The Secrets of Zara: Customer Co-creation & Passionate Culture

Zara is one of the world’s most successful global fashion retail brands. With its dramatic redefinition of fast fashion since it was founded in 1975 in Spain, the Zara brand aspires to share responsible passion for fashion across a broad spectrum of people, cultures and ages. Zara’s strengths lie in putting customers first.

Recently, Miko walked into a Zara store in Tokyo and asked the young store assistant for a pink scarf. The store did not have any pink scarves. The same happened almost simultaneously for Michelle in Toronto, Elaine in San Francisco, and Giselle in Frankfurt, who all walked into Zara stores and asked for pink scarves. They all left the stores without any scarves - an experience many other Zara fans encountered globally in different Zara stores over the next few days.

7 days later, more than 2.000 Zara stores globally sold pink scarves. 500.000 pink scarves were dispatched - to be exact. They sold out in 3 days. How can such lightning fast stocking of pink scarves possible happen?

Co-creation: The Zara designer is the customer

Customer insights are the holy grail of modern business, and the more companies know, the better they can innovate and compete. But it can prove difficult to gain the right insights, at the right time, and get them consistently over time. One of the secrets of Zara’s success is that the brand trains and empowers its store employees and managers to be particularly sensitive to customer needs and wants, and how customers enact them on the shop floors.

A trend starts small, but develops fast. Zara employees are trained to listen, watch and be attentive to even the smallest seismographic signals from their customers, which can point towards a new trend developing. The quicker Zara can respond, the more likely the brand is to succeed in supplying the right fashion merchandise at the right time across its global retail chain. Zara has set up sophisticated technological systems, which enable information to travel quickly from the stores back to its headquarters in Galicia in Spain, enabling decision makers to act fast and respond effectively to a developing trend.

Culture of Zara: The word “impossible” does not exist

Zara has a very entrepreneurial culture, and employs lots of young talent who quickly climb through the ranks of the company. The brand has no fear in giving responsibility to young people and the culture encourages risk-taking (as long as learning happens) and fast implementation (the mantra of fashion). The organizational structure is flat with only few managerial layers.

Customers are the most important source of information for Zara, but like any other fashion brand, Zara also employs trend analysts, customer insights experts, and retain some of the best talents in the fashion world. The creative team of Zara comprises over 200 professionals. They all embody and enact the corporate philosophy that the word “impossible” does not exist in Zara.

The entire culture is extremely customer-centric – a management topic I wrote about in Customer-centric and consumer-driven brands.This is the other secret behind Zara’s success.

Why did customers ask for pink scarves?

Miko, Michelle, Elaine and Giselle asked for pink scarfs at the same time, but in different parts of the world. Why did that happen in the first place?

Like any trends, they often start unexpectedly, originate from uncommon places and grow out of nowhere. Maybe Hollywood actress Scarlett Johansson had worn a pink scarf to a charity gala the evening before in Los Angeles, or golf star Michelle Wie had showcased a pink scarf at a tournament in Asia.

But in a world swamped with Big Data – and yet more been collected with a rapid pace, brands still need to be careful and observant. One of the secrets behind Zara’s global success is the organization’s respect for the fact that no one is a better, authentic trendsetter than the customer. So why not ask her for a start? Zara always does.

Do you always ask your customers what they want?

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Martin Rollis a business & brand strategist, and the founder of Martin Roll Company. He provides advisory and guidance on leadership, strategy and execution, and how to build and sustain high-performing, enduring brand-driven businesses and global, marketing-oriented organisations. Author of Asian Brand Strategy.

Specialities: Branding, Marketing, Strategy, Leadership, Change & Transformations, Business Family Transition, Business Coaching, Asia & Emerging Markets.

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