Consumer Behaviour - Margiela

Consumer Behaviour

Group projectConsumer of luxury goods

A

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11 Martin Margiela: A discrete but renown fashion designer

MMM

Jewels

Ready to wearFlagrance

• First collection in 1988

• A brand that makes nomarketing. No one eversees Martin Margiela, the MMM wear

Haute couture

Flagrancesees Martin Margiela, thefounder

• Minimalist spirit: from the creations to the corners

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22 A quick overview of their creations

Theoretical modelB

Consumer of luxury goods

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33 Consumption drivers – Individual dimension

HedonismUniqueness

“Indicator of the exceptionalexclusivity and scarcity of aluxury product or service”

E.g. Limited edition

è Differentiation è Feel privileged

“Capacity of a luxury product tosatisfy an emotional desire forsensory gratification”

E.g. Advertising based on sensorypleasure

è Excitement of buyingExcitement of buyingèPleasure of consuming

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44 Consumption drivers – Financial dimension

PriceFinancial indicator of the value (quality, exclusivity…) of a luxury product

E.g. Hublot “One million Big Bang” watch

è Level of prestigeèExternal « objective » indicator

Materialism

Capacity of a luxury product to satisfy a need for possession

E.g. Vast range of products within a collection

è Need for possessingèPossession as a signal of status

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55 Consumption drivers – Social dimension

PrestigeSymbolic sign of membership to a reference group provided by the possession of a luxury product

E.g. Owning a Sunseeker boat

è Status affirmationè Bandwagon effect

ConspicuousnessIndicator of elitism and wealth linked to the possession of a luxury product

E.g. High visibility of the brand and its logo

è Influence of reference groupsèSocial luxury value perception

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66 Consumption drivers – Functional dimension

Quality

“Superior performance of a luxury product or service”

E.g. Handmade luxury products

è Brand reputationè‘Sine qua non’ attribute?

Usability“Superior functional values of a luxury product or service”

E.g. Highly equipped car

èConsumer’s needs èProduct’s properties

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77 Prism

Price

MaterialismUniqueness

Hedonism

Individual dimension Financial dimension

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Conspicuousness

PrestigeQuality

Usability

Functional dimension Social dimension

88 Consumer profiles

Price

MaterialismUniqueness

Hedonism

Individual dimension Financial dimension

Connoisseur New Rich

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Conspicuousness

PrestigeQuality

Usability

Functional dimension Social dimension

Expert Snob

MethodologyC

Consumer of luxury goods

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99 First Steps : developing the research

Defining the aim of the study

èIdentify MMM’s consumersèEstablish their profileèUnderstand their reasons for buyingèDefine their relationship to the brand

Inside Maison Martin Margiela

Group interview with 2 employees ofMMM Paris (PR and marketingassistants).

Defining the brand identity and theconsumer’s profile.

Helped us to build the “lifestyle” partof our questionnaire

Inside Maison Martin Margiela

Group interview with 2 employees ofMMM Paris (PR and marketingassistants).

Defining the brand identity and theconsumer’s profile.

Helped us to build the “lifestyle” partof our questionnaire

Elaborating the researchSecondary Research : no use of pre-existing dataPrimary Research : exploratory / descriptive research

Thus the elaboration of a survey.

•1st round of testing : friends and family•2nd round of testing : teacher’s feedback

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1010 Advanced Steps : implementing the research methodsCollecting the data throughthe online surveyGoogle Survey- Possibility of integrating scale

questions- Results provided with graphs- Quick and free- Limits in the formulation of the

questions

Administrating the questionnaire to the right sample

Convenience sampling : ESCP Students, family and friends- ESCP students : general income above average / social status and

interest in fashion / future potential consumers of luxury goods- Family and friends : social background / center of interest

Judgmental sampling : acquaintances who would know the brand or be familiar with the luxury goods in general. In the end, this sample provided most of the answers we collected.

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1111 Final Steps: delivering the study

Interpreting the results through rigorous analysis to deliver the final report

Collecting the answers

Spreadsheet provided by Google Survey with the results listed

deliver the final report

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Final step of the methodologyCore interest of the Group Project

Results analysisD

Consumer of luxury goods

08/06/2011

1212 Our survey in numbers

67 persons answered our survey

76%respondents who knew

35 of our respondents bought a luxury product during the last 12 months

29 respondents knew MMM

76%respondents who knew Margiela consider themselves as fans

MMM consumers bought an average of 1.6 products, whereas theaverage of luxury products bought by the average respondent was 1.2

