Daily LInks
1. What Do 30 Million Zillennials Want? The Who, What and Why: This is the name for that hybrid population born between 1990 and 2000 (that’s 23- to 33-year-olds), which bridges millennials and Generation Z. – Read More on Forbes
2. Luxury stocks rally from China reopening, but world’s largest luxury market may choose to shop “in-house.” Years of zero-Covid measures have taught Chinese consumers they can get their fix of opulence on their own shores — and experts say this habit is here to stay. – Read More on CNBC
3. From Shoes to Insurance: Startups Latch onto the AI Hype Cycle. Silicon Valley’s attention has decidedly shifted. The new obsession: artificial intelligence. And every company is angling for a piece. – Read More on Bloomberg
4. Canada Goose Joins Growing List of Luxury Brands Offering reCommerce: “We’re leaning into where Gen Z and millennials are,” CEO Jamie Iannone said. “There’s a bigger focus on sustainability, and ‘re-commerce.’” – Read More on PYMNTS
5. The Nike x Tiffany & Co collab is a match made in branding heaven: Arnault believes constant novelty and creativity is crucial to the success of modern luxury brands. “You need to be a part of the cultural conversation.” – Read More on Fast Co.
6. Coinbase wins dismissal of lawsuit claiming it sold tokens illegally: U.S. District Judge Paul Engelmayer in Manhattan said customers who transacted on the Coinbase and Coinbase Pro trading platforms could not show that the company sold or held title to the 79 tokens, a form of digital asset, they traded. – Read More on Reuters
1. Bernard Arnault Takes on Elon Musk With SPAC Deal to Take Lotus Public: Lotus Technology, the electric-car maker owned by China’s Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co., said Tuesday its agreed to merge with L Catterton Asia Acquisition Corp. in a transaction that values the combined entity at about $5.4 billion. – Read More on Bloomberg
2. Plenty of Demand for Brick-and-Mortar Luxury Retail: No longer mostly consolidated in New York and Los Angeles, areas such as Phoenix, Austin, and Nashville are gaining in popularity, according to recent foot traffic data from Placer.ai blogger Bracha Arnold. – Read More on Globe Street
3. Men dominated 2021 ranks of highest-paid CEOs in S&P 500: But execs. from Ross Stores, Coach-owner Tapestry, etc. among the top on female-specific list. – Read More on S&P Global
4. Europe’s luxury stocks have room to rise, but becoming costly: An index of European luxury goods retailers has rallied around 18% so far this year, outperforming the wider pan-European STOXX 600, which is up 6.2% in the same time frame. – Read More on Reuters
5. Rent the Runway Announces Corporate Debt Restructuring: The company says the transaction enhances its ability to pursue its growth goals by extending maturity to October 2026 and reducing cash interest payments significantly. – Read More in Press Release
6. German retail sales post surprise plunge in December amid rising prices: Retail sales decreased by 5.3% in December compared with the previous month, the federal statistics office said on Tuesday. Analysts polled by Reuters had forecast a 0.2% rise in price-adjusted terms. – Read More on Reuters
1. We were told a fashion rental revolution was coming. It never arrived: Although the sharing economy has changed the way we live, fashion and accessories is the one sector where it has not taken hold, despite initial interest. – Read More on SCMP
2. Kering shares flat after Gucci names creative director: The label has been losing momentum in recent years after stellar growth in 2015-19. De Sarno will be tasked with reviving the fortunes of a brand that accounted for 2/3 of Kering’s profits in 2021. – Read More on Reuters
3. ChatGPT Spotlights Microsoft’s Early Efforts to Monetize AI: The software company said last week that it was pouring billions of dollars more into OpenAI, whose chatbot ChatGPT can answer difficult questions, write book reports and compose poetry in seconds. – Read More on the WSJ
4. China’s domestic e-commerce hits 13.79 trillion yuan in 2022, growing 4%: In 2022, overall domestic e-commerce sales recorded a steady increase, reaching 13.79 trillion yuan, up 4% year-on-year. Online sales in rural areas reached 2.17 trillion yuan, up 4.9% year-on-year. – Read More on Global Times
