The underwear market is segmented, seeking differentiation is the development trend

Core summary: With more and more participants in the underwear industry, market shares are divided. In order to highlight the brand's influence, underwear brands need to continuously innovate and develop derivatives to attract consumers.

Underwear, as a product just needed by women, consumers have gradually begun to pay attention to the quality and details of the product. The emergence of multiple brands in the underwear industry has also led to a decline in the performance of underwear stores. In order to break the singularity of traditional underwear brands, most brands are now moving towards horizontal and vertical business development. There are not only many home wear, leggings and swimwear, but also shaping clothes, shaping pants, etc., and sales of non-underwear products. It accounts for even more than half. Industry insiders pointed out that with more and more participants in the underwear industry, market shares are divided. In order to highlight the brand's influence, underwear brands need to continuously innovate and develop derivatives to attract consumers.

Underwear growth is weak

With the strong competition among domestic underwear brands, homogenized products have gradually become saturated in the market. A reporter from Beijing Business Daily visited a number of underwear brand stores and found that in the Victoria's Secret store, fragrance products and body lotions are popular with consumers. In the first quarter, the same-store sales of Victoria’s Secret of L Brands Group fell by 1% year-on-year, while sales of its bath brand Bath & Body Works increased by 5% on the contrary. The overall sales of the brand. Therefore, L Brands has announced plans to reorganize its beauty business, and in the future will increase its promotion of its beauty business to make its cosmetics business more prominent.

The future underwear industry is also full of uncertainty. As more specialty underwear brands join the competition among major underwear brands, the underwear market may face a reshuffle at any time. The Austrian luxury underwear company Wolford recently released data for the first three quarters of the 2017/2018 fiscal year. Although it has been reduced by half compared to the 5.08 million euros in the same period last year, the company's after-tax loss is still as high as 2.57 million euros. It is sold through wholesale channels. The amount fell 4.4% year-on-year.

With the gradual maturity of domestic consumer consumption concepts, the function of underwear is no longer single. Underwear will be more in-depth market segmentation according to users' different scenes, ages, functions, preferences, etc. Taking women’s bras as an example, the diversification of colors and styles is not a problem. The steel hoop gathered bras that have been popular for many years have also shrunk sharply under the dominant trend of "health" in the past two years, and they are quickly seized by non-steel bras. .

Derivatives become the main force

Derivatives of the young underwear brand 6ixty8ight are almost the same as the main product category. According to relevant personnel from the market of the brand’s Beijing branch, 6ixty8ight’s products mainly include underwear and casual wear. The sales of casual wear account for about 43% of the total sales. At the same time, the sales ratio of underwear and casual wear is 5:1, and physical stores and online stores often have 115 yuan and 5 pairs of underwear and other discounts. With such a strong sales method, most consumers will buy 5 underwear at a time.

Another example is the above-mentioned Austrian luxury underwear company Wolford said that the decline in wholesale business was mainly due to the movement of hosiery brands from the original main location to the higher floors of department stores. At the same time, the decrease in department store traffic is also a commercial phenomenon in recent years. Although in this case it should focus more on self-operated stores, the nature of Wolford's business determines that it cannot be completely separated from department stores. On the contrary, it shows that the sales of hosiery products directly affect the company's performance.

Since Victoria's Secret cancelled its derivative swimsuit business, its performance has declined. The December 2017 sales performance report released by the parent company of Victoria's Secret, L Brands, showed that the withdrawal of swimming and clothing categories led to a 3% and 5% decline in sales of the company and Victoria's Secret, respectively. In December 2017, the company's net sales were US$2.516 billion, a year-on-year increase of 3%. At the same time, in the third quarter of 2017, the company's sales were US$3.84 billion, a year-on-year decrease of 11%. Among them, the same-store sales of the main brand Victoria's Secret fell by 13% that month. In response, Victoria's Secret CEO Jan Singer responded that he is currently re-adjusting the brand's core products while accelerating the improvement and enhancement of in-store services. In fact, Victoria’s Secret’s downturn has continued for a long time since the cancellation of its swimsuit and ready-to-wear businesses at the end of 2016, and its same-store sales have fallen for 12 consecutive months.

Reduce share, seek differentiation

The "2018-2023 China Women's Underwear Industry Market Outlook and Investment Planning Analysis Report" pointed out that the trend of women's underwear segmentation is more obvious, and the market segmentation of the underwear market for different consumer groups will be the future development trend. The report also shows that as consumer needs gradually become diversified and personalized, the proportion of consumers choosing mass brands has declined, while niche waist brands have gained a larger market share. The entire market meets the diverse and personalized needs of consumers through differentiated brand strategies.

Chai Li, a high-end fashion designer and expert judge for the Italian International Fashion Week, said that the popularity of underwear derivatives is also due to the increasing number of competitors in the underwear industry, which has divided the market share to a certain extent. In order to highlight brand benefits, the development of derivatives is also one of the measures of brand innovation. But the current underwear is no longer one of the accessories of clothing, but as a mainstream of trend and fashion, and can even be worn outside. Underwear will be healthy, fashionable, personalized and differentiated in the future, but it needs more in-depth precipitation of various brands and further segmentation of the population according to customer preferences. Therefore, many big brands are currently facing the risk of customers being cut away by market segments.

Luxe.Co’s research director Shen Yuan said that the emergence of derivatives is based on a natural product extension when companies with a certain brand power are seeking new growth points. Whether they are doing well or not, they need to return to the financial report data. . On the whole, the recent round of decline in traditional brand performance is mainly due to the brand's extensive channel-driven business model in the past, which is relatively weak in brand building and user management, and the new generation of consumers will take the initiative through more information and channels. Looking for a product brand that is more suitable for you is also one of the reasons why consumption is scattered. On the contrary, it has created more opportunities for the new brands of many new generation entrepreneurs.