Long-term Objectives

The company has the following as their objectives in the long-term:

1. Save energy, the eco-friendly store:

They are implementing an eco-friendly management model in their shops in order to

reduce energy consumption by 20%, introducing sustainability and efficiency criteria.
This management model sets out measures to be applied to all processes, including
the design of the shop itself, the lighting, heating and cooling systems and the
possibility of recycling furniture and decoration.

2.Produce less waste and recycle:

Zara recycles their hangers and alarms, which

are picked up from their shops and processed into other plastic elements. This is an
example of their waste management policy. Millions of hangers and alarms
are processed each year and both the cardboard and plastic used for packaging are
recycled.

3.Their commitment extends to all their staff, increasing awareness among the
team members:

The Company holds In-company awareness campaigns and specific multimedia-based

training programs to educate their staff in sustainable practices,such as limiting
energy consumption, using sustainable transport and modifying behavior patterns.

4.Use ecological fabrics, organic cotton:

Zara supports organic farming and makes some of its garments out of organic cotton
(100% cotton, completely free of pesticides, chemicals and bleach). They have
specific labels and are easy to spot in the shops.

5.Use bio diesel fuel:

Zara‘s fleet of lorries, which transport more than 200 million items of clothing a year,
use 5% bio diesel fuel. This allows them to reduce their CO

2 emissions by 500 tons.

We can see from the objectives that Zara is aiming to be an environmental-friendly
company. It is their top priority at least until the year 2020.

The opportunities of zara:

1. Increasing Middle Class in Asia weighs as 0.10 with a rating of 3; it is categorized

as highly-rated since it is an important factor. Not only because Asia is a booming
continent in which there are populous countries with growing GDP, but also because
people in Asian countries have the taste which Zara offers for its clothing. Moreover,
people in Asian countries, especially the teenagers and young adults are usually
western oriented. Meaning, they like to follow the trends that the western culture
currently has and adapt those trends in their country. One of those trends is definitely
apparel. Zara‘s rating for this factor is 3, which indicates that the response is above
average because Zara is expanding aggressively in the see merging markets of Asia
(India, China, and Indonesia). They are also the first mover in these countries.
Therefore, we conclude that they have higher response rate.

2.Opportunity to Build Distribution Centers in Developing Countries to Lower Costs

weighs only 0.05 because even though it sounds interesting in order to cut costs of
distributing the finished products, but there are problems that may occur,such as
infrastructure problems in developing countries which might actually

hamper the company‘s super efficient supply and value chain. That is also the reason
why we put Zara‘s response as 1 or poor, because they are not interested in

this option.
3. New Designers for better design weighs a 0.10 with a rating of 3; this is very
important since they are based on fast-fashion which they need to change product
every 2 weeks. Therefore, excellent team of designers is crucial in this business.Since
Zara just cooperated with a lot of new designers, consequently their response is
categorized as above average.

4. Rising Environmental Issues weighs a 0.05 with a rating of 4 or superior; They are
keen to have a good reputation of being an eco-friendly company, they even set their
mission regarding this issue, but too bad that sometimes the consumers do not care
about the eco-friendly issue, especially consumers in Asian-emerging markets like
India, Indonesia, and China. They simply want exclusive and trendy clothes.

5.International Recognition weighs a 0.20 with a rating of 4 or superior

response;undoubtedly this factor is the most important for Zara‘s opportunities
because it is the key to successful expansion. In case of Zara, it is widely-known
across the globe with good reputation in most of the countries. Therefore, it is a
winning point for Zara to have such brand image in the eyes of global consumers.

The Threats of Zara:

1.Fierce Competition weighs a 0.20 with a rating of 4; one of the biggest

threats because of new and affordable products from different stores such as H&M,Fo
rever 21, and Uniqlo may harm Zara in terms of consumers‘ loyalty. The

analysis from Five-Forces also gives us some details about how this fierce
competition can affects Zara. However, somehow, regardless the amount of
advertising investments Zara made, this brand can still enjoy remarkable growth
across the globe. Allegedly it is the supply chain that makes it the winner.Therefore,
we conclude that the response rate is superior.

