Fast Fashion Supply Chain Research Articles

Strategic Signaling and Sustainable Consumer Purchase Behavior: The Case of Fast Fashion Supply Chains

Strategic Signaling and Sustainable Consumer Purchase Behavior: The Case of Fast Fashion Supply Chains

Fast Fashion Supply Chain Management in China: Critical Success Factors and Their Supply Chain Performance Implications

Fast Fashion Supply Chain Management in China: Critical Success Factors and Their Supply Chain Performance Implications

Digital Transformation of Supply Chain Management in the Fast Fashion Industry: A Case Study of Zara

With continuous innovation and evolution in the clothing industry, fast fashion brands have gained significant popularity due to their ability to quickly respond to changing fashion trends, offer affordable and stylish clothing, and cater to the preferences of fashion-conscious consumers worldwide. This research analyzes the supply chain of the renowned fast fashion brand Zara, known for its unique supply chain management model. It is one of the most valuable apparel brands globally. The study explores the impact of supply chain management and digitalization on the entire fast fashion supply chain, encompassing upstream suppliers and manufacturers, middle-channel retailers and distributors, and consumers. Through a comprehensive examination of Zara’s success story, this study serves as an inspiring example for domestic apparel enterprises, showcasing the potential benefits that can arise from adopting a unique supply chain model, and offers valuable insights for Chinese apparel companies seeking to enhance their supply chain management and adapt to the digital era.

How Do Environmental Impact and Gender Inequality Characterise Fast Fashion Supply Chains?

How Do Environmental Impact and Gender Inequality Characterise Fast Fashion Supply Chains?

Fast Fashion Supply Chain Issues in the New Marketing Environment: Zara

Fashion companies, including Inditex-Zara, are required by the public to speak out more about sustainability concerns in their supply chains nowadays. This article covers the sustainability problems that Inditex's present supply chain is causing for society and the environment, as well as how to revamp it using IT technology and 3D digital techniques to give the corporation market value in the post-pandemic period. ZARA is facing the new fast fashion market in a way that is somewhat at odds with the expectations of the media and society about this company, which may affect customer satisfaction. Therefore, this article has chosen this topic for research and development. This paper examined this in-depth analysis as a means of helping ZARA improve its market performance and some of its internal strategies, and used company-related information, including third-party papers and interview transcripts, to obtain preliminary information. The report mainly includes how ZARA's supply chain strategy works with recommendations on two of the major issues, while references are attached at the bottom.

Benchmarking fast fashion supply chains: Identifying enablers of operational excellence

Businesses regard benchmarking as a systematic method to develop strength and learn from the best. In supply chain management, benchmarking is crucial for evaluating its operations and improvement. This article explores the fast fashion supply chain and argues that it is the best practice across different industries. It identifies critical success factors of a fast fashion supply chain business model and its enablers through a comprehensive analysis. For example, sophisticated information systems enable the short lead times in the fast fashion business model, likewise how performance measures enable fast fashion brands to meet their customer requirements.

Re-shaping sustainable value chain model under post pandemic disruptions: A fast fashion supply chain analysis

Reshaping a sustainable value chain model is proposed to address supply chain disruptions for the fast fashion industry. Prior studies introduced a sustainable value chain but did not involve social media and qualitative information in supply chain analysis under pandemic disruptions. This study provides an opportunity for the fast fashion industry to reassess and reshape its sustainable activities within the value chain during pandemic disruptions. This study proposes a hybrid method employing exploratory factor analysis, social media information conversion, and a fuzzy synthetic method - decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory - to assess the sustainable value chain. This study contributes in the following ways: (1) the theoretical basis of the sustainable value chain is reinforced under pandemic disruptions; (2) a hybrid method is proposed to develop an interdependent hierarchical model; and (3) a precise guideline for improvement is provided under pandemic disruptions. The analytical results reveal that the structured aspects have significant interdependent relations; therefore, digital technology that supports sustainability plays a critical role in reshaping the sustainable value chain model. In practice, adopting an eco-clothing design, using digital techniques for improving production efficiency and providing the related information to customers transparently are the leading measures using digital techniques for generating sustainable values.

Analysing the barriers of sustainable supply chain in fashion sector: a review

Purpose: the aim is to figure out the barriers and challenges that mostly influence sustainable fashion supply chain especially textile in order to develop the industry in Egypt Design/Methodology/Approach: About 59 academic papers, books, were used from different search engines like the Egyptian Knowledge Bank, Emerald insight and Elsevier, to identify the barriers that influence sustainable supply chain in the Egyptian fashion industry Findings: The fashion industry’s supply chains are facing some internal and external environmental, social and economic challenges and barriers to being sustainable in Egypt Research Implications/ Limitations: very limited research focusing on fast fashion supply chain sustainability, especially in the Egyptian Industry. Practical Implications/ Limitations: Practitioners have lack of knowledge about sustainability recognition and information about sustainability gains Originality: The paper gives academics and practitioners guidance on how to better understand the challenges and barriers to applying and implementing sustainable strategies in the Egyptian fashion industry supply chain. Keywords: fashion, apparel, slow fashion, fast fashion, Ultra-fast fashion, Sustainable development strategy, sustainability, sustainable supply chain, sustainable fashion, and supply chain barriers.

