Certain luxury brands have targeted the super-rich and super-priced, but in doing so they have left behind cool consumers. Who is the true elite of the industry? Tommaso Maria Andorlini, CEO of the LuisaViaRoma Group, has no plans to replicate the mistake. Now the e-tailer with the same name wants to break out of the quagmire: how? By focusing on products with the right value for money, bringing in the aspirational value so dear to fashion.
Those aiming for super-rich and super-price
This seems to be the starting (or ending) point. “Luxury has focused on the super-rich, the top 1% of customers”, Andorlini (pictured from Instagram) points out to L’Economia de il Corriere della Sera. “But now even this segment no longer wants to spend on products whose prices appear overpriced and no longer guarantee either experience or exclusivity. According to the CEO with this pricing policy, brands have gradually lost the hard core of customers, those he calls “high spenders”, leaving behind even those who look to fashion for its ability to create trends.
A bubble that has burst
“Today, luxury is everywhere, but inaccessible”, Andorlini argues. That’s one of the reasons it has become standardized, which also begs the question of how much brands today are looking at the creative side. “Where are the creative people? The best designers often can’t even make it to market, and we can’t intercept them. By doing so, in the long run, fashion itself will disappear and everything will be fast-fashion”.
LuisaViaRoma’s strategy
To recapture cool consumers, the Florentine group will focus on research, betting on brands and products that are not overly distributed, exclusive, but not overpriced. “The idea is that communities and macro buying trends are born from these brands, placing us at the opposite of very expensive and over-distributed brands. The consumer must be surprised by us”, Andorlini concludes. A change of direction that will also affect physical stores. In fact, each store will have its own specific positioning, dividing the women’s and men’s worlds, as well as the inclusion of product lines created specifically for LuisaViaRoma by artisans working in the luxury supply chains, always priced right and exclusive.
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