5. LVMH, L’Oréal Among Suitors for Stake in Aesop: LVMH and L’Oréal SA are among the luxury consumer companies weighing offers for a stake in Aesop that may value the high-end cosmetics brand at $2 billion or more, people familiar with the matter said. – Read more on Bloomberg
6. SPAC IPOs, deals fell in 2022: There were 86 SPAC IPOs in 2022, compared to 610 in 2021, according to S&P Global Market Intelligence data. The reversal of the SPAC market coincided with increased regulatory scrutiny and rising interest rates. – Read More on S&P Global
7. RELATED READ: Lanvin’s IPO – Can the Chinese Group Make a Name for Itself in Luxury? One need not look further than the group’s announcement of the SPAC back in March, in which it touted its “strong foundation in Europe combined with a unique position to capture significant growth opportunities in the world’s largest luxury markets – N. America and Asia. – Read More on TFL
1. Why China’s luxe shoppers are shunning the West: “A lot of consumers already have the habit to purchase locally for the luxury goods. And also, given the policy of repatriation, a lot of consumption will also happen in Hainan.” – Read More on Yahoo
2. Behind the second-hand luxury watch boom: Gen Z buyers who shop sustainability, scarcity, the lure of vintage & a rise in online selling. The difficulty of buying new models is another factor. Watch brands from Rolex to Richard Mille are seeing the benefits of entering the pre-owned market. – Read More on SCMP
3. Gibson and Heritage agree to end trademark and antitrust legal battle: Heritage Guitar Inc. agreed to drop its antitrust lawsuit against Gibson Brands Inc. in a settlement that also ended Gibson’s trademark counterclaims—which a Michigan federal judge had already deemed “baseless.” – Read More on Bloomberg
4. Fashion and beauty brands turn to ‘we made too much’ sales to offload inventory: She went on to say that packaging a sale under the guise of having too much of one product is a clever and easy way to get rid of unsold merchandise without having a big to-do about it. – Read More on Modern Retail
5. Gucci Names Sabato De Sarno as New Creative Chief: More recently, Gucci’s sales growth has lagged behind some major rivals such as Louis Vuitton and Dior, both owned by luxury juggernaut LVMH. Those brands tend to appeal more to older, wealthier consumers who seek out products that are unlikely to go out of style. – Read More on the WSJ
6. ‘Vegan,’ ‘sustainable’: How to spot misleading fashion claims. “Brands are really defining sustainability based on their own interpretations [of various sustainability buzzwords] in order to justify salary, growth and profit.” – Read More on Washington Post
7. E-Commerce Retail Just Passed $1 Trillion For the First Time Ever: E-commerce hit $1.09 trillion in the U.S. in 2022, with the last quarter accounting for $332.2 billion. A key driver? Mobile, which grew at twice the rate of desktop e-commerce. – Read More on Forbes
1. Italy Starts Seizing Large-Scale Fake E-Commerce Websites: Italian officials have this week begun seizing what could be one of the world’s largest networks of online fake shops that have defrauded customers by appearing to offer discounted goods from luxury brands that never materialize. – Read More on Bloomberg
2. Following a wave of retail IPOs, delisting notices hit the industry: Investors are losing confidence in some retailers’ ability to perform in a climate where shoppers are pulling back spending, supply chain constraints impact operations and a possible recession is looming. – Read More on Modern Retail
3. ‘Cultural appropriation’ testimony derails ‘O.M.G.’ dolls trademark trial: A California federal judge declared a mistrial on Wednesday in a trademark lawsuit brought by toymaker MGA Entertainment Inc to contest claims that it copied designs for its “L.O.L. Surprise! O.M.G.” dolls from pop group OMG Girlz. – Read More on Reuters
4. Is Dall-E the Next Dior? How AI Is Trying to ‘Make It Work’ in Fashion: As the AI art generators that have been “stealing work” from artists and even winning art competitions begin to move on to new industries like fashion. – Read More on PC Mag
5. Building the Circular Economy: Finance leadership in the sustainable fashion revolution. The fashion industry it may be on the cusp of a revolution in how it sources materials based on reuse rather than new production. – Read More on Forbes