As cheap as humanly possible: why consumers care less about worker welfare

PurposeWorker welfare and modern slavery within the fashion industry remain a key supply chain challenge for many retailers, consumers, governments and advocacy groups. Yet, despite publicised worker-welfare violations, many fashion retailers continue to post record sales and profits, indicating that consumer concern does not always translate at the cash register. Research has shown that worker welfare is a less salient area of concern for fashion consumers, and the aim of this research is to investigate the reasons why this may be the case.Design/methodology/approachDue to the exploratory nature of the research, a qualitative methodology was deemed the most appropriate. Twenty-one semi-structured interviews were conducted with Australian fast-fashion consumers to investigate the underlying reasons worker-welfare violations are less likely to elicit pro-social consumer behavioural change and are a less salient area of concern.FindingsThis study found that consumers perceive worker-welfare concerns at both a proximal and cultural distance to themselves, and therefore struggle to connect with the issues associated with modern slavery. Additionally, there was an underlying social consensus that exploitative practices are an accepted part of the fast-fashion supply chain to ensure the continuation of low-cost clothing. Despite an underlying awareness of exploitative practices and acknowledgement that modern slavery is ethically wrong, other consumer values often influenced purchase behaviour and the level of concern expressed towards garment workers.Originality/valueThis is the first study to apply psychological distance in a fast-fashion context to better understand consumer perceptions towards modern slavery. Responding to calls for further research into ethical consumption of apparel, this study develops an in-depth understanding of the reasons why worker welfare is a less salient area of concern for fast-fashion consumers. Extending on current literature, this study qualitatively investigates consumer sentiment towards worker welfare, identifying the greatest barriers to consumers' levels of concern. In addition to a theoretical contribution to the fashion, ethics and business literature, this article provides key insight to guide practice.

Adapting business models in buyer-seller relationships: paradoxes in the fast fashion supply chain

Purpose This paper aims to deal with the issue of business model change in industrial markets. It considers the fast-fashion supply chain by addressing the following research questions: What are the paths of change of the supplier’s business model to match the business model of fast fashion customers? How can a supplier’s business model be adapted to customer’s requirements in these paths of change? Design/methodology/approach Empirically, the paper presents a multiple case study of 10 semi-finished textile suppliers, carried out through a long-term research programme in the Italian textile industrial district of Prato. Findings The multiple-case study shows some key drivers of change in the suppliers’ business models. Three main paths emerged from the interactions with fast fashion clients. Paradoxes in the supplier’s business model changes are identified and discussed. Research limitations/implications The paper proposes implications for suppliers interacting with fast fashion clients and discusses how the adaptation of business models may be interpreted. This study points out how matching the business model of the customers does not call for alignment of similar features. Originality/value The paper deals with an understudied topic within the literature: business models change in business to business markets, taking into consideration the perspective of the supplier. It considers buyers-seller relationships in industrial supply chains as being part of a chain of business models and the need for the supplier’s business model to adapt and match one of the clients. The paper proposes two potential interpretations of such adaptation.

Traditional versus fast fashion supply chains in the apparel industry: an agent-based simulation approach

In the past, most companies in the European apparel industry focused on minimizing manufacturing costs in the design of supply chains in conjunction with long-distance shipping from production sites in the Far East and relatively long production cycles. Today, for some market segments, the speed of production cycles is more important than the cost because short throughput time allows the flexibility to adjust to rapidly changing fashion trends in these market segments. Accordingly, choosing the most beneficial supply chain strategy has become an established research topic. However, apparel markets are complex systems. Therefore, attempts to reduce the underlying complexity in order to model these markets have limited existing research to the consideration of only selected aspects of markets (e.g., considering only homogeneous buyers, a single period, a single product, or a single manufacturer in the absence of competition) rather than taking a more comprehensive view. These limitations can be overcome by applying an agent-based simulation approach—an approach that can account for a wider range of factors, including several competing manufacturers utilizing different supply chain strategies, individual consumer preferences and behavior, word-of-mouth communication, normative social influence, and first-hand experience, as well as advertising. In this paper, the capability potential of such agent-based market simulation is demonstrated by investigating two supply chain strategies (fast fashion vs. traditional fashion) with varying product and communication strategies (product attributes and advertising) in several market scenarios.

