A Swot Analysis Of Zara

1. Introduction

In the modern society, all the enterprises in the face of an increasingly complex social environment, fickle and variable current social situation in the economy, politics, culture and other factors bring both opportunities and challenges to enterprises. To develop in intense market competitions, be prepared is the foundation of all the business activities. To walk on the right way by a clear direction to reach a right goal, planning must be an indispensable and significant process of the business operation.

A strategy is defined as a plan of action designed to achieve a long-term or overall aim by Oxford Dictionary. A strategy is a series of integrated, coordinated action that designed to help organization develop core competencies

Zara is one of the largest international fashion companies. It belongs to Inditex, one of the world’s largest distribution groups. (Zara, n.d.) ZARA brand can be called an alternative brand in the fashion industry, the fast fashion ZARA created are highly respected and has become a major mainstream.

ZARA is one of the popular fast-fashion brands around the world; it sells fashion for men, women and kids, welcoming shoppers in 86 markets with over 1700 strategically-located stores in main cities. (Inditex Group, n.d.) ZARA uses designers as group instead of individual to quick update products at a great extent, besides, company keep low inventory in stock because each new product is supposed to be sold within 10 days. ZARA constitutes around 80% of Inditex business (8 companies) which means a failure in ZARA can put the whole group at a risk. (Inditex Group, 2014) Base on the research, the following is analysis of ZARA by SWOT model.

• Strengths: Good enterprise management status and economic status; Good development space; The broad consumer groups (men, women, children); Great brand attractiveness; Powerful design capability; High speed of product renewal; Parity

Porter’s value chain is a good tool for company to understand their business and determines costs and affects profits. It is a flexible model that all businesses must undertake in some form.

• Disadvantages: Porter’s value chain is a relative professional analysis model, people who are not experts in its use might not benefit from this tool.

4. Conclusion

Like ZARA posted on their official website, they believe that the customer is at the heart of our unique business model, which includes design, production, distribution and sales through our extensive retail network. (ZARA, n.d.) ZARA’s core competencies are related to planning processes and meeting their customers’ needs. The company analyzes business using Porter’s value chain to determine if it can meet the requirement of customer and market better than SWOT analysis. SWOT analysis is an easy model that everyone can use it to get the basic understanding of business; the terms used to describe factors were general and often vague. In the dynamic and turbulent fashion industry, ZARA in the face of complex challenges and opportunities as the most valuable brand in the INDITEX and one of the most popular fashion brands, markets are unsuited to the inherent rationale of the SWOT approach. The dynamic nature of