6. Skinny jeans still a great fit in shrinking economy, Levi CEO says: Bergh said the company’s top-selling women’s items were the 311 and the 721 – both skinny jeans – although half of its revenue in the bottoms category in the quarter came from looser and baggier fits. – Read More on Reuters
1. How Retailers Use Sustainability and Modern Marketing to Drive Brand Loyalty: Sustainable business practices help retailers differentiate and gain customer loyalty by offering greater transparency on individual product life cycles. – Read More on SAP
2. Inflation is cooling, but prices on many items are going to stay high for months: To protect against unpredictable price spikes, many companies have long-term contracts that set the prices they pay to operate their businesses months in advance. – Read More on CNBC
3. Block Inc. Can Keep Using Name in H&R Block Trademark Spat. A split Eighth Circuit reversed a trademark injunction won by H&R Block Inc. – Read More on Bloomberg
4. Get Ready for the Fourth Wave of E-Commerce: Brand manufacturers are developing their own DTC channels with the potential to capture large amounts of end consumer data. – Read More on Inc.
5. Almost one in three U.S. adults have purchased a luxury good in the last month: Despite inflation remaining at relatively high levels, consumers are still purchasing luxury goods, with 30% of adults purchasing at least one luxury item within the last month. – Read More on Yahoo Finance
6. Hong Kong’s retail market faces ‘slow recovery’ as surging Covid-19 cases rain on the parade of city’s open border: A recent uptick in the number of enquiries from potential shop tenants betting on a flood of mainland visitors returning will be short-lived. – Read More on SCMP
7. Prada’s Lorenzo Bertelli sets out ‘soft transition’ to new leadership: Bertelli added that the group is still assessing the feasibility of a dual listing on the Milan stock exchange, to complement the one it has in Hong Kong. – Read More on Reuters
1. Consumers Tired of Inflation Scrimp—and Splurge: People are also looking for luxury at more affordable price points in the secondhand market. “That’s allowing them to do more revenge spending than they have been doing before.” – Read More on the WSJ
2. Why K-pop rules fashion week: As South Korean pop music becomes an increasingly global obsession, and as luxury megabrands sign more and more deals with its leading stars, K-pop groups’ fanatical young followers have become a fixture. – Read More on CNN
3. RETRO READ: Fashion Brands Continue Leverage the Power of Asia’s Biggest Pop Stars. Add to LVMH’s eagerness to invest in Korean companies the interest of the fashion industry (as a whole) in the country’s biggest stars. Chanel and Fendi, for example, continue to tap K-Pop stars to appear in their campaigns and sit in the front row of their runway shows. – Read More on TFL
4. Luxury boom shows the staying power of the ultra-rich: One of the most interesting differences between the post-Covid luxury boom and the post-2008 market is that, this time around, there seems to be no worry about conspicuous consumption. Perhaps this is a hangover from the “greed is good” Trump era. – Read More on the FT
5. Big opportunities are in luxury goods that have a lot of price leverage: Beauty and luxury remain top sectors amidst growing caution on the middle- and low-income consumer, Oliver Chen, senior research analyst at Cowen. – Read More on Bloomberg
6. Inflation Isn’t Just Pinching Wallets. It’s Squeezing Handbags, Too: “Our Quarterly Handbag Promo Tracker suggests there could be demand risk in the accessory and handbag segment as the pressure of inflation creeps to higher household income brackets.” – Read More on Barron’s
1. Judge dismisses Whole Foods workers’ lawsuit over ‘Black Lives Matter’ masks: U.S. District Judge Allison Burroughs found little evidence to refute Whole Foods’ “legitimate business explanations” for strictly enforcing the dress code, and no significant evidence it targeted the plaintiffs by firing them in the summer of 2020. – Read More on Reuters
2. Adidas’ Recent Trial Loss Unlikely to Deter Brand Enforcement: The fear among large brands is that without aggressive prosecution, a once-distinctive trademark may lose its value as more and more third parties begin to use similar looking marks. – Read More on Bloomberg
