Socio-Cultural Factors of UK Fashion Industry

A business plan is a document that is developed for revealing the specific details in a business. A business plan includes the business opportunity, business description, financial information, market strategies and competition analysis (Zollo et al. 2017). For an organization, it is important to change their old business plan and to incorporate a new business plan to meet the demand of the current market. To give the shape a start-up business it is important for a business owner to develop a specific business plan to get a competitive advantage in the global as well as local market. This study deals with business planning in the context of Fashion Fiesta, which is an online fashion vintage business in UK. This is a new venture and going to develop a business plan to get a good business in the online fashion industry.

UK is unique for its fashion trend as the fashion industries of this country are innovative and creative. However, the UK fashion industry offers high brand and casual wears, which are not so much expensive. The fashion brands of UK are popular for their unique twists (Thecreativeindustries.co.uk 2018). Fashion Fiesta is a new venture that is going to start their online fashion business in UK. They are going to introduce mainly women clothing products and accessories through online marketing. In order to develop a better business plan, this organization needs to understand the socio-cultural and technological factors of UK to identify their opportunity. The consumer fashion trend of UK focuses on the ethical clothing and environmentally friendly clothing (Nibusinessinfo.co.uk 2018). This fashion trend gives a big opportunity to Fashion Fiesta to grow their business in UK market. However, development of ethical and environmentally friendly clothing will be a good approach for Fashion Fiesta to cover the customers in UK online fashion industry. The economic condition of UK is stable and growing, which acts as the positive factor for Fashion Fiesta to start their new venture. The social lifestyle of people is high and their income level is good in UK that leads the Fashion Fiesta to prepare an online fashion marketing with high opportunity.

 In the recent years, people are more technology oriented and life is so fast. UK is a technology-oriented country. Technology drives major changes in the fashion market. One of the most popular examples is the online fashion marketing (Zollo et al. 2017). Fashion Fiesta is an online fashion vintage. Hence, the emerging technology of UK leads this organization to get a high benefit from their online business. The lifestyle of people is very fast and advanced and they prefer to do their work with the help of technology. Online shopping is very common and popular in UK. People have less time due to their routine bound life. Hence, they prefer to shop clothes via online during their busy life (Rodgers et al. 2017). Online marketing of Fashion Fiesta will give the customers to complete their shopping from their home or from their workplace. They have just press one click to buy their preferred product from a range of variety. This will enable Fashion Fiesta to cover a large range of customers from the different geographical regions in UK.

Technological Factors of UK Fashion Industry

 Social media plays an important role in online business. However, peoples of UK are very social in nature and they spend a lot of time on social media. This digital tool is a great part of their online shopping (Shen et al. 2017). Rapid use of social media in UK leads Fashion Fiesta to grasp a good opportunity for their new online business as they can link their online business with social media marketing. This will help this new venture to cover many customers in a short period of time. Online fashion business in UK has been growing since 2013. In the years 2017, 24% of the online fashion business has increased in UK market. According to the market forecast, online fashion business will increase up to 79% by 2022 (Nibusinessinfo.co.uk 2018). Based on this statistical data it can be said that Fashion Fiesta has a great opportunity to increase their profit margin through online business in UK fashion industry. 

One of the major risks of the online vintage fashion industry is the breach of the security (Belew and Elad 2017). However, a huge range of customers is associated with the fashion industry. Hence, Fashion Fiesta needs to maintain the privacy of the customer’s sensitive information. UK business industry needs to follow the Data Protection Act to run their business. As an online vintage fashion business, Fashion Fiesta needs to comply with this Act. Incompliance with this privacy law may lead Fashion Fiesta to face legal obligation. Due to break of confidentiality this fashion organization may face the lawsuit and loss of their customer trust, which is a big threat to their new venture. Ever-changing tax law is another big risk for the online fashion industry (Kshetri and Alcantara 2017). Fashion Fiesta needs to follow the changing sales tax to continue their new venture, which may affect their profitability.

UK economy is affected due to Brexit. Hence, as a startup business, Fashion Fiesta may face the financial struggle. However, the fashion industry is one of the creative sectors among the various industries. Hence, for the online vintage fashion business website designing is a crucial part to attract the customers (Turban et al. 2017). Fashion Fiesta has to plan, design, create, host, secure and maintain their professional e-commerce website. These are not cheap processes and as a new venture, this organization aims to get high volume and growing sales. As a result, they need to invest a significant amount in their operating process, which will increase their operating cost. Hence, to make a resemblance between the investment and the profitability will be difficult for this organization.

Opportunities and Threats of Online Vintage Fashion Industry

Advertising cost is high in the fashion industry in comparison to other industries especially in the context of online vintage fashion business advertising cost is high as they have to create attractive websites for their business promotion (Kshetri and Alcantara 2017). In the context of Fashion Fiesta it will be difficult to establish a trusted brand name via online business without having a physical store. This may affect their business. Apart from this customer dissatisfaction is a common threat for the online fashion business as often the customers claim that the fashion product, which they have seen on the website is different from the product that they have got in their hand after purchasing the product. This may affect the customer loyalty in the context of Fashion Fiesta.

Summary of the organization

Fashion Fiesta is an online vintage fashion business organization and they are going to start their new venture in UK. They aim to introduce women clothing and accessories. They will create a cost-effective operation to increase the growth of the organization. They will focus on the creativity and the low price. Providing quality product is their main target for the customers of UK fashion industry. They will start their business via online across the UK.

