Quelles sont les stratégies gagnantes des startups dans le secteur de la mode ?

Abstract

The fashion industry is currently increasingly being sought by more and more young entrepreneurs in Belgium. Specialized incubators in fashion as Job'in Design and Maison Mode are set up by the Walloon Region and the Brussels-Capital Region. In addition to these two design and fashion hothouses, there is also the investment fund, St'ART, which invests into creative fashion startups. Nevertheless, the sector is represented by rather low figures. Indeed, one project out of five is related to a fashion project and based on the total amount invested by St'ART, only 5% are related to fashion projects.

The subject of this thesis is "What are the winning strategies of fashion startups?". The objective was to highlight the strategical methodologies put in place by five young designers from Liège and Brussels. In addition to that, the fashion industry is highly competitive, so the second objective was to see to what extent the "Ocean blue" strategy was suitable for fashion startups. The aim of the study was obviously not to compare several strategies but to find the main characteristics of the methodology and the strategic thought of several startups within the fashion industry.

First, the different models as the product development model, the customer development model and the "Ocean blue" strategy are developed in the first part of the study: the literature review. Afterwards, based on the interviews of five entrepreneurs/designers and the design incubator, Job'in Design, an analysis is carried out in order to highlight the main characteristics of the methodologies used by the speakers and the suitability of a specific strategy as the "Ocean blue" strategy. Finally, through a crossed analysis of the interviews and the theory put forward in the first part of the study, the customer development model seems partially incorporated into the fashion startups. Indeed, once the vision, the value proposition and the positioning are defined, the startup can adopt such a model which involves that the pivot will primarily take place at the product level. At the same time, the "Ocean blue" strategy seems inconvenient in such an early stage of a company for two reasons: the production is done in small quantity preventing the startup to benefit from economies of scale and the differentiation strategy is mainly lined up with the label.