2. Lawsuit related to Sweatshops weighs a 0.05 with a rating of 2; this threat is not
much of a threat because the cases were not highly publicized, and also because the
company has created a commitment to stop the practice of sweatshops in every
factory; in every country where they produce their products.

3.Possible imitation of goods weighs a 0.05 with a rating of 2; there is a risk of

Zara‘s products being copied, either by their competitor (the designs) or by

irresponsible people that practice counterfeiting. However, since Zara is targeting the
middle-upper class, therefore, it is not much of concern. Moreover, Zara‘s

consumers are popularly known as loyal consumers to the brand.

4.Dilution of Brand Equity weighs a 0.2 with a rating of 4; this is also an important
threat because it can decrease in its brand value in customer eyes. Therefore, Zara is
implementing their best strategies to increase the brand equity. Probably more
significantly to their European consumers through the eco-friendly company
campaign which is highly noticed and precedence by European consumers.

Based on the EFE Matrix result, we see that Zara has a score of 3.45 which indicates a
strong response from Zara towards the opportunities and anticipation of threat.

STRENGTH:

a. Global outreach:

Inditex, as the head company, expands Zara in a large amount of scale. Currentlythey
have more than 1,700 stores in exactly 86 countries around the world. Thiscondition
is one of a good strength that Zara has because as an international brandcompany,
especially in apparel industry, Zara should reach every part of the world.Therefore, a
weight of 0.08 would be adequate for this factor.We rank this strength 3 out of 4
because we think that this factor is definitely one of Zara‘s strengths, even though it is
not their major strength. Therefore, rating 3(minor strength) would be sufficient to
describe Zara‘s condition. In addition,reaching global market is a foundation to step
for an international brand to dominate the industry.
b. Strategic Location

Zara chooses where to locate their stores carefully because they are aiming for a direct
communication strategy to promote their products. They have a unique approach in
locating their store in each countries, and even cities. For example in Indonesia, Zara
locates their stores in almost every big shopping mall because it has a high traffic
everyday and it is the main place for people to go shopping. In France,Zara locates
their store in downtown and main streets as the local people usually walk down the
street to go shopping. We gave this factor 0.08 of weight considering the importance
of convenience for consumers in the industry. Consumers will like it if they can find
good products available at their beloved shopping centers.Since Zara‘s locations are
strategic globally, we therefore give3 of rating for
this brand. It is categorized as their minor strength because we think this is not the ma
in reason why Zara is prominent in fast-fashion industry.

c. Distribution Strategy

In the distribution system, Zara control most of the supply chain and distribution of its
products from the headquarters. Zara has their main manufacturing place in three
different contingents. 50% of the products are produced in Spain, 26% in the rest of
Europe, and the rest 24% percent is outsourced in Asia and Africa. Then
the products were transferred to Zara‘s distribution centers located in Spain to be
exported to Zara‘s stores around the world. We can see that their distribution strategy

is vertically integrated. This requires a high concentration and control form the
headquarters in Spain, and that is exactly what Inditex does. Since the distribution
strategy is integrated, combined with their high technology, the products can be
distributed globally in just a short amount of time. This is the uniqueness of
Zara.They are able to adapt to the latest trend in limited time, using the Hybrid
Communication system, then produce those latest trend with available materials to
cut production time and cost, and after that the products are immediately transferred
to all the stores.We found out that this is strategy has become their strength. An
effective distribution, therefore, has a higher weight of 0.12. In our opinion Zara
deserves 4rating for this factor since this is their specialty.
d.Store Image