1313 Luxury goods consumer

Hedonism

MaterialismUniqueness

Price

Conspicousness

Prestige

Quality

Usability

1414 Maison Martin Margiela consumer

Hedonism

MaterialismUniqueness

Price

Conspicousness

Prestige

Quality

Usability

1515 Typical luxury goods consumer

Hedonism

MaterialismUniqueness

Price

Conspicousness

Prestige

Quality

Usability

1616 Qualitative analysis

Respondents, who knew Maison Martin Margiela have following characteristics:

- They are fashion connoisseurs, 79% of respondents said they have a strong interest in fashion

- They are interested in arts and the creative sector as a - They are interested in arts and the creative sector as a whole, 83% reported they keep informed about new trends appearing in arts

- They are not sensible to advertising, 69% said advertising had no impact on their buying decisions

- They prefer traditional retail channels, only 17% reported they would buy an MMM product on the internet

- Brand identity is very important to them, 52% reported brand identity is as important to them as the product itself

1717 Word clouds

Our respondents perceive Maison Martin Margiela as:

They don’t perceive it as:

1818 Competition analysis

Most of the respondents who knew Maison Martin Margiela, also knew the following brands

18

27

20

25

30

9

12 12

18

0

5

10

15

20

Rick Owens Raf Simons Ann Demeulmester

Dries Van Noten Jil Sander

Managerialrecommendations

E

Consumer of luxury goods

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1919 Current situation

Diesel Group

MMMA shift in decision making

08/06/2011

The acquisition of MMM by the Diesel Group has lead to various changes in management style:

- Martin Margiela, creator of the brand retired, leaving MMM in the hands of the new investor – This resulted in an increased focus on economical performance

- Diesel decided to implement a strategy aiming at increasing customer awareness. The first step was to launch a perfume in collaboration with l'Oreal, that would address a broad audience

- Diesel also recognised the need to target specific customer segments. An example is the campaign against AIDS, MMM launched in 2003

2020 Awareness

Awareness

Awareness is low: although we targeted our

respondents, only 43% knew MMM

Awareness is difficult to raise as 69% of MMM consumers said

not to be

Low awareness can be considered a strength of the company: words

like “mysterious”

08/06/2011

not to be sensitive to advertising

“mysterious”and

“independent” are associated to

MMM

Our research showed that the competitor with the highest consumer awareness was Jil Sander. MMM could pursue a similar strategy:

- Hire a young, creative and trendy designer (Raf Simons)- Increase Co-branding efforts, in order to avoid damaging the MMM brand while improving perception among the broad public (example of J+)

- Sponsor “edgy” personalities in the sector of arts to take advantage of the interest of the target group in the this domain

2121 Loyalty and quality

• Consumers’ loyalty is good, with an excellent brand image: compared to the average luxury goods consumer, MMM consumer buy more products

• 76% of those who knew the brand considered themselves as fans

How to make it even better?

•Creating a community of consumers. Buying MMM is a privilege, and •Creating a community of consumers. Buying MMM is a privilege, and customers have to feel it. Creating a blog commenting on latest trend could be well inspired

•Therefore, MMM should advertize more how much they focus on quality (our research showed that MMM consumers value quality as much as uniqueness and hedonism)

üUse of noble fabric: mostly organic üMade in France and ItalyüExperience in fashion

2222 Distribution & targeting

• The distribution strategy of Maison Martin Margiela is currently focused on its stores. Moreover, an e-boutique was just launched allowing customers to buy products online

• Our research has shown that customers associate MMM with a certain “shopping experience”. Hence, only 17% would buy MMM Hence, only 17% would buy MMM online

Our recommendation

• Our survey showed that it is essential to customers to experience the MMM atmosphere. As stores are still very scarce and their success is based on their exclusiveness, a solution would be to create small buying universes that could be integrated in different environments:- Art fairs- Pop-up stores- Galleries

• Internet is still an area, where MMM has to improve. A website that would be more user friendly could certainly increase the interest of its costumers

LimitationsB11

Consumer of luxury goods

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2323 Limitations and difficulties

• The BrandMaison Martin Margiela appeals to real fashion connoisseurs, which significantly increases the difficulty to gather relevant answer from part of the sample. • The SampleESCP students in spite of their income and social status do not constitute the core audience for luxury goods. Few are those who can actually afford to buy those products on a regular basis. As a result, we had to share the survey with a very large number of As a result, we had to share the survey with a very large number of contacts in order to obtain our results. • The QuestionnaireThe online survey presents strong limits (depth of the analysis, low response rates, no follow-up). • The TimeDue to schedule conflicts and lack of organization, we did not have enough time to conduct field studies that would have helped us obtain more diversified results.