Victorians Secret is wholly owned and the largest holding of publicly transcendentalism company. Victorians Secret is known for its catalogs and annual fashion show: the Victorians Secret Fashion Show. Victorians Secret is credited with single-handedly transforming “America’s conception of lingerie” by pioneering “sexy underwear as fashion”and “lingerie mainstream entertainment. ” The societal manifestation is ‘the increased cultural acceptance of shopping for undines” in the United States. Company History . Leslie Weaker founded the Limited, Inc. In 1963 in Columbus, Ohio with two women’s apparel stores.
The Limited grew organically and through acquisition to include 4,600 specialty stores by the end of 2001, with brands such as Bath & Body Works, Express,Learner New York, Limited Stores, White Barn Candle Co. , and Henry Bended. Len 1982, Weaker purchased a small San Francisco-based women’s lingerie chain, named Victorians Secret, with four stores and a catalogue. Victorians Secret, with its boudoir-style stores, took sexy underwear out of girlie magazines and imbued it with a romantic nostalgia. The merchandise showed good taste, and the company made the products easy to buy in environments that were comfortable and inviting.
Over time, the number of stores grew to over 900?by the late asses, nearly every major mall in America had a Victorians Secret store. Catalogue sales grew apace, and total store,catalogue, and web sales topped $3. 2 billion in 2001 (see Exhibit 1, for financial). The business consisted of three segments: Victorians Secret Stores, Victorians Secret Direct(catalogue and the Internet), and Victorians Secret Beauty (makeup and bath products). Case Solution This case illustrates the general strategy employed by Victorians Secret to acquire a new segment of customers through the introduction of its brand Pink.
Pink is line of “lounger” (sweatpants, T-shirts, pajamas, bras and panties, pillows and bedding) targeted toward 18-30 year old females. The garments feature comfortable cuts and mostly cotton fabrics in bright colors. New garments are introduced every three or four weeks. The image is one of “cute and playful” versus the more overtly sexy image of the core brand. The case highlights the different promotional approaches that Pink managers are taking in contrast to those of the core brand. This is a lifestyle brand. The Victorians Secret chain has been a big driver of financial success for Limited Brands (parent company), and
Pink is expected to be a big part of Victorians Secretes sustained growth. Not only does it give the chain a new set of customers, but it brings in customers at a younger age who will then “graduate” up to the Victorians Secret core brands. The ethics of the Pink strategy are considered in detail. 1. Analyze the buyer decision process off typical Pink customer. A typical Pink customer goes through several stages. It starts with the customers recognition that she needs a specific product, whether it is lingerie or even sweatpants or a t- shirt.
The next stage will be the information search among several places that offer fashionable and cool products in order to find out which is the right place to buy. Pink will be easily spotted by possible customers because they can find very good references of Pink products almost anywhere (friends or family or even the Internet). Potential buyers will also find a lot of appealing information about Pink products in many forms of advertising,whether the products are aired on TV in form of fashion shows (as Victoria Secretes products) or in many magazines.
After these stages, the buyer is going to evaluate all the alternatives they have. They ill probably compare Pink products with other brands such as American Eagle’s Aerie or Firebombed & Fitch. However, what differentiates Pink is that it is a sub brand of the universally known Victorians Secret, which many young girls find quite appealing since they are looking forward to buy those products when they are a bit older. The next stage will be actually buying the product.
By this time it will be pretty easy to buy a Pink product because of all the information search and comparison with other brands; and also important because the products are really popular in present times and almost every girl has a Pink product. Finally, the last stage is the post purchase behavior. It involves evaluating the purchased products and comparing it with other products you could have bought instead. 2 . Apply The Concept Of Aspirations Groups To Victoria s Secret Pink Line Should Marketers Have Boundaries With Regard To This Concept ?
The main aspirations groups for the Victorians Secret Pink line comprise of teen and young girls who are now found to be in a hurry to transform into maturity lifestyles in keeping with their older counterparts. Social groups have often criticized the practice adopted by Pink in addressing the weakness of youngsters y encouraging and luring them into adopting extremely adult lingerie and undergarments with the pink label. They have accused the marketing companies of exploiting such traits and depriving them of their childhood lifestyles. 3.
Explain how both positive and negative consumer attitudes towards a brand like Pink develop. How might someone s attitude towards Pink change? If the brand can be related to what the customer aspires to do and achieve in terms of what is hot and cool, or fashionable and stylish in keeping with the tastes and patterns of peer groups, a positive attitude towards it will develop and the customer will atropine the product. A negative approach towards the brand will develop when consumers start disassociating themselves due to its changed nature. . Explain How Both Positive And Negative Consumer Attitudes Toward a Brand Like Pink Develop ? Negative consumer attitudes toward a brand like Pink may develop from parents that spend a lot of money annually buying Pink products to their teen or young adult daughters. They may think that buying them so much Pink products is unnecessary. Positive consumer attitudes toward Pink may develop due to the creation of good and long lasting relationships.
One of he reasons of how Pink’s marketers create good lasting relationships is that every three of four weeks they launch new products in order to stay “fashion” Therefore, Pink customers will never see the same in their Victoria Secret stores; they will always have a cool variety of products from which to choose. Someone’s attitude toward Pink might change negatively by acknowledging that they do not fall within the age range of 18 through 30 years of age.
However, it might change positively by acknowledging that in the next years, they will have even more Pink products and more space to shop thanks to the remodeling of the charity of the Victoria Secretes stores into bigger stores. How might someone ‘s attitude towards Pink change . If the brand can be related to what the consumer aspires to do and achieve in terms of what is hot and cool , or fashionable and stylish in keeping with the tastes patterns of peer groups , a positive attitude towards it will develop and the customer will patronize the product .
A negative approach towards the brand will develop when consumers start disassociating themselves due to its changed nature , or if it is portrayed by PR and Ad agencies as not keeping up with their aspirations . It is in this way that Ad and PR agencies influence and change consumer attitudes. 4 . What role does pink appear to be playing in the self concept of preteens teens and young adults?
Pink as a brand has begun to be recognized by teens and young adults as identifying themselves with the users of Victorians Secret and gives them an ego satisfaction in keeping with its adult image of the high end adult who is able to have an edge over others in terms of its existing brand value, which is brought about by using the Pink label and which they feel makes them belong to a set that is a class apart from the rest. According to the case, many critics say that Pink plays a role in promoting early adolescent sexuality.
This happens because very young girls who go buy their Pink products with or without their mothers, are already exposed to Victoria Secretes sexy products. Furthermore, more evidence is that Pink is known for selling thong underwear to preteens. This leads preteens to feel like there is a need to move from childhood to maturity earlier in order to have more fashion products. Conclusion : Roy Raymond idea for a lingerie shop that was both accommodating for women and for men shopping for women has flourished into the premier enterprise in its industry.
Closing in on three decades since its startup, Victorians Secret has become a household name with worldwide notoriety. Due to the company’s widespread popularity and success, there has been an exceeding interest within the apparel stores industry. Although a portion of the company’s success can be accredited to “Victorians Angels” and its highly attractive advertising campaign, its use of technology and information based decision making has propelled the company to be the top women’s lingerie company in the United States.