Zara is a trendy yet exclusive fashion store. This is the image of Zara from around the
world. A unique concept of fast fashion might become a trendsetter in international
fashion industry. A good store image also drives people to consider Zara when they
want to purchase fashion items. In addition, their excellent customer in-store services
result a loyal behavior from consumers. In the industry with a high level of
competition, consumer loyalty is crucial; therefore we give a high weight of 0.12and
rank of 4 because this strength is a strong foundation for the company which is highly
acknowledged by Zara.

e.Fast Changing Collection

This factor is one the specialties and uniqueness of Zara. Every 2 weeks
Zara published brand new fashion items. This strategy exists to stimulate and refresh

consumer‘s curiosity about Zara‘s products. This is also the strategy to strengthen the

image of Zara as the designer teams always work to find out what the new
designsshould be. The aim is to be the trendsetter of fashion business. However, in
theapparel industry, it is easy to copy the style of designs. Therefore, a rating of 0.09
isgiven for this strategy. In terms of their response towards the factor, we give Zara
4rating since they put high concern on this matter through their business model.

f. Responsive employees:

Employees‘ presence is important inside the store to control, rearrange items, and

also to give information to the customers. Therefore Zara also concerns about

Employees‘ responsiveness

, especially because they claim to have directcommunication as their prominent

marketing strategy. Customer control andsatisfaction sometimes depend on the
service and Zara want to optimize those
satisfactions in order to get the customers‘ loyalty.

On the other hand, sometimesconsumers do not really care about the customer service.
Sometimes they care onlyabout the product and price. Consequently, a weight of 0.03
is given for this strength,as it is not as important as the other strengths. In term of

Zara‘s

effectiveness inresponding to this factor, a rank 3 out of 4 is adequate.

g. Brand Image

We set the brand image as the highest weight of 0.15. We do think that this is
the back bone of every player in apparel industry; again, considering the amount ofco
mpetition in this industry. One of the proofs would be the fact where consumersstill
buy the product from certain brand even though many claim it uses bad fabrics, orthe
price is sometimes too high, and so on. Eventually, they would still come
back because of the image that they will get when they purchase the product. In other
words, this symbolic brand benefits do exist and they are important.The brand of Zara
is famous for their exclusivity and trendy product. Zara wouldnever

have a ‗not up to date‘ image as they always publish new

items in every 2weeks. The strong brand image is admitted around the world. This is
what helps Zarato keep improving and reach the sustainability. Therefore, we give a
full score of 4 interm of their response towards this factor.

WEAKNESSES

a.Limited Stocks

Even though Zara has a fast fashion concept, which is publishing new items inevery 2
weeks, but some of the items are limited. So for some items, they might not be
available in every store. Even though this is actually intentional, but for
consumers,this can be included as a weakness as some customers will not be satisfied
if they did not get the items that they want when they want it and where they want it.
Customer‘s dissatisfaction quite have an effect for Zara, therefore rank 2 out of 4 is
given with weight of 8% considering the fact that this strategy of Zara might actually
be risky.

b.Price

In its country of origin, Zara is categorized as a low-end product. However, Zara is

included in a high-end product in Indonesia and in many other countries, 1 item of
long sleeve shirt can be priced at 600,000 Rupiah. This is one of the weaknesses for
Zara as the customer will think twice to purchase if price is a big consideration for
them. This problem occurs mostly in developing countries, where the GDP per capita
is still relatively low. Even though the middle class segment is growing, but not all of
them are used to spend hundreds of thousand rupiah just to get a T-shirt. Therefore,we
rank a low rate of 1 out of four with larger weight of 12%.

C. Brand image closely tagged to competitors

As mentioned earlier, the problem in apparel industry is that it is very easy to copy

each other‘s designs.

