The Success Story of Uniqlo

A Japanese company Uniqlo is known for the simplicity, price and quality. Its interesting to know how it got this big so in this article I’ll be talking about the brand, the origin story of Uniqlo. The man behind Uniqlo success is its founder Tadashi Yanai Jana. He is currently the richest man in Japan.

The name Uniqlo is just a combination of the words unique clothing. Originally, during the Uniqlo trademark registration process in 1988, it was supposed to be spelled as Uniqlo with a ‘C’ as in UniClo, but the registration staff misread the letter ‘C’ as the letter ‘Q’ and saw that the Unexpected error wasn’t that bad. That was really nice, well they held their ground and that’s how they came up with the iconic Uniqlo branding with a letter Q.

Tadashi Yanai was born in OB Yamaguchi on February 7, 1949, his father was already in the business of selling clothes and running a clothing store called Oh Gauri shaji men’s store. The location of the stores was conveniently located in the same building in which they lived; the store was on the ground floor and Jana and her family lived on the ground floor.

Jana graduated from college walls in 1971 with a BA in economics and politics. As soon as he finished college, he got a job in the same industry as the clothing industry, but he was still not working for his father. He worked in a supermarket selling men’s clothing and kitchen utensils and while there he was in charge of restocking the sales floor.

He loved to wear a shirt and jeans to work, while his manager wanted him to wear a tie. He asked the manager how wearing a tie would help him since he’s only there to restock.

After only a year at the grocery store, he decided to quit his job and since he had nowhere else to exercise, his father asked him why he didn’t help him in the store and he decided to work for his father’s clothing store.

Jana was 23 when she joined her father’s railway tailor shop. His father’s shop sold suits and ties, basically formal wear in Asia. He spent more and more time working in the business, found himself enjoying the job, and soon began to realize that running the business was interesting enough for him.

In 1984 he traveled to Europe and the United States, he discovered the impact of brands such as GAP and Benetton that were making these large casual clothing chains that he focused on. Casual Out of Fashion GAP is specifically known for revolutionizing American retail when it made the basic simplicity of school to its advantage. Seeing this, Yanai was able to visualize the immense potential if it were to enter the casual wear market in Japan.

So young that he began drafting plans to evolve the family business from suits to casual wear in 1984 in Hiroshima, Japan. As soon as he became president of his father’s company, he branched out and founded his own clothing brand called Unique Clothing Store, which would later be renamed simply Uniqlo.

They made it a priority to focus on non trendy clothing casual wear mostly ones that are not expensive but are made of high-quality fabrics and you know what happens when you sell high quality products at a low price well you get growth.

By 1991 he renamed his father’s store Ogura Yoji to fast retailing and was listed in the hiroshima stock exchange in 1994 in April of 1993 nine years from launch Uniqlo had over 100 stores in Japan and this word reached 200 by 1996 initially Uniqlo’s grant was hit with a problem of being classified as a discount store brand.

Well the hats entailed Uniqlo opened a three-story shop in the iconic Harajuku district in central Tokyo in 1998. As the years went by the high quality and low price point of Uniqlo’s products didn’t go unnoticed. Uniqlo’s model worked incredibly well in Japan everything that Uniqlo does is encapsulated in one single message.

Uniqlo is a modern Japanese company that inspires the world to dress casually, the brand has chosen to completely ignore the need to pursue or create emerging trends, which is what its main rivals Zara and H&M are known for.

Uniqlo believes that  people are categorized many ways, be it by age or gender and this is summed up in their branding statement made for all the appeal of. Uniqlo is the discovery of a market that wants to look good and feel good, but does not necessarily want to convey how much their clothes cost, unlike clothing brands that people use as a sign of wealth, unless you ask someone if they are wearing something. from Uniqlo.

It’s hard to tell as there is no visible brand or logo on the outside, the clothing is simple, essential, comfortable and universal, but it doesn’t undermine the simplicity of Uniclo products because a lot of innovation went into making their clothes. Tadashi Yanai has explicitly shared that Uniqlo is a technology consumer retail company, the brand constantly innovates a new fabric that is developed in-house, while Zara and H&M differentiate themselves by design sophistication.

Uniqlo prides itself on its unique innovations that enhance the functional performance of each piece of fabric, one example is its thermal-backed fabric. Imagine if you could stay warm during the winter without wearing bulky clothing, the answer was thermal-backed fabric, this lightweight fabric absorbs the moisture your body gives off and then generates enough heat to warm your body.

Of course, the high-tech fabric required years of development and more than 10,000 prototypes and that is not another example is the brand’s ultra stretch jeans which, unlike normal jeans, which are harder, the ultra stretch jeans of Uniqlo are unusually soft designed to have a snug fit without sacrificing the look and feel of normal jeans.

These fabric innovations are the result of a close partnership with Dory Industries, a Japanese chemical company Yanni refers to Uniqlo and Tori as one company, although technically this is not the case, both companies work hand in hand in the development of new technologies that alter the space of clothing. Their goal is to continue to improve the clothing production process to make it one that is less wasteful, looks better and has greater functionality, and so far everything seems to be working well for both companies.

