Chapter 5. Conclusion
5.1