This weakness is one of the toughest to deal with. Beside Zara,there are a lot of other
brands that reach the international market that also build an exclusive image for them
self. Therefore sometimes public cannot
differentiate product from Zara and their competitors. In other words, it is going to be
easy for them to switch from one brand to another. Moreover, this will affect people‘s

judgment that all the brands that in the same level as Zara is actually the same or

similar in term of types and products, or in other words, no clear

differentiation between those brands. As a player in this industry, Zara needs to obtain
consumer loyalty; therefore, we rank this weakness as their major weakness with
rating 1 out of4. However, the weight of this factor is not that high since in apparel
industry, despite the existence of problems in the designs differentiation, a brand can
develop a strategy

to build consumers‘ loyalty, just like what Inditex is trying so hard to do to its brands,
including Zara.

d. Lack of Marketing

Zara is lack of marketing such as promotion and advertisement. In Indonesia it is

very rare to see Zara logo and advertisement outside the store and in public area.
Infact, Zara in different countries also does not have that much of advertisement.
They only depend on the strong brand image that they already have. This can be a
tough weakness if the competitors keep on increasing their marketing strategy,
especially in emerging countries.

From all the strengths and weaknesses we come out with the result of. This is an
average result from a perfect score of 4. So we can conclude that their effectiveness in
utilizing their strengths to cover the weaknesses is satisfactory enough.

The Strategies

A. Integration Strategies

Zara applies the Forward Integration. Since Inditex demands a high

integration between the headquarters and all branches across the globe, therefore
Inditex controlsits retailers and distributors all around the world in order to
standardize the
overall business performance. In addition, Zara also performs some horizontal integrat
ion through its acquisition of Massimo Dutti from the Massimo Dutti group and the
acquisition of Stradivarius.

B. Intensive Strategies

As an aggressive expander in global market; hence, Zara practices the Market

Development strategy in which they are entering new market with Asian-developing
countries being their first targets. Countries include China, India, and Indonesia. That
is why nowadays, almost in every new shopping malls in Jakarta, you can find Zara
store in it. Currently Zara is targeting the Asian market, hoping it will generate
much profit from this promising
market. Not only that it applies the Market Development, Zara also applies the Market
Penetration strategy, especially in European and American markets. Their techniques
of doing this strategy are by improving its online store and increase customer service
in all retail stores.

C. Diversification Strategies

To complete its product lines, also as a form of their differentiation, Zara sells
accessories to complement their main product which is apparel. This kind of strategy
is called the related diversification. Further, Zara also has the unrelated form of
diversification which is the Zara Home. Zara Home is a retail store which specializes
in home fashion and decoration. Zara Home, similar to Zara, emphasizes exclusivity
in all f its products and it is also relatively more expensive than its competitors. Zara
Home is available in 55 countries including Indonesia. However, in Indonesia we can
only find Zara Home store in Plaza Indonesia, Jakarta, Indonesia.

D. Defensive Strategies Zara has no defensive strategy because the company is in

good condition, not in any kind of jeopardy. Therefore, it does not need any defensive
strategy at the moment.

GROWTH RATIO

Based on the financial statement, Zara had a 16% growth of sales. This could be
affected by an improvement on the effectiveness of managing their assets and
inventories. 16% is quite a large number of growths in one year. Net Income had a
growth of 22%. This is even bigger than the sales growth. So, it shows that Zara not
only improve in managing their assets and debt, but Zara is also good in managing
their expenses so that the net income was boosted up.Zara also has an increase of
13.47% in earning per share growth. With an increase of net income, Zara allocates
more from their earning to the outstanding shares.

RESOURCE BASED VIEW ANALYSIS:

The RBV approach to competitive advantage contends that internal resources aremore
important for a firm than external factors in achieving and sustaining competitive
advantage. Therefore, in this analysis, we will look deeper into the internal factors
that Zara is relying on for their success.Further, RBV is divided into three main
categories: Physical Resources, Human Resources, and Organizational Resources. In
order to be valuable, each resource
must be either: (1) rare, (2) hard to imitate, (3) not easily substitutable. The following
arethe analysis of Zara using the RBV:

