Value Redefined

value redefined, originally uploaded by mickstravellin.

The future laboratory's THE quarterly magazine came out the other day and I spent my weekend on public transport reading through it. It always has quite a lot of little random tid bits which I use to dramatise points of view in presentations and explanations of my thinking. But something that got to me personally was the 'value redefined' article which discusses fashion value will change in fashion amongst the drop in consumer confidence.

It touched me because when I arrived in the UK, I started to shop for clothes as I had been travelling and didnt have anything to wear to work. I thought things like H&M and Topshop amongst others were pretty cool, as they were cheap. All my english friends in Australia told me how expensive everything was there and how they missed these stores. So I got involved and bought things from across a number of these stores. Problem was they started to fall apart quite quickly. I didnt get it. Why would I want something that only lasted a short amount of time. Then I started to get an understanding of the idea of 'fast fashion' and how these stores were addressing the consumer need to want the latest, NOW. But like the trend, the clothes wont last. I am not really like that. I like buying quite serious items and paying more so they last. Then maybe a couple of small stupid things. But this is probably as I grew up in a culture that wasnt driven by 'fast fashion'.

So the future labs article on 'value refinded' touched me as it discusses that now in the drop in consumer confidence and in turn spending. People will shop for fashion looking for more classic pieces of higher quality that will have a longer shelf life. This could be a very interesting idea of value across a number of categories, linking specifically to trend driven areas and things with short shelf life.

So what does this mean for topshop, H&M and all the fast fashion stores. I think it would be quite interesting to see them adapt to deliver slightly higher quality, more expensive ranges and finally I might have some more places to get clothes from.