For a long time, the right to speak and define the global fashion industry has been dominated by the fashion giants in developed countries such as Europe and America. The influence of China clothing brands on the international fashion stage is relatively weak, and there are few brands that can directly affect the global fashion trend. However, with the changes of the times and technological innovation, this pattern is undergoing profound changes. As one of the four major brands in the world, SHEIN, with its excellent innovation ability, efficient supply chain management and unique market strategy, has not only won the enthusiastic pursuit of consumers around the world, but also successfully broken the market structure dominated by international established fashion brands for a long time.
Today, SHEIN is becoming popular all over the world and has become one of the four most popular fashion brands in the world. Recently, in the latest list of "Top Ten Fastest Growing Brands in America" released by Morning Consult, an authoritative consulting company in the United States, SHEIN was selected together with global head brands such as ChatGPT, OpenAI, Facebook and CocaCola, and it is also the only fashion brand selected in the world.
In 2023, SHEIN once again won the global shopping APP download list, and ranked second in the favorite clothing brand of American young people; And together with well-known brands such as Apple, Gucci, Mercedes-Benz, etc., it won the Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands List of Brandz (No.70); In 2022, SHEIN surpassed internationally renowned brands such as Nike and Adidas to become the most searched clothing brand in Google, and replaced ZARA as the most popular fashion brand in the world in 2022. At the same time, SHEIN is also the hottest brand in the United States in ADAGE in 2022.
These honors have witnessed SHEIN’s unparalleled rising speed and extensive influence in the international market.
There are many factors that consumers like fashion, such as the material of luxury goods, brand stories, fashion trends and so on. SHEIN is unique in this respect, and it shows a unique solution when facing some core challenges of the fashion industry. For example, the dilemma that the fashion industry often faces-how to strike a balance between providing a variety of product categories and maintaining high cost performance, SHEIN has successfully overcome this problem and achieved a wide range of products with affordable prices. Another example is inventory management, which is the biggest headache for fashion merchants. With its excellent supply chain management and agile operation strategy, SHEIN has effectively reduced the risk of inventory backlog, thus standing out from the industry.
It can be said that the success of SHEIN is the innovation brought by technology and supply chain efficiency. Through the flexible supply chain, SHEIN can make timely response and adjustment according to the needs of the market and consumers, thus reducing the possibility of inventory waste from the source. In short, SHEIN relies on its innovative flexible supply chain mode of on-demand production, uses the actual market demand to predict sales and control production, and finally reduces overproduction. On the premise of real-time analysis and tracking fashion trends, all SKUs start with very small orders, and each SKU generally starts with 100-200 pieces. If the sales trend is good, the order will be returned immediately, but if the sales are not up to expectations, the production will be suspended.
In addition, thanks to the cost reduction brought by the efficiency improvement of the supply chain, SHEIN gives back 100% of these values to the end consumers and shares the created value with consumers. This move has greatly reduced the sales price of goods, which is also the reason why SHEIN’s products are cost-effective.
SHEIN’s flexible supply chain has become the biggest killer in the fashion field. In the report Agile Supply Chain: A New Source of Competitive Advantage in Fashion Industry, Boston Consulting Group mentioned that innovative agile supply chain represented by SHEIN has become the general trend of the industry, which can bring more potential income, higher capital utilization rate, lower storage discount cost, less waste and more competitive price advantage.
Therefore, the rise and success of SHEIN is not only an individual breakthrough of the brand, but also reflects the role change of China fashion industry from follower to leader in the context of globalization. It provides a brand-new development model for the global fashion industry, showing how technology and innovation can deeply reshape the supply chain, improve efficiency and reduce costs, and then promote the sustainable development of the whole industry. In the future, SHEIN will continue to lead a new round of changes in the global fashion industry with more flexible and efficient supply chain management and unique market strategy, and bring more high-quality and cost-effective fashion products to global consumers.
