A REVIEW OF JAPAN’S CLOTHING BRAND UNIQLO ENTERING IN INDIA AND ITS STRATEGIES IN PARTNERSHIP WITH ARVIND

1. Student of Masters of Fashion Technology, National Institute of Fashion Technology. 2. Assistant Professor and CIC, Department of Fashion Design, National Institute of Fashion Technology. ...................................................................................................................... Manuscript Info Abstract ......................... ........................................................................ Manuscript History Received: 23 November 2019 Final Accepted: 25 December 2019 Published: January 2020


Brief of Fast Fashion:
Costumers are reluctant to spend on discretionary items and when they do, they expect fashion, quality, and low cost item. When a design move from catwalk to store in the fastest time it has been termed as fast fashion by fashion retailers. Internet, globalization and technological innovation, fast fashion operates on a far faster product turnover cycle than traditional models. (Brand & Assouly, 2013) Image-1:-Fast Fashion Segmentation (Brand & Assouly, 2013).

Vision of Uniqlo:
"Uniqlo has a clear vision that inspires the world to dress casual". The corporate strategy helped Uniqlo so far is to totally ignore fashion.it does not chase the fast fashion trends like other competitors. The brand has the philosophy of "Made for All". Even after facing a challenging situation the perception of people change after the launch of 3-storey in iconic Harajuku in central Tokyo in 1998.The perception instantly shifted from being cheap and low quality, to being affordable but high-quality. Today, Uniqlo is wholly owned subsidiary of fast Retailing Company Limited and it is known for providing high-quality private-label casualwear at reasonable price. As at January 2018, the brand has grown to more than 13, 00 stores worldwide. Brand value according to Forbes Uniqlo have brand value of USD 7billion and is 91 st on the list of the World"s most Valuable Brand. (Zhenxiang, 2011)

Uniqlo Brand Strategy:
Uniqlo is a modern Japanese company that inspires the world to dress casual. The corporate strategy that has worked for Uniqlo is to "Totally ignore fashion" instead of chasing fast fashion trend. Some of the key brand success factors for Uniqlo include the following: Delivery system supporting a clear brand promises two of the biggest challenge for any brand is to define a clear brand promise and to effective delivery on all point of customer.

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Product development approach and efficient supply chain: Tadashi Yani often fond of calling Uniqlo as "Uniqlo is not a fashion company, it"s a technology company". To compete with the leading fast fashion brand like Zara, Uniqlo takes exact opposite approach, planning production of its wardrobe essentials up to a year in advance.
High dedication to innovation: Uniqlo is known for its fabric innovations. One of the signature innovation of Uniqlo is HeatTech, a fabric developed in conjunction with a Japanese chemical company named Toray. The HeatTech fabric is thin, comfortable which has enabled the brand for creating stylish design. Other such fabric is AIRism (a soft fabric with quick-drying inner fabric), Lifewear (a blend between casual and sportswear), UV Cut (Material designed to prevent 90% of ultraviolet rays from reaching the wearer). (Zhenxiang, 2011).

Uniqlo Global Sustainability Approach:
With the growing economy sustainability has been burning topic in business. One of the 23 Management Principles of Tadashi Yanai is to contribute back to society. Uniqlo"s approach towards sustainability compromises of 4 pillars: 1. Production: To enable factories to operate a safe and fair workplace through improving working conditions, safety and wages. 2. Environment: To use best practice tools, industry collaboration and consumer engagement to minimize the company"s environmental footprint specifically in chemicals, emissions and water usage. 3. People: Implementation of policies and programs to create a fair and ethical work culture, focusing on work-life balance, job satisfaction, talent recruitment and retention. 4. Community: Social effort has been taken into account to leverage financial and human capital.

Key Issues:-
The online retailing is 4 % of sales. The product size is inconsistent between Asian and U.S. America.

GAP:
1. Pioneered SPA model (allows for direct visibility of sales data). 2. Continued growth and expansion plans for china.

Arvind Fashions:
Arvind Fashions is a subsidiary of Arvind Mills, is an important player in the Indian branded apparel industry. Arvind group with an array of International brands like Lee, Arrow, Tommy Hilfiger, Wrangler and domestic brands like Newport, Flying machine. Started in 1931, company had installed state of the art machinery imported from England to produce high quality fabric. Arvind have contributed 14% to industrial production, 4% to India"s GDP and constitutes 13% of the country"s export earnings. (Cheng & Choi, 2010).