1. Physical Resources

a. Prime Location: One of the best strategies that Inditex applies to all of
its brands, including Zara is that the stores are always located in prime locations of the
city. If the center of the crowd is in the shopping mallslike Jakarta, then that is where
you will find Zara stores. In European countries and USA, crowds are usually
centered downtown or in shopping streets, and that is exactly where Zara stores are
located.Choosing prime locations give more benefits to the company from the amount
of store visitors which can result more sales created.

b. Attractive Window Displays: Even though Zara does not have many advertising or
commercials, Zara does rely so much on its physical store-experience.
Their ―marketing‖ strategy includes putting attractive and

creative window displays to attract consumers, and maintain them inside the store
with the store ambiance and service; hence, creating an impressive shopping
experience for consumers.

b. Exclusive and Trendy designs: As the leader in fast-fashion industry,Zara is

popular for its fast-changing designs. What makes it interesting is that Zara is able to
provide apparel designs that their customers love and it is consistent, even in a very
short amount of time. Their total designs in 2012 reached 36,000 designs in a year.
That is a marvelous number.
d.Sophisticated IT System: One of Zara‘s secret will be the integrated

information system using the PDA and POS. Both will be explained further in the
following chapters

2.Human Resources

a.Trained designers: In order to boost their product quality in terms of its couture
value, Zara cooperates with many new designers and they give training to the
designers for them to able to produce in shorter lead-time,and adaptive enough to
produce with materials/fabrics that are available instead of designing the apparel first
then finding the material/fabric.That type of operation will cost more also consumer
more time to the company.

b.Caring Employees: In order to enhance the customer service in each of its retail
store, Zara, therefore, train their employees to prove better service, including their
attitude, professionalism, having a sense of belonging to the store, and hard-working.

3.Organizational Resources

a.

Market-oriented Strategy: Just like what the old saying says, the customer is the king.
In the industry with high competition profile,choosing to emphasize on your customer
is important and wise. Because in this type of industry, the key is to be able to make
your customer loy also that they will not shift to other brands easily. By concentrating
on customer‘s demand and preferences, supported by its operational strategies, Zara
shows their commitment towards their customers. That is why Zara‘s customers are
loyal; thus, Zara can reach its position right now.

b.Staff-education: Related with the discussion on Zara‘s human resources,

Zara is concentrating on customer service; thus, the need to educate theirstaff is one
of their top priorities.

c. Eco-friendly: The global warming issue is a hot topic nowadays. Moreand more
companies start to put special attention to deal with this issue.Especially in European
countries, where the society is fully-aware with the importance of eco-friendly
business operation, having a mission
of becoming an eco-friendly company will inevitably bring positive response from the
society. Note that the society is actually the consumers

d. Production strategy: One of the most innovative strategies that Zaraapplies is the
production process. As mentioned before, instead of designing the clothes first, the
designers actually examine the available materials and/or fabrics, then after that they
will design apparel based on the existing material and/or fabrics, therefore, the lead
time can be reduced and costs will be decreased.

e.Value chain: Zara‘s overall value chain differs from its competitors and

it is unbeatable until today, especially its lead time of 2 weeks. Zara‘s value chain is
actually what makes Zara able to produce new designs in just 2 weeks.

The Boston Consulting Group (BCG) Matrix

The BCG Matrix portrays differences among divisions in terms of relative market
share position and industry growth rate. The Question Marks have a low relative
market share position, yet they compete in a high-growth industry. Companies in this
group must decide whether to strengthen them by pursuing an intensive strategy, or
sell them. The Stars represent the organization‘s best long-run opportunities for
growth and profitability.They have high market share and high industry growth rate.
The Cash Cows have high market share but compete in a low-growth industry. As for
the Dogs,they have a relatively low market share and compete in a slow-or-no-growth
industry.

