How Fashion Designers Develop New Styles:Creative Epiphany Versus Market Feedback

Abstract

Iconic fashion designers see themselves as artistic visionaries whose creations are impervious to market critique. Using real- world data, this work refutes this notion, and is the first empirical study to document a market response model of fashion. We show empirically how elite European fashion houses introduce new styles based on how previous styles have been received by the market. More specifically, we find designers introduce styles that are more similar to styles that were successful in the past and less similar to styles that were less well-received. Further, the styles a designer introduces are shown to depend on the market’s response to competing designers’ styles. In showing how styles evolve systematically over time, this work illustrates the systematic integration of market feedback on new product introductions, doing so in an industry based on aesthetic innovation.