Introduction
Max Mara is the best-known name of a number of lines produced by the Maramotti family which include Sportmax, Weekend (lower priced with less expensive fabrics), I Blues (separates), Penny Black and Marella (lower priced), Pianoforte (evening clothes), Max and Co, and Marina Rinaldi (for larger sized women). It is one of the largest if not the largest manufacturers of women’s clothes in Italy.
What is more, Max Mara Group is one of the most important groups worldwide today, with 23 brands, and more than 4,500 employees in the different premises and estimated revenue of over $2 billion. SIZE: Revenue: EUR 1,16 billion Revenue: EUR 1,16 billion Net Profit, to EUR 55,1 million Aggregate turnover of the Group: 1,166 MLD € MISION Shapes, colours and fabrics: over 50 years of ideas and dreams that have become reality.
Today the company is run by son and chairman Luigi Maramotti, and its design director is Laura Lusuardi, who consists Max Mara classic style. Maramotti’s brother Ignazio and sister Maria Ludovica also work for the company. So it is kind of family business.
Brands & products/product lines
As we can see, Max Mara fshion grouop is a multi-brand company. In fashion, line and brand extensions often result from an articulation of brands under the same family-brand (brand endorsement). For Max Mara, these new brands and lines are internal creation. And each brand accounts for at least 10 percent of total revenue.
And for multi-brand, Max Mara is an interesting example; where segments are related to the Max Mara world, we have new labels that hark back to the Max Mara label (Marella, Max & Co, Sportmax). Why created a multi-brand group? mainly to acquire know-how to increase market presence with a proposal targeted to different specific segments, and this multi-brand strategy is multilevel reach different targets and to increase the penetration of the market, but avoid mass distribution. The Max Mara collection is dedicated to glamour chic women who enjoy rediscovering a refined yet dynamic and practical look in everyday life.
A modern and contemporary woman with a sophisticated and refined image, a look in line with the trends and suitable for the different occasions of modern life. The Sportmax collection was conceived in 1969 by Max Mara’s creative team as a more practical and eclectic proposal compared to the company’s stylistic tradition. This brand id for the tastes and requirements of new generations. Max&Co. is a project dedicated to young women searching for a personal style made of dresses, accessories and ideas to be freely mixed creating new and transversal languages and codes.
Made in Italy quality combined with style, glamour and intelligent design–at a relevant low price. Weekend–lower priced with less expensive fabrics The Weekend brand was born from the need to dress customers in every moment of their day with practical and functional garments. iBlues is a brand that proposes a sensual and feminine look with winning shapes and colours. It is designed for curious and daring women who follow the fashion world, love to be part of it. Marella–(lower priced) Marella offers a complete and diversified collection with a fresh and contemporary feel in line with today’s moods and lifestyle.
Marella always careful to maintain a quality-price balance for its customers. Pennyblack offers a style that is constantly keeping up with the items, highly aware of trends without exasperating tones in a relevant low price. Marina Rinaldi(for larger sized women) has represented a milestone in costume history by being the first in the world to propose a collection of clothes and accessories for curvy women. The goal is to create garments in line with the trends with refined materials and sartorial details. Persona targets all young women with an innovative and transversal concept.
The Business Model
The company position Max Mara, king of Italy’s ready-to-wear revolution As well acknowledged, Max Mara is the symbol of made in Italy! –The Max Mara Group treasures and constantly develops its know-how regarding the manufacture of garments. For this reason a company of the Group is dedicated to representing the excellence of Made in Italy products as regards the manufacture of women’s coats and suits. But the firm’s beginnings were rather humble by comparison. After more 60 years’ developing, now Max Mara is a model and reference point for Italian and international pret-a-porter.
Max Mara is famous for its classic style, luxury fabric and unique technical skills in knitting textile. The value of the company products: Max Mara is famous for its classic style, luxury fabric and unique technical skills in knitting textile. Love for tailoring and a passion for dressmaking are key aptitudes handed down by the great grandmother of the founder, Marina Rinaldi, who in 1850 owned and managed an important atelier in the centre of Reggio Emilia: everything was done by hand with great attention to detail and the finishing touches.
Max Mara pursues the continuous improvement of the quality of Max Mara products. The firm also maintains a respected modern art collection that is frequently displayed to the public. The result is skilfully manufactured coats, short coats, jackets and suits that become true works of art, unique of their kind. The Max Mara winter coats are a lynchpin in many women’s wardrobes, made of the finest wools including cashmere blends and pure cashmere, usually in classic cuts, but with enough variations each season to keep them up-to-date. con the wool and cashmere blend ladies’ camel coat-“101801” coat Intangibles an early forerunner of diffusion lines.