Fast and ultra-fast fashion supply chain management: an exploratory research

PurposeThe aim of this study is to identify and analyse the main strategic differences between fast and ultra-fast fashion supply chain management.Design/methodology/approachThis study uses a qualitative approach, using document analysis and in-depth interviews with industry specialists.FindingsUltra-fast fashion differs from fast in the following supply chain strategies: avoids any excess inventory, focuses on local manufacturing, on-demand production, and shorter lead times from a few days to a week with a combination of agile, lean, responsive supply chain strategies.Research limitations/implicationsThe limitations of this research are due to the cut-off period and the use of a restricted sample. As implications, technological capabilities are underexplored in the fashion industry. Although important to the traditional and fast fashion industry, technology is viewed as a tool and not as a capability that can generate competitive advantage. This paper addresses technology as capabilities to make ultra-fast fashion retailers more competitive.Practical implicationsUltra-fast fashion could potentially impact current fast fashion retailers to partially move their business model and operations towards an ultra-fast approach. Fast fashion retailers desiring to speed up their production processes launch more weekly collections to cater to consumers who are more fashion-conscious.Originality/valueThere is a rapid emergence of new start-ups that are calling themselves ultra-fast. Newcomers wanting to adopt this new segment’s business model, develop technological capabilities to meet the challenges of this supercompetitive market.

Last mile logistics in Fast Fashion supply chains: a case study

In the fast fashion industry, high delivery frequencies and low lead times are key factors of market competitiveness. To this goal, many companies are evaluating the possibility of opening urban satellites close to retail stores. Urban satellites can assure a number of daily replenishments larger than one at the retail stores. However, opening urban satellites requires expensive capital expenditures and can increase transportation costs. In this paper, we investigate the impact of urban satellites on the service level, inventory and transportation costs of fast fashion supply chains. Discrete event simulation is used to assess the value that urban satellites can provide to fast fashion supply chains. The application to an Italian retailer case study reveals that the increased transportation and storage costs may be compensated by increased sales as a result of a wider product assortment at the retail stores. The case study simulation results are proposed as possible lessons for other fast fashion last mile distribution systems.

Effective Disclosure in the Fast-Fashion Industry: from Sustainability Reporting to Action

This work, set in the context of the apparel industry, proposes an action-oriented disclosure tool to help solve the sustainability challenges of complex fast-fashion supply chains (SCs). In a search for effective disclosure, it focusses on actions towards sustainability instead of the measurements and indicators of its impacts. We applied qualitative and quantitative content analysis to the sustainability reporting of the world’s two largest fast-fashion companies in three phases. First, we searched for the challenges that the organisations report they are currently facing. Second, we introduced the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) framework to overcome the voluntary reporting drawback of ‘choosing what to disclose’, and revealed orphan issues. This broadened the scope from internal corporate challenges to issues impacting the ecosystems in which companies operate. Third, we analysed the reported sustainability actions and decomposed them into topics, instruments, and actors. The results showed that fast-fashion reporting has a broadly developed analysis base, but lacks action orientation. This has led us to propose the ‘Fast-Fashion Sustainability Scorecard’ as a universal disclosure framework that shifts the focus from (i) reporting towards action; (ii) financial performance towards sustainable value creation; and (iii) corporate boundaries towards value creation for the broader SC ecosystem.

Key drivers of an agile, collaborative fast fashion supply chain

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to investigate the market structure and the key drivers of the competitiveness of an agile and collaborative fast fashion supply chain using South Korea’s Dongdaemun fashion market – one of the world’s largest and most competitive fashion hubs – as an example.Design/methodology/approachA qualitative approach is employed with a two-stage study. The first stage is a preliminary study based on a desk research and several field visits, while the second is an in-depth interview study with seven informants collectively representative of the members of all echelons along a fashion supply chain.FindingsThe findings demonstrate that the Dongdaemun fashion market has a complex market structure and a unique business pattern. Supply chain agility and collaboration are two important components of its success, which are supported by five factors: self-sufficient structure, multiple-integrated network, strong entrepreneurship, close and long-lasting buyer-seller relationships, and quick-response product delivery and inventory replenishment.Originality/valueThis study extends our knowledge of supply chain management in the fast fashion industry and provides insights to assist in the development of supply chain strategies in other fashion markets and/or other industries. The extended conceptual framework as well as the proposed questions may serve as points of reference for future studies in the subject area.

