nau, a sports fashion brand, introduced the business model of combining online and offline into the fashion industry for the first time. Nau has opened stores in seven major cities in the United States, where customers can try on clothes and then either buy them immediately or register in the store and order online. If buyers choose to order online, they can enjoy free delivery and 10% discount.

Whether online clothing brands are suitable for opening physical stores or not cannot be concluded because of the closure of an experience store in Martha Marceau. Each has its own choice, and the decisive factor is the positioning and development strategy of the enterprise.

At least Martha Marceau bravely stepped out of this step. For the whole Chinese clothing industry, it seems more necessary to summarize the experience from this brave attempt to better realize cross-border business in the industry.