Exploring the blurring of fashion retail and wholesale brands from industry perspectives

Abstract

Purpose – This exploratory study challenges the fashion retailer/wholesale brand debate considering established definitions, structures and propositions of these brand typologies, developing new perspectives with particular emphasis on the blurring of the product range, retail fascia concepts and supply chain management. The paper argues that the fashion industry has evolved significantly since the theoretical definitions were established in the early 2000s. The paper presents the results of a series of in-depth interviews conducted with key informants from large-scale fashion retailers, manufacturers, textile researchers and funding organisations in the UK. The paper highlights the blurring of retail and wholesale brands occurring to gain direct access to the market or enter new markets and subsequently, from a manufacturing perspective, attain competitive advantage and operate vertical integration to satisfy customer demand.

Keywords:

• Retail technology
• retail brands
• wholesale brands
• the fashion industry
• supply chain management

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).