3. RELATED READ: Thom Browne Beats Out adidas in Stripe-Centric Trademark Battle. At the heart of adidas’ case was its claim that consumers “are likely to assume that [Thom Browne’s] goods originate from the same source, or that they are affiliated, connected, or associated with [adidas]” when no such affiliation exists. – Read More on TFL
4. The 100 most sustainable companies of 2023 still flourishing in tumultuous times: While the average gender diversity of Global 100 boards inched upward slightly to 34%, that figure shot up from 23% to 32% for the broader universe of more than 6,000 companies analyzed. – Read More on Corporate Knights
5. How the new ESPR legislation will impact intellectual asset protection: The ESPR aims to establish a framework to improve transparency around circularity, energy performance and environmental sustainability of products among product manufacturers, dealers, importers and distributors. – Read More on OAG
6. New study suggests AI will revolutionize fashion design: The research notes the use of AI in the fashion industry has grown significantly in recent years. For example, it is already being used to personalize fashion recommendations for customers, optimize supply chain management, automate processes, and improve sustainability to reduce waste. – Read More on Just Style
1. How ‘groupist culture’ and social media are fueling South Koreans’ craze for luxury goods: Luxury goods purchases by customers in their 20s in S. Korea doubled every year, far exceeding overall luxury sales growth since 2016, while customers in their 30s became the largest contributor to luxury sales. – Read More on SCMP
2. How Price Changes Influence Consumers’ Buying Decisions: Buyers are more likely to buy now if they see a single large price decrease or a series of smaller price increases, because they’ll assume that the price will go up if they wait. – Read More on HBR
3. Renaissance in Uncertainty: The impact of a possible global recession in 2023 could differ from the impact of the 2008–09 global financial crisis. The luxury market now appears better equipped to cope with economic turbulence, thanks to a consumer base that is both larger and more concentrated on top customers who are less sensitive to downturns. – Read More on Bain
4. Apple wins appeal to keep $308 million U.S. patent verdict at bay: The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on Friday affirmed a decision to throw out a $308.5 million jury verdict against Apple for allegedly infringing a patent related to digital rights management. – Read More on Reuters
5. Europe’s luxury sector looking forward to the return of big-spending Chinese tourists: “China reopening is one of the key ‘mega-themes’ for the luxury sector in 2023,” RBC Bank said in a recent note to clients. – Read More on SCMP
1. Russia’s McDonald’s successor applies for trademark in Kazakhstan: Vkusno & tochka, the Russian successor brand to McDonald’s has applied to have its trademarks registered in neighbouring Kazakhstan following the U.S. company’s exit from its market, the Kazakh government said. – Read More on Reuters
2. Allbirds Says eCommerce-Only Model Limits D2C Brands’ Growth Potential: “Being purely D2C can hinder long-term potential because reach is limited. Brands must meet consumers where they are.” – Read More on PYMNTS
3. How the young spend their money: They have thin wallets and expensive tastes. They prize convenience and a social conscience. They want shopping to be at once seamless and personal. They crave authenticity while being constantly immersed in an ersatz digital world. – Read More on the Economist
4. Resale value of Gucci, Chanel, Louis Vuitton handbags is falling: According to The RealReal’s Annual Luxury Consignment Report 2023, handbag resale prices fell 20% for Louis Vuitton, 17% for Gucci, 10% for Hermès and 9% for Chanel over the past 90 days. – Read More on CNN
5. Thinx settled a lawsuit over PFAS chemicals in its period underwear: Class members were notified of the settlement this week. As part of it, Thinx has committed to paying up to $5 million to provide reimbursement as well as making some changes to its marketing and production processes. – Read More on NPR
6. Fashion retailer Shein in talks to raise funds at lower valuation of $64 bln: The latest valuation would be nearly 36% less than the $100 billion the company was reportedly valued at in a funding round last year. – Read More on Reuters