Strengths:
1. Vast textile production capacity. 2. Large pool of skilled and cheap work force. 3. Flexible textile manufacturing systems.
Arvind Lifestyle Brands Limited (ALBL), renowned for retailing both in-house and licensed international brands. They are called fashion powerhouse. They are: 1. A global leader in apparel manufacturing that is also transforming water management. 2. A denim pioneer that is a trailblazer in advanced materials. 3. A wearable technology manufacturer that is also delivering state-of-the-art engineering solutions.
Arvind has started innovation in fiber to sustainability in fashion. Arvind is powering high-fashion brands across the world, while delivering unmatched excellence across the garment value chain. They are pioneering tech with wearable garment fabric for fast fashion retailers. They are using sustainable yarns for future immense possibilities. They have been bringing wide range of fashion brands of different categories. Arvind Lifestyle Limited fuels the aspiration of modern India. Arvind have "Future Ready" portfolio of global brands working in segment ranging from Bridge to Luxury, premium, and premium value.

Growth Strategies:
As of 2005, Arvind with set of brands was in a comfortable position. Most of its brands had high recall value and enjoyed a fair share of loyalty. From the perspective of its parent company, Arvind Mills, which produced 110 million meters of denim every year, the garment division, i.e. Arvind IS the future growth engine.

Competitors of Arvind:
1. Raymond 2. Bombay Dyeing 3. Welspun 4. Aditya Birla Grasim 5. Madura Garment Fashion Possibilities: Innovation-Possibilities of paper to fabric in future. Another masterpieces of Arvind is the Travelers Shirt. A boon for the modern-day, jet-setting lifestyle, this shirt requires miniscule maintenance due to its wrinkle-free properties and comes with anti-microbial properties that reduce bad odor. This shirt also provides protection from UV rays and is stain repellent.

Sustainability:
The proverb, well begun is half done, is apt when it comes to sustainability. Arvind believe that sustainability when systematically embedded at the source gets cascaded throughout the production line and the value chain. They 357 adopted input management as a preferable approach. They are using six core inputs that are truly material and form the foundation of business. They focus on managing, enriching and getting these inputs fundamentally right and thereby making our business sustainably sound. (Arvind | fashioning possibilities. (2017, August 16).

Arvind Denim Lab:
1. It is a unique facility of its kind in Asia, which enables brand design teams to leverage all infrastructure and capabilities under one roof, to co-create their signature products and finishes. Further, it has partnership with Denim City, Amsterdam gives its customers access to the cutting edge developments in the world of Denim. 2. Innovation and Sustainability are a way of life at Arvind Denim, and a large number of global rewards received each year are testimony of our commitment to it. It provide technologies such as Neo, wash techniques that reduce water consumption, and sustainable fibres that make us one of the most responsible denim producers in the world. 3. Arvind Denim"s strength is reflected in its propriety innovative products such as Azurite, and brands like BOOMERANG™ that enjoy consumer level co-branding. 4. It also collaborate with village industries on truly hand spun and handloom woven Denim products that help preserve heritage crafts and support thousands of livelihoods. 5. Each year Arvind Denim produces over 100 million meters of fabrics and 6 million pairs of jeans.

Overview:
Despite the huge success till date Uniqlo faces its own global challenges. The brand takes very different strategy from its fast fashion competitors like ZARA GAP etc. Uniqlo should have in mind some business consideration in it"s strive to be the world"s top apparel retailer. The biggest dilemma might be the brand differentiation as it tries to be "Everything for everyone". It may lead to some strategic mistake. One of the secret behind the success of Uniqlo is its strong delivery system supporting a clear brand promise and its relentless commitment to innovation. By clearly defining the brand commits to provide high quality performance enhance, universal and basic casual wear at affordable prices and by running robust and efficient supply chain to produce its apparel, the brand has created such an environment where it is continually increasing customer expectations.

International expansion:
When a brand starts to gain popularity in its country and region, the next step would be to expand globally. This is especially so for Uniqlo, but the brand has met with considerable challenges. However till now, the brand footprint and awareness are relatively low outside of Asia, something the company is tackling through global retail store expansion programs, advertising and marketing. More recently the brand had wanted to enter into a merger with J.Crew Group 2014 but the company eventually pulled out of the deal due to hefty USD 5million price tag. Moving towards Uniqlo should focus on expansion internationally with strategic plan of each market.
Arvind has contributed 14% to the industry production, 4% to the GDP of India, With 45milion people employed, employed directly, the industry is one of the largest sources of employment in country.

Outlook:
Most analysts believed that the big brands owned by large textile houses like Arvind treated their ready-to-wear segment as an augmentation of their fabrics business and due to this mindset they are lacked of fresh ideas.

Omni-Channel brand: Creyate
This brand is both online and offline and using e-commerce for personalized clothing.3-D visualization software and delivering garment in 12 days. It planned to enter US, UK, Germany and Japan. (Arvind| fashioning possibilities. (2017, August 16) Suggestion:-For Future Prosperity, Strengthen supply chain integration and supervision: It always was a hot potato to ensure the quality of clothing. Proper supervision and control of all aspect during the process can solve this problem. Various assembly line order fulfillment, transportation of raw material should be properly supervised.