Price differentiated channel switching in a fixed period fast fashion supply chain

Fashion products are characterized by short product life cycles and high market success uncertainty. An unsuccessful product requires multiple price discounts to clear inventory. Fast-fashion retailers use a variety of strategies to counter these uncertainties including: frequently changing collections, quick response sourcing, and data driven channel switching. This paper proposes a switching solution for the Fast Fashion Supply Chain (FFS) of retailers who have preordered an initial or block inventory, and plan to use channel switching as opposed to multiple discounting steps. We consider a retailer which ships product from a central warehouse to store/clearance and outlet channels. The FFS Multi-Channel Switching (MCS) problem then is to monitor market demand data, such that at the optimal period the store inventory is switched to clearance, and the warehouse inventory is switched to the outlet channel. Using a linear projection of the moving average demand trend, we estimate the remaining cycle revenue at any time in the cycle. Channel prices are fixed, and the remaining revenue is a concave function of switching time. Using a set of conditions the objective is further simplified into cases. The Linear Moving Average Trend (LMAT) heuristic prescribes whether a channel switch should be made in the next period. The LMAT was compared with the optimal decision, the No-Switch rule and an intuitive heuristic using a simulation experiment. The LMAT performed well and for most problems provided a solution within 0.4% of the optimal. Confirming the LMAT can readily and effectively be applied to real time decision making in a FFS.

A Comparative Study on Fashion Demand Forecasting Models with Multiple Sources of Uncertainty

Fast fashion is a timely, influential and well observed business strategy in the fashion retail industry. An effective fast fashion supply chain relies on quick and competent forecasts of highly volatile demand that involves multiple stock keeping units. However, there are multiple sources of uncertainty, such as market situation and rapid changes of the fashion trends, which makes demand forecasting more challenging. Therefore, it is crucial for the fast fashion companies to carefully select the right forecasting models to thrive and to succeed in this ever changing business environment. In this study, we first review a selected set of computational models which can be applied for fast fashion demand forecasting. We then perform a real sale data based computation analysis and discuss the strengths and weaknesses of these versatile models. Finally, we conduct a survey to learn about the perceived importance of different demand forecasting systems’ features from the fashion industry. Finally, we rank the fast fashion demand forecasting systems using the AHP analysis and supplement with important insights on the preferences on the demand forecasting systems of different groups of fashion industry experts and supply chain practitioners.

Analysis of Product Complexity considering Disruption Cost in Fast Fashion Supply Chain

Outsourcing in the textile industry has been playing an important role in the global economy for six decades. Recently, reshoring is an emerging trend due to various complexities involved in supply chain management. As compared with basic textile and apparel products, fast fashion products are complex in their own way. A single assortment contains several new styles, colors, and sizes with unpredictable demand and urgent deadlines. Numerous assortments run simultaneously in the supply chain. For each assortment, the garment manufacturer has to source various types of fabrics and materials from different suppliers and then manufacture the garments to ship within the deadlines. This complexity contributes to supply chain disruption. This paper develops a model to estimate supply chain disruption cost as a function of fast fashion product complexity in the global outsourcing environment. Estimation of disruption cost will help us to increase visibility and eliminate the bottlenecks in supply chain. Model conclusions are used to develop a method to manage the level of product complexity from the global supply chain perspective. Several strategies are proposed to manage the impact of product complexity on supply chain design.

Governance of sustainable supply chains in the fast fashion industry

This paper examines the impact of corporate social responsibility behavior on the sustainability performance of focal companies and their partners in fast fashion supply chains. The attributes of sustainability and the mechanism of sustainability governance of the fast fashion supply chain are also discussed. From the perspective of strategic corporate social responsibility, we first analyze the motives for adopting sustainability governance in fast fashion supply chains, and identify seven competitive sustainable attributes of the fast fashion product based on sustainable development theory. Then, by establishing a sustainability governance framework, we identify seven factors that affect the sustainability governance decision-making and evaluate the efficiency and legitimacy mechanism of sustainability governance from internal and external perspectives. Finally, we explore the application of the governance mechanisms via a case study based on H&M’s seven sustainability commitments. The findings suggest that the core influence and centrality of a corporation should be strengthened from the perspective of internal governance, and stakeholders should collaborate to achieve sustainability governance throughout the entire fast fashion supply chain from the perspective of external governance.

Mean Variance Analysis of Fast Fashion Supply Chains With Returns Policy

This paper is motivated by observed industrial practices. We conduct a mean variance (MV) analysis of a fast fashion supply chain with returns policy. Different from the conventional newsvendor type products, fast fashion brands plan to have stock-out because it is a feature of fast fashion and can bring some benefit. Based on the fast fashion features, we build an analytical MV optimization model for a two-echelon fast fashion supply chain to address the following research questions. 1) What are the differences and similarities in the structural properties between the supply chains that carry fast fashion products and conventional newsvendor type products? 2) How do we optimize a fast fashion supply chain with multiple retailers under the MV framework? 3) Can a simple returns policy optimize (and “coordinate”) such a multiretailer supply chain? 4) How do individual retailers' degrees of risk aversion affect the achievability of coordination? 5) Can the above simple contract help coordinate the supply chain under information asymmetry? We propose a novel approach called “negotiated space” in the analysis. We generate several important insights which include an interesting finding that a simple returns policy can be applied to coordinate the fast fashion supply chain even in the presence of multiple retailers.