The following is the position of Zara and several other Inditex‘s brands in terms of

BCG Matrix:

 STARS (High Market Share, High Market Growth)

 Question Marks (Low Market Share, High Market Growth)

 Cash Cows (High Market Share, Low Market Growth)

 Dogs (Low Market Share, Low Market Growth)

Zara is placed as Stars because it has high market share and compete in an industry

with a high growth whereas the other Inditex‘s brands such as Stradivarius, Pull&

Bear,and Bershka are placed at the Question Marks since they have lower market
share compared to Zara.

Based on the company‘s annual report presentation, from Inditex‘s overall income in
2012, exactly 66.1% comes from Zara, while Stradivarius, Pull&Bearand Bershka
contributed 6%, 6.8%, and 9.3% respectively.Based on the theory, companies
positioned at Stars should consider the forward, backward, horizontal integration
strategies, market penetration, market development,
and product development strategies. Zara as a leading brand should therefore receive
substantial investment to maintain or strengthen its dominant position. As a result, not
only that it is expanding aggressively across the globe, Inditex as the owner of Zara
has also made several investments specific to Zara in order to remain its position,
those investments include: additional investment for advertising, IT improvements for
better customer service, and hiring new designer teams to strive for becoming a
trend-setter.

The Grand Strategy Matrix

This matrix will determine the company‘s position based on two evaluative

dimensions: competitive position and market growth. Since Zara has a very strong
competitive position and it also has a rapid market growth of 16%, consequently, we
can conclude that Zara is positioned in the 1st Quadrant of the matrix (Quadrant I).

Among the suggested strategies of Quadrant I companies, specifically for Zara,Inditex

has used the market development, market penetration, forward integration, and related
diversification. In general however, Inditex has done twice of horizontal integrations
in the form of acquisition of two brands: Massimo Dutti and Stradivarius.Market
development effort for Zara includes opening new and larger stores in Asian countries
such as China, India, and Indonesia with stronger visual merchandising. They also
increase their product visibility in all the stores across the globe. Market penetration
efforts include enhancing its online-sales expansion in Europe, America, Australia
and South Africa. Moreover, they also enhance the in-store experience to increase the

consumers‘ loyalty.

As for the forward integration, Inditex has been famous for its vertical integration in
which it takes the control over distributors and retailers. All policies regarding
every business activities from the headquarters in Spain all the way down to the retail
stores,wherever it is located, all must be approved by the headquarters first. The
distribution is centralized to Inditex‘s 4 distribution centers which are located in 4
different cities in Spain: Madrid, León, Tordera, and Barcelona. Even though the
products are manufactured in many different countries, every single product must be
exported back to Spain to be then distributed to all Zara stores around the world.

The last strategy is the related diversification. As one of the major player in
fast-fashion industry, Zara has to be able to differentiate its products and increasing
the brand equity with all of its capabilities. Zara does not only sell apparel, but they
also sell accessories to complement the apparel. The accessories are produced with
the same quality standard as the apparel and it is available in all Zara stores
worldwide

The 4Ps of Zara:

1.Product:

Inditex describes Zara as the brand for the latest fashion for women,men, and
children. Product lines include: apparel, footwear and accessories.Inditex also claims
that Zara is not a luxury-brand.
2.Price:

Zara is originally positioned as an affordable brand, however, as itexpands to

developing countries where the GDP/capita is lower from itscountry-of-

origin‘s, Zara in developing countries then shifts its position to the

lower-end.

3.Place:

Zara is now available in 86 countries with total 1,770 stores worldwide. The store is
located in prime locations of the area with high concentration of visitors. In
distributing its products, Zara practices the constant flow of updated data that
mitigates the so-called bullwhip effect the tendency of supply chains to amplify small
disturbances. A small change in retail orders, for example, can result in wide
fluctuations of factory orders after it's transmitted through wholesalers and
distributors. In an industry that traditionally allows retailers to change a maximum of
20 percent of their orders once the season has started, Zara lets them adjust 40 to 50
percent. In this way, Zara avoids costly overproduction and the subsequent sales and
discounting prevalent in the industry (Keller, 2012).

