Milano Fashion Global Summit

Milano Fashion Global Summit 2007
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In the annual luxury conference in Milan last year, the importance of the retail luxury was discussed and there are some important points that are current today and I would like to discuss as they apply to the fashion industry:

-The luxury brands are embracing the idea of global concept stores. There is a shift in the way the stores put the product in a context. The new centers of luxury are multi-floor complexes selling not only apparel but moving into accessories, interiors, etc. As an example is the Armani Tokyo’s 6,000sqm store that will open with a club, florist, homeware section and more.
-Diego Della Valle, CEO of Tod’s explained: “The message that you convey is the idea of a dream. You build a temple. A store today in not just a way to sell a brand, these are now places people can go to, hang out and then buy into a dream”.
-E-commerce is also an area relatively new to the luxury brands in process of expansion. The Halston brand, for example, launched their new collection with e-commerce being the only point-of-sale. The items showcase in the runway could be shipped 24 hours after the runway show. This is a never-before seen event that could create big changes in the fashion industry. Designs from the runway shows are going to be accessible to the public must faster than has traditionally been the case at a lower cost to the retailer.
-New centres of luxury could emerge such as Japan (Tokyo), China and India. According to Paola Durante, director of Merrill Lynch, “In China there are 66 billionaires and this number is growing fast. In a short term, the Chinese will be the largest group of luxury consumers worldwide.”

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