Month: October 2013

It seems as though trendy clothing retailer, Abercrombie & Fitch, has always been known for its strict employee dress code. Just last week, however, the company finally agreed to modify the company’s “Look Policy”, after being faced with an employee discrimination lawsuit. The company fired Hani Khan from a store in San Mateo, California, after she insisted on wearing a head scarf because of her Muslim beliefs. Feeling discriminated, Khan brought the case to court, and the court ruled that the company “violated anti-discrimination laws”. In response to this lawsuit, hijabs, or head scarves, are now permitted for employees, a change to the policy. In addition, Abercrombie & Fitch will also “submit biannual reports to the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission for the next three years regarding the new policies”. The company said in a statement that they are “happy to have settled these cases and to have put these very old matters behind [them]”.  This case highlights marketing and company ethics butting heads at Abercrombie & Fitch. Having employers look trendy and dress a certain way is a part of the company’s marketing methods – they want customers to view them in a certain image. However, Khan being fired for insisting on wearing her headscarf shows that there was a flaw of discrimination in the employee’s “Look Policy”. I am happy to see that the company did take steps to modify the employee dress code, and hope they are taking a step in the right direction in continuing to assure that their dress code and the freedom of their employees’ beliefs align.

Articles:

http://www.businessinsider.com/abercrombie-and-fitch-changes-look-policy-2013-9

http://www.ctvnews.ca/world/abercrombie-and-fitch-wrongly-fired-worker-over-head-scarf-judge-1.1446859

Every fashionista out there would have thought that Tamara Mellon, co-founder of luxury shoe company Jimmy Choo, was living the dream and loving her $900 million dollar business that she co-founded with her parents’ money. It would not be hard to imagine that she was content and loving the life that her company gave her – having an extravagant clothing allowance, being pampered by her own make-up artist and hair stylist on call, and being invited to A-list parties. Believe it or not, though, that was not at all the case. It turns out, for the majority of the time, Mellon felt “aggrieved”. She says that she was “unappreciated by executives at the company and exploited by the private equity investors who funded its expansion”, and was “betrayed by those close to her”. Mellon left Jimmy Choo in 2011 with $135 million and never wanted to look back, and released her book of resentment called In My Shoes. This season, though, Mellon is launching Tamara Mellon, her own line of shoes and clothes, with products in the collection still made in the same factories in Italy as Jimmy Choo. What is unique to Tamara Mellon is that instead of releasing a line every season, just like other high end luxury companies, she will release new products every month. Just last week she was preparing for fashion week in Paris. She is now happy that she “[has] the luxury now to choose who [she has] in [her] business”, people with “good ethics and values”. This goes to show just how crucial relationships are internally for a company. In this case, a company’s own co-founder left her company just to break free of being mistreated by her own team – something that should never happen. This demonstrates to be a flaw in the values of the company, proving that team-building is essential for a business to thrive.

Article: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-10-04/jimmy-choo-co-founder-tamara-mellon-puts-on-her-revenge-boots

There once was a time when social media giants Facebook and Twitter were advertisement-free. Just last week, Instagram hopped onto the newsfeed-advertisement bandwagon when it announced that it will also start featuring advertisements on users’ news feeds – an action which we cannot say we did not see coming. The question now is, will this decrease the amount of users the photo-sharing service will have in the future? Instagram assures users that it will start out slow though – it will show advertisements “only occasionally and only from companies that are already members in good standing of the Instagram community”. The company says they will aim to make advertisements “as natural to Instagram as the photos and videos [users] already enjoy”. This is a way of the company expanding their business model – they have added another method of revenue stream in the business model canvas by going forward with this decision and will now gain revenue from their advertising clientele. In my personal opinion, I do not think that advertisements on Instagram feeds would necessarily be a bad thing for users – if Instagram really is going to be careful in what they advertise and expose unique and interesting companies and users whom I would have never discovered, then I am all for it.

Article:  http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-10-03/instagram-will-have-ads-dot-get-over-it