4.Promotion:

In the competitive clothing industry, Zara has successfully built a worldwide famous
brand by a unique management system of design, production and supply

chains. The ―fast fashion‖ concept and operation

Allow Zara to always provide the most fashionable clothes to their customers and the
always renewing collections definitely help build a brand loyalty. This results a
remarkable growth globally with only limited investment on advertisements,or even
none. Inditex on its company report states that its business model includes no
advertisement when entering a new market to avoid the main fixed costs of
international expansion. Moreover, even in its home country, Zara does not rely on
traditional tradition. Instead, they rely on direct communication with consume
CONCLUSION

Zara’s Competitive Advantage

After analyzing the success factors both internally and externally, in this section,we
will derive the core of this analysis, which is the reason why Zara can become such a
strong player in the industry or in other words, the competitive advantage of Zara.

In our opinion, according to what we found during our analysis, one of the
competitive advantage that Zara has and its competitor lacking is the
customer-responsiveness. Even though Zara does not have many investments in
Marketing, but Zara relies on the most important aspect of the business, the customer.
They focus on their customer, listen to what their customers have to say, obtain their
comments and feedbacks, and then use those information to evaluate the next
production, meaning on the next production, they will produce based on the
information given.Consequently, the results will be gratifying for the consumers.

Next competitive advantage that Zara has will be its business operation. Zara‘s

overall business operations, including the design process, production process, and the
distribution process, all are so sophisticated that it enables Zara becomes the fore front
in the industry. Especially because it is combined with their
customer -responsiveness,imagine how impressive it is. Zara is the only brand that has
the capacity to produce the latest design that the consumers demanded, and make it
available at the stores in just 14 days. Because Zara will be the first one to place a
certain design in the store,hence the customers will tend to make Zara their first
choice in shopping or browsing for clothes.
Finally, the excellent business operation together with customer –Responsiveness will
lead to customer loyalty, creating a cycle of growth; the secret success of Zara

Vision, Mission, and Strategies

Throughout the chapters, we have seen the analysis of Zara‘s strategies t

hat they currently have and the ones they should have. Now let‘s recall the vision and
mission that underlies the whole strategies and see whether the strategies that Zara has
now are sufficient in order to achieve the stated vision and mission.

Zara in its vision stated that it aims to satisfy the desires of its customers.They pledge
to continuously innovate their business to improve customer experience.Up to

this point, we think that Zara‘s strategies are already aligned and so far effective
enough to drive the company closer to achieving the vision. Think of Zara‘s effort in

obtaining feedback from consumers in order to understand the consumers and

therefore able to produce the designs that the consumers love. Moreover, Zara also
never stops improving its in-store customer experience through employee trainings
and direct communication with the consumers. Further, in the vision statement Zara
also promises to provide new designs made from good materials and also
affordable.With the information Zara gets from customers, Zara is able to provide
good designs with available materials and therefore can lower the production cost as
well as the production time. As a result, a more affordable outcome of products can be
distributed to end consumers.

In addition, in its mission statement, Zara states that it aims to contribute to

sustainable development of society and environment it interacts with. In this case,Zara
proves that its decision to outsource its manufacturing process to other
countriesBusinessOperationCustomerLoyaltyCustomer -responsiveness has brought a
positive impact for the host country, as we recall the example of India.Moreover,
especially for environmental issues, Zara has committed to help reduce the emission
and create an eco-friendly business and the commitment is still strongly upheld until
today. Even now there are more and more concrete moves that the company is doing
in order that this mission can be achieved, including investing more money on
creating a eco-friendly business operation starting from the headquarters,the
manufacturing plants, and all the way down to the stores across the globe.

In conclusion, looking from the strategies that Zara is doing now, we can say that
these strategies are aligned with the vision-mission and that these strategies are
effective and sufficient enough for the company to achieve the stated vision and
mission.