River Island

River Island

Introduction

River Island has been the trend setter in the fashion industry. Since the launch of the company, it has been very successful. The company has been successful because of the technology that it has adopted. The company's success depends on the blend of the technology that the company has adopted and has been able to break all the rules that the fashion industry was following. Vertical integration has made the company earn a lot of profits and remain ahead of its competitors in the market. This was due to the fact that the company was able to reduce its cost and increased the barriers for the potential new entrants in the industry, which is why; the company is the market leader in the industry.

River Island's position in the market is due to the strategies that the company has adopted. The company has policies that are making it the leader. The profits of the company tripled in the years between 1996 and 2000 and have even increased between the years 2001 to 2007. The company has been earning revenues from $2.43 billion to $13.6 billion in these years, and this is the reason the company was able to move ahead of the market leader, Gap.

Fashion provides an outlet for self-expression in addition to fulfilling society's traditional requirement to cover our bodies. It welcomes the fundamental human need to belong and identify with others. It gives us the freedom to reinvent ourselves and to present the various styles that make each of us unique. We become attached to specific garments because they represent something special. The truth is that most people already know this. However, no one likes to discuss it because we want to believe that clothes are meaningless and take all the credit for creating our identities (Philip, 2004, pp.213).

Fashion is an art form. Like Monet, Michelangelo, Diego Rivera and other world-renowned artists, fashion designers are creators of remarkable art that is appreciated by millions of people across the world. Typically, this form of art is presented on the runway as couture collections instead of art galleries and museums. People identify with a designer like they identify with an artist. Wearing a specific brand name can serves as more than simply clothing, it can provide an identity that leads to confidence (Varadarajan, 1999, pp. 88).

With such a huge revenue stream, it is no surprise the fashion industry avails itself the trendiest form of communication. Reality television shows, bold advertising schemes and eye-popping stunts have become the norm in fashion, so it is only natural for fashion to turn to the hottest trends in communications and go viral with social media. While there are many debates over the definition of social media, for the purposes of this thesis, social media will be used to describe the various web-based elements designed to support social interaction between users of the Internet. Social media has introduced various platforms that allow users to go from being content consumers to becoming content ...