2 Fashion Industry Business Thinking and Management

Vocabulary practice flashcards covering luxury goods categories, product life cycles, consumer adopter stages, collection lifecycle steps, and departmental structures within a fashion company.

Accessories (Luxury Category)

A luxury goods category characterized by strong growth in recent years, high profit margins, and constantly increasing prices.

Apparel (Luxury Category)

A luxury goods category that contributes less to a company's profits, but is where designers best express their creativity.

Perfumes and Cosmetics

A luxury category used to consolidate brand awareness, attract young consumers, break into new markets, and frequently developed through licensing agreements.

Watches and Jewellery

A category historically considered luxury that includes new products which are relatively more accessible and 'fast'.

Planned Obsolescence

A practice that encourages new demand season after season for products that could last much longer considering their functional and technical features alone.

Product Life Cycle Curve

A model showing sales over time across stages (Introduction, Growth, Maturity, Decline), contrasting the rapid spike of a Fad, the medium lifecycle of Fashion, and the extended lifecycle of a Basic Product.

Fashion Innovators

Consumers who adopt a new product first, motivated by innovative and unique features; marketing to them emphasizes product newness and distinctiveness.

Fashion Opinion Leaders

Early adopters, celebrities, and magazines who copy fashion innovators and convert the product into a popular style distributed across more retail outlets.

Mass Adopters

The general consumer base who adopts a fashion product at the peak of its popularity, targeted through mass merchandisers and broad advertising.

Late Adopters and Laggards

Bargain hunters and consumers slow to recognize and adopt a fashionable style, who buy products when popularity fades and items are marked down for clearance.

Adopter Lifecycle Curve

A bell-shaped curve mapping the number of adopters over time across five sequential consumer groups: Fashion Innovators, Opinion Leaders, Masses, Late Adopters, and Laggards.

The Cultural Pioneer

An early adopter audience segment serving as cultural barometers—critically minded, driven by knowledge, actively engaged with fashion culture, and influential among peers.

Collection Life Cycle

The five sequential phases of fashion collection development: 1. Collection Guidelines and Plan, 2. Collection Execution, 3. Collection Presentation, 4. Sales Campaigns, 5. Production & Distribution.

Style Department

The department that designs collections under the supervision of the Creative Director, often organized by line (menswear, womenswear, kidswear, accessories) or specific product categories.

Product Department

The department that supports the Design Office by translating creative choices into feasible, manufacturable versions and overseeing prototype development to build the sample collection.

Merchandising Department

The function that analyzes past sales performance to establish guidelines for future collections (product categories, assortment, sizes, colors, styles) and sets product assortment for e-commerce.

Buying Department

The department responsible for managing product assortment and inventory flow to ensure adequate stock levels across company-owned stores and brand retailers.

Visual Merchandising Department

The department responsible for creative window display setups in retail stores following seasonal creative guidelines.

Public Relations (PR) Department

The department that manages the company's relationships with media outlets, celebrities, and influencers.

Brand Image Department

The team working directly with the Creative Director to create storytelling and visual communication for fashion shows, advertising campaigns, lookbooks, special projects, and photo shoots.

Media Department

The department responsible for purchasing advertising space across offline and digital media to distribute campaigns, without direct involvement in the creative phase.

Digital Department

The team that creates and produces visual and textual content for digital channels, specifically the website and social media.