Business objectives

The business objectives of Fashion Fiesta are as follow:

• To provide high-quality product
• To offer product at affordable rate
• To understand the needs of current market
• To utilize the benefits of online marketing by creating accessible website

Mission

Fashion Fiesta aims to establish a customer-centric business. This is due to understanding the current needs and demand of the market. However, they have chosen the online marketing technique to promote their business in the national and international market. 

Products

Fashion Fiesta mainly focuses on the women clothing and accessories. They will offer outdoor clothing and seasonal clothing as per the demand of the customers. The women clothing products and accessories are as follow:

Clothing product

• Synthetic clothing for outdoor activities
• Fleece outwear
• Coated nylon and rain gear
• Hats
• T-shirts
• Pants
• Shorts
• Skirts
• Various types of fashionable vests

Accessories

• Jewellery
• Bags
• Shoes

Market Research

Market research is an essential component of any existing and new business. However, a proper market research helps the organization to identify the current market trend (Hair 2015). On the other hand, competitor’s analysis can be done by conducting a thorough market research. According to the current market research, it has been found that the demand for women clothing has been rising since last 15 years in UK as well as in the global market. Online stores of clothing are rapidly growing due to the popularity of the internet. In the recent years, 17-25 years age group of women are the main target audience for the online fashion business as they are mostly attracted to the fashion websites. They have less money in comparison to the middle and older age thus they focus on the online shopping to get new variety at an affordable rate (Rasmussen and Tanev 2015). In UK, the customers mainly focus on the environmentally friendly clothing product. This is the current trend of UK fashion industry, which needs to be observed by Fashion Fiesta before starting their new business. However, the fashion industry is a creative industry. In order to make the business fast and global UK fashion market focuses on the technology, this results in the online clothing stores. Therefore, customers also prefer online shopping rather than shopping from physical stores. Such factors of the current UK fashion market need to be analyzed by Fashion Fiesta. 

Business Objectives of Fashion Fiesta

Strategy to implement the new business goal in the context of Fashion Fiesta

Pricing is crucial for any business to enhance the customer loyalty and to increase the sales revenue generation (Lechner and Gudmundsson 2014). In the context of Fashion Fiesta, they focus on the low pricing strategy with a high quality product. They aim to provide the discount at the initial month of their operation. Therefore, they have planned to offer the seasonal discount to enhance the interest of their customers towards the business. Cost reduction in the operating process is another strategy to improve the profit margin. Apart from this, they are going to make an environmentally friendly business to leads their new venture towards success as environmental sustainability is a current demand for every growing business. They are going to be green by incorporating waste management technique in their manufacturing process.

Fashion Fiesta follows the marketing mix strategy to enhance their market share in the UK fashion industry. The marketing 4Ps include product, price, place and promotion (Rasmussen and Tanev 2015). Fashion Fiesta gives their concern in product differentiation they offer various types of fashionable vests. Therefore, they focus on the low pricing strategy with high quality products to cover a large number of customers. In order to get more popularity this organization has decided to establish their stores in the crowded area as this area will be easily accessible for the potential customers. Their aim is to establish their new store in Bristol, which is popular t place of UK for business. On the other hand, their promotional strategy includes social media marketing to cover a large number of customers from different geographical regions.

Management and operation summary

Fashion Fiesta will be going to develop a marketing team, a human resource management team, a technical team for managing the website and a corporate team to gather the current data of their business. The technical team is the main part among the other teams as this organization is going to start an online business in the UK fashion market. The website design team includes web administrator. They want to establish a cost-effective operation process to make a balance between the investment and the profitability. Cost reduction is crucial to make a business sustainable (Wheelen and Hunger 2017). Thus, Fashion Fiesta aims to give the shape a cost-effective business operation to make their new venture sustainable.

Financial plan

Start up the cost of an online business includes design and marketing cost mainly. These are the two major areas of the investment for an online vintage fashion business. In the context of Fashion Fiesta, their start-up investment will be £ 186900.00. 

Market Research

List of expenses

Legal requirement-£10,000

Consultant-£15,000

Manufacturing cost-£66,900

Equipment cost-£30,000

Business promotional cost-£25000

Human resource cost-£20000

Website designing-£15000

Others-£5000

Hence, the total expense is £186900.00 for the startup business of Fashion Fiesta.

Cash Flow Statement

Cash flow statement from 1st Jan of 2017 to 31st December 2017
Cash flow from investing	($1,200)
Cash flow from financing	($18,00)
Cash flow from operation	$5,000
Net cash flow	$2,000

Cash flow refers to the flow of the business funds statement, which focuses on the firm’s capacity. In the context of Fashion Fiesta their net cash flow is $2,000 in the year 2017.

Promotional planning

Promotional planning plays an important role in ant startup business as the success of a new venture depends on it (Park et al. 2017). In the context of Fashion Fiesta, they are going to start an online vintage fashion business thus their promotional plan will be based on the company shopping website and social media. They will advertise their products by creating their own shopping website and by using others fashion websites that popular in UK. On the other hand, they aim to use social media like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram to promote their business in customer domain.

Conclusion

The above study focuses on the business planning in the context of Fashion-Fiesta. It has been found that this organization aims to offer a creative product at low price across the UK fashion market. They cost reduction in the operating process is their another mission. They have decided to provide a discount for the first month of their operation. On the other hand, they focus on the use of social media and creation of the website to promote their business via online. 

References

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