Back in September, I was invited by my friend to join a group for our assignments in class. Although I didn’t know most people in my group, I quickly came to realize how amazing our group is. Everyone had such great work ethic, and most importantly we had a very interesting group dynamic. We all had very distinct personalities and skillsets, which I believe contributed a lot to the advantage of our team.

The video assignment in particular was my favourite part of the assignment. The first assignment scared us all, and we all spent a significant amount of time trying to research for superficial facts about our company, lululemon atheltica. We found a lot about the company’s background and yoga industry in general to create a SWOT analysis. After the first assignment, we all became quite familiar with the topic of yoga and active lifestyle of North American women. By then we were able to make intelligent assumptions to come up with our STP. The reason why I was personally excited about the last assignment was because throughout the process of all our assignments, it was genuinely interesting to have developed personal opinions about the company. How we, as a group, think lululemon could increase their marketing initiatives through media, or to continue targeting North America instead of expanding.

It’s one thing to learn concepts and memorize marketing related terms on the textbook, but for us to actually spend time critically thinking what we can recommend to a company from a marketing consultant’s position was one of the most exciting parts of the course. Honestly speaking, we were all thinking “oh no, not another SWOT analysis” in the beginning. But near the end, the fact that we were able to apply our knowledge and intuition to simulate a consultant’s role made me realize how much we have all learned compared to the beginning of Comm 296 in September.

Who doesn’t love items on discount? 

Nowadays, there are malls dedicated for these ‘discount stores’ called outlets or outlet malls. The general idea is that there are stores with same items from the same brand, but at a cheaper, discounted price. Upside to having outlet stores is that a brand can increase their sales. Their products become more ‘accessible’ and affordable to the consumers who otherwise could not afford it.

However, the reason why these outlet stores exist is due to the fact that the prices are just relatively high for a certain brand, for example, Coach. Now that the same products are available for same price, the consumers with higher income sees less value in their products when they see consumers with lower income, such as teenagers, using the same products.

Les Wexner, CEO of Limited Brands, says “the outlet business is easy money, [but] discounting yourself is the beginning of the end…it’s hard to have a dual identity. Outlet doesn’t build a brand.” I couldn’t agree more with his statement.  The reason why this is so true relates to my previous argument. Coach was initially launched as a mid-luxury brand. And as with any sort of luxury brand, most consumers purchase luxury brand items to get social validation from peers, and also to portray that they are from a different social status. Making those items at a lower price defeats its entire purpose. At the end of the day, loyal Coach customers will continue purchasing the products but ultimately, Coach depreciates its name value and place in the luxury brand industry by increasing their outlet stores.