Today the company has many labels, catering to clients of all ages,sizes,needs and tastes. Company and Legal Information Max Mara S. R. L. issued capital 13. 000. 000,00 EurosSole Shareholder Company. Max Mara GroupMaxMara is an example of an Italian family business gone global The tpye of its label: ready-to-wear.
But small stores can compete by offering unique merchandise, targeting a specific demographic, providing superior customer service, or serving a local market. So the group should take adventage of being a large company. The industry is labor-intensive: annual revenue per worker is about $145,000. Competition for the clothing store industry includes department stores, discount stores, and Internet and catalog retailers.
Level of income:$40,000+/per year Education:high level education Services: Max Mara was one of the first companies to market its product as fashionable, high-quality, and affordable A conveniently located stores are operated in 105 countries worldwide. the nunber of monobrand stores reaches 2258 to let target customers has a easy way to get products. offers the customer complete information about the different lines ,and the heritage of max mara fashion group online. The headquarters complex for Max Mara, Italy’s leading fashion house, is a low energy-use development on a 30ha rural site south of Milan.
Professional services: control of originality of products, conformity check of purchase orders, production quality control for supplies of clothes and accessories producted with the “Made in Italy” labels in order to protect traders, department stores, chain stores , importers, exporters, wholesalers and brokers. Besides, services also include online view of the brands, catalogue and online shop. Opportunities for the customers Using luxury materials offered by Swarovski . such as The latest Max Mara eyewear collection using a Swarovski Crystal Fabric coating with tiny, extra-dark crystals scattered on the temples.
The Path Of Evolution industrial companies that were working toward building powerful brands. The company follows the transfer of the Max Mara production department active since 1951 to a modern factory, now produces over 100,000 Max Mara garments, carefully conceived following a profitable exchange with the Style department of the different lines. And the enterprise worths more than $1,000,000,000. With more than $1 billion in sales, Max Mara is one of the largest and most secretive fashion firms in Italy. Most of its business is in clothing, but Max Mara is buying other companies to produce more handbags and shoes.
Its trendy Max & Co. line is growing, with 40 to 50 stores planned for the U. S. over the next five to six years. Max Mara Wholesale As an Italian fashion house known for its ready-to-wear clothing, In fact, the company present with all its brands in 90 countries with 2,254 stores, Max Mara fashion house states not only its great success but also that of the italian fashion all over the world. The international fame it gained is due both to its high fashion collections of wonderful style, manifacture and design, and to its ready-to-wear nice clothing, which is very appreciated for its good value.
Max Mara is therefore associated with the best of Italian fashion and give prestige to Made in Italy in the world. To ensure that these valuable clothing are the true representatives of Made in Italy in the world, Brand Authenticity propose itself as a company that certifies products originality to all wholesalers, distributors and suppliers of Italian fashion at international level.
Besides owning retail stores, Max Mara fashion group also adopt the form of franchise which constant growth in 2008, with an average of 20 to 30 percent. and the Estimated turnover figures for MONOBRANDS in 2008 is 2,1 million EUR. now the monobrand stores cover the shopping centers all around the world. they represent the products and collections through innovative and technological display concepts, which involve the public through new consumption experiences and knowledge of the product. It’s very convenient for customers to buy the products they want.
What’s more, in the monobrand stores, a complete collection can be presented and it is a powerful vision flow for the customers, and express the concept of the brand more deeply. But operating monobrand store costs more than relying on other retailers. Besides, the segments of customers will low down. but in multibrand store, there is the cross-buying phenomenon. Online store: It is a good platform to present its all production at a lower cost, and it is the fast way to let the world know that new collection or products will or have launched.
Because now the fashion group owns six manufacture plants, and the manufacturing combing the expertise of the personal with strong technological development and the quality of manufacturing processes to production excellence. The processing of a garment starts with the cutting of the fabric with the help of advanced technologies, the semi-finished product is then run along the entire production line on air in order not to damage it in any way. The product quality is also guaranteed by an in-depth study of processing methods and by quality control throughout the phases of the production cycle. Once the product is finished, the final inspection is carried out following a strict protocol: certain trimmings are then added by hand in a sartorial way.
