Brand UR Intensive Fabric Supplier "Direct Battalion" To Join

When ZARA, H&M and other international fast fashion brands have stepped up their efforts to "attack the city" in China, the domestic fast fashion brand U R is also not to be outdone: the U R, which has always been the main business operator, turns to the main attacking mode this year, and will expand overseas channels. Li Mingguang, founder of U R, told Nandu reporters that in the first 6 years, U R had been practicing their internal strength and expanding their speed relatively slowly. This year, Rio Tinto was chosen as the "future". clothing In addition to luxury brands and Industry Designer Besides brand, fast fashion will be a major trend.

Therefore, U R has taken a different form from the traditional franchise mode -- "direct battalion".

The so-called "direct battalion" is always the protagonist of the whole operation, grasping management and decision-making in hand. Specifically, franchisees follow the idea of opening a one thousand square meter store. The image and standard setting from the front end to the production and operation of the back-end are consistent with the operation of the direct store. The store location U R has one vote veto.

For U R, which is never advertised, windows are their only advertisement and the most important input. If they are operated by franchisees, they will not exclude the requirements of unification and standardization in order to save costs. "This nature can not be ignored."

Such a "lock", franchisees in the direct camp is also quite an investor role, Li Mingguang said, the only place to release is only deposit, commission, job adjustments and other details. At the same time, it also solves the inventory concerns for franchisees. Specifically, franchisees do not need to sell products that are self financing and can not be sold as a traditional model. U R has assumed the allocation and inventory of all commodities. Franchisees have closer relationship with U R under zero inventory operation.

　 Intensive fabric suppliers

After changing the management mode, Li Mingguang believes that the optimization of the supply chain is the core of fast fashion brands.

U R divides all products into 4 levels: explosive, best-selling, unsalable and flat sales. Store teams do terminal analysis every day, and then make quick return, extension design and cargo transfer arrangements. The total amount of bursting is generally adjusted in 3 days, while the best selling adjustment period is 7 days. Two new updates are carried out every week, the fastest leading time is only 10 days, and the longest is only 90 days.

In inventory handling, U R has its own way: new stores usually open new discounts, but in fact, they are equipped with the latest fashion design with stock fabric, which means that past inventory can be digested in the new store. Therefore, the surface accessories will be properly stored, and then the finished products will be sold immediately according to the prevailing wind direction. Sometimes even the discounted products are out of stock, and additional hot storage of fabric inventory is needed. "However, in order to better control the cost and quality, our fabric suppliers have been reduced." Li Mingguang told Nandu reporters that along with the improvement of brand awareness, U R is on the way of intensive development in the supply of fabrics. Suppliers have been reduced from the previous 50 to 5 now, and processing plants have been reduced from over 100 to 30-50.

According to introducing, at present U R's stock accounts for about 20%, after discount sale promotion is about 3%-5%. Li Mingguang said that the new store digestion inventory can not be used as a long-term strategy, inventory control or through the downward direction of demand, the rapid collection of the preceding data, reasonable deployment of goods.

　　 Bite site selection criteria

For the location of the franchisee, U R seems very inflexible. Once a franchisee in Chongqing spent more than two years for the site selection, it turned out that five or six places were rejected by Li Mingguang. He said frankly that a good location is half the success. If the location of the new store is not good, it would rather not. In recent years, fast fashion brands have gradually moved the new store from the first floor to the negative layer or the subway level. He thinks that if a layer is not a luxury brand, it should insist on selecting the best location and floor in the franchisee to get the best development opportunities. For example, the first franchisee of U R opened in Zhengzhou's best shopping center, China World Trade Center 360 square, and was selected on the first floor of the most popular stream. Its sales have been growing steadily for three years.

With the expansion of U R's fashion layout, Li Mingguang also plans to develop the internationalization of platform testing for overseas franchisees. At present, enterprises in Philippines and Dubai have a vision of fast fashion and offer to join. Both companies have decades of experience in clothing agency, and Philippines's enterprises have also represented more than 100 clothing brands.

At the same time, U R is considering the business as a new channel to try O2O mode, but as the exhibition space of the shop is still its core - in addition to the previous women's clothing, girls' clothing and men's wear three plates, in May this year, 5 stores in the country began to launch children's clothing is an attempt of the whole category.

For the future goal, Li Mingguang said that it will continue to expand its scale moderately, and it is expected to reach 100 stores in 3 years. At the same time, it will strive to surpass U R's "teacher" ZA R A in the Chinese market -- the product is more suitable for China, the price is more affordable, and the store service is better.

　 "Direct battalion" alliance

In 2006, Li Mingguang opened the first store of U R in Guangzhou's good Plaza, and has developed to 21 stores nationwide, most of which are direct battalions. Li Mingguang said that from direct camp to join is a strategic choice to further expand the scale after the development of U R.

The store must be large, the product should be rich, the update should be fast and the price should be substantial. Li Mingguang's set up for the franchisee is no different from that of the direct store. He believes that the development of franchising must have a standardized mode, so that each store in goods, services, image consistency, which is to reduce the risk of joining the basic point. However, the traditional franchising is often a large wholesale mode consisting of brand dealers, wholesalers and retailers, which can easily weaken the ability of brands to control terminals, resulting in an awkward situation of "not even locking".