In fact, their partnership is based on their API, unlike Zara, whose success is based on their ability to respond quickly to rapidly changing fashion trends and to be able to get products from the factory to each location in about two weeks. .

Uniqlo produces only a few styles of practical basics each year to ensure that your product development team is aware of how the consumer M actually responds to the products they develop this same product development team is also assigned to handle the concerns of consumers. customers that this gives the team first-hand information and how the products they made can be further improved and to top it all, product development teams and marketing teams are involved in strategy and execution.

Uniqlo exceeds the global industry average when it comes to the training period for each new employee, reaching up to three months during this training period. each Uniqlo manager’s office. It is reportedly a sign that says “always follow company instructions, do not work your way during training period”, your thinking about how things are thought at Uniqlo.

This includes the way they fold clothes, employees are supposed to fold six shirts, and in less than a minute the way they return the credit card to customers, which is supposed to be with both hands and full eye contact and how to properly interact with customers is with eye contact and a smile.

New employee activities are logged and analyzed during this period, it also says here that they use six standard phrases and become a Uniqlo star advisor, which is what they call the staff on the sales floor. You’re supposed to recite at least four of the six phrases to every customer who walks through the door, it’s a bit excessive, but I guess if that’s what it takes to be the biggest Uniqlo then I guess that’s fine.

 Uniqlo implements a couple of ways to communicate what the brand stands for initially, which is why they relied on television commercials as their main advertising medium. Today, the company understands that every point of contact with a customer is an opportunity. to reinforce what Uniqlo is Try to remember the feeling you have when you enter a Uniqlo store.

Well that’s because, as I mentioned earlier, the brand doesn’t release thousands of new designs each time, and therefore since the number of designs it produces is limited, the in-store environment is intentionally designed for them to clients don’t feel like options are lacking as a result. Here’s how each unique low location has wide aisles, bright lights, neatly stacked shelves, and a minimalist design that stacks shelves from floor to ceiling is an intentional move to create the illusion of choice that makes you feel like there’s so much to choose from.

It really is amazing, you walk into a unique location and think wow, this looks good without realizing that every corner of the store is there for a reason – there is a team in charge of doing just that of making sure every experience inside history is fulfilled. about what Uniqlo is all about.

The company has always set out to become the world’s largest apparel retailer by 2020 and this largely depends on whether its expansion into the China and US online markets is successful before we dive into the struggles of Uniqlo in the US

Uniqlo has a total of two thousand two hundred and forty-nine stores worldwide, unsurprisingly, 817 of them are located in Uniqlo’s home country of Japan, the brand’s second largest store account belongs to China. with 738 locations. The Philippines with 61 despite its huge consumer market, the brand only has 52 locations in the United States.

The United States and Europe, including the United Kingdom, Uniqlo only has 100 locations, Russia has 41 stores, France 24 stores, while the United Kingdom has 15 stores. In Southeast Asia, out of a total of 223 stores, the Philippines has 61 stores and Malaysia and Thailand have 51 stores each. Obviously, it has been a challenge for Uniqlo to replicate its success in Asia in the US market and Europe, for example in the UK.

Uniqlo will need to establish that you can buy clothing that is affordable but not disposable, and until now Uniqlo has been slowly associating itself with aesthetically pleasing products with a reputation for durability, fast retailing has made other moves to conquer the market. And that’s by acquiring Brands that have a stronger brand presence in the country did so by acquiring clothing brand fury in 2003 and 80% of J Brand in 2012 fury now has 458 stores as of 2019.

Learning from Past Mistakes Uniqlo also has a new strategy to penetrate the most exclusive market in the US and Europe to combat the stranded products of Zara and H&M Uniqlo has started collaborating with designers to create a unique style since designer Alexander Wang created a five-piece dress collection and Other collapses include French designer Christophe Lamar Russian-American designer Alexander Rokhorov and German fashion designer Jill Sander collaborating with designers is giving Uniqlo faster access to markets where brand awareness is weakest, especially in the United States and Europe.

The company’s expansion into those markets is supported by its success in Asia, except for a recent setback that is reducing Uniqlo’s sales. Political turmoil is affecting Uniqlo’s sales in Hong Kong due to protests and, in the case, In Korea, the national boycott of Japanese products and services is affecting Uniqlo.

His commercial is basically to mock and reopen the wounds of Japan’s colonial past. Immediately a unique loophole from the commercial, but the damage is already done and it is affecting Uniqlo sales because South Korea is one of its biggest markets, it is really impressive how the South Koreans are united. in this move to boycott Japanese products and services.

Today, Tadashi Yanai, the man behind Uniqlo’s parent company quick retailing, is the richest man in Japan and the 41st richest man in the world with a net worth of 22 point two billion. American dollars. dollars as of 2019 fast retail is the largest fashion retailer in Asia and the second in the world behind Inditex yen i and the family still owns a 44 percent stake in the company.