Design Max
Mara remains a family company although, interestingly, no member of the family is a fashion designer. Max Mara rely on freelance designers to sustain the stylistic identity of the brand (or combine the two solutions). And Max Mara is real different from other well-known fashionable brands. The basis of the Max Mara design philosophy is understated, easy to wear clothes in luxury fabrics, with an emphasis placed on quality of cut and production.
The company consistently emphasizes the requirements of the Max Mara customer and the importance of innovation has always been carefully balanced by wearability. Tailoring is one of the company’s strong points, Under this situation, Max Mara turn the focus on manufacturing instead of design. Annually, new products designed are in a little percentage, and they only do the presses and shows of they new collections and haute couture.
Retail Main market: the company’s main market is the European market, the second one is the East Asia market including the area of Japan, and the third one is American. The fashion group owns a distribution company. And the group itself is a retailer. The mass segment is the fashion retailers’ territory. The strategy can be summarized as follows: deliver new, fashionable merchandise to large, welcoming stores at a convenient price.
But Max Mara operates in relevent high price segments. And it has industrial backgrounds and, in general, are vertically integrated in value chain activities (design, industrialization, and manufacturing). The fashion group reported it closed 2009 with a 33% decrease in its net profit, to EUR 55,1 million, compared with the previous year.
The revenues of the group decreased by 7,7% to EUR 1,16 billion. The annual report of the group also mentions that considerable investments have been made to maintain the prestige of its brands. The company reported that in the first months of 2010, sales have seen a slight improvement, however, remains cautious about the overall performance. ?. Communication/interaction The Communications Archive is a collection of materials from the Communications and Advertising Departments of all Max Mara Group companies from the early 1960’s to the present day.
The fashion group stress a lot on providing promotion programmes, and they also spend an amount budget on communication.
Marketing activities are targeted to consumers and media. Advertising of collections in press and official websites,fashion shows of pre-fall ,spring rtw,resort and fall rtw. runways and campaigns which presents the latest images and collections. They are advertised in fashion magazines,official websites and main fashion websites like style. com and vogue. com.
The magazine with which Max Mara talks with readers worldwide, presenting its vision of fashion and image through the glossy content-rich pages. The group once hired famous photographers like Richard Avedon, Sarah Moon, Paolo Roversi, Fabrizio Ferri , Arthur Elgort, Albert Watson? Giampaolo Barbieri to catch the soul of each collection.
The Max Mara Group takes part in important partnerships with schools and universities related to the fashion sector and other fields; the idea is to transfer their enthusiasm and passion to youngsters and to give them the opportunity to be part of the Max Mara world through work placements, and project work, to prepare them for a possible entry in one of the Group’s companies.
To support the development and growth Max Mara has chosen to invest in young people. Graduates and school leavers who come to work in the companies of the Group are the investment in the future. In-company and on the field training but not only this; through the Giulia Maramotti Foundation vocational training courses are organised dedicated to the different professional roles of the fashion world: from the style sector to modelling and technical design.
Licence
Because Max Mara is focus on the area of clothing manufacturing, so weak in the shoes, fragrance, leather goods and sunglasses area, so it needs other industrial company cooperation to produce high quality goods. And normally, it is through licence. Like we find that for the fragrance part, Max Mara licence to Selective Beauty–a exclusive worldwide licence agreement for the creation, development and distribution for fragrance under the Max Mara brand.
The contract will run through Dec. 016. Prior to this licence, the Max Mara fragrance was managed by a jiont venture with Procter-Gamble. w For glasses and sunglasses 12th April 2006 – Safilo Group(MTA: SFL), worldwide leader in the luxury and high end eyewear sector, and Max Mara Group, the international clothing and accessories brand, today announced the extension to 2013 of the current licensing agreement for the design, production and worldwide distribution of Max Mara branded prescription glasses and sunglasses.
Furthermore, the two companies have reached an important agreement that foresees the development and distribution of glasses under the Max. brand. The launch of the new Max. collection, which will be primarily dedicated to a market with a young and fashionable target, is planned for 2007.
In recent years Collections continued to develop and two important cultural projects have come to life: the itinerant exhibition “Coats! ” (a fascinating journey through the history of Italian fashion following the history of coats, Max Mara’s icon garment) and the opening to the public of the Maramotti Collection, with over two hundred works of art by around one hundred international artists from 1950 up to today, including Vito Acconci, Francis Bacon, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Alberto Burri, Francesco Clemente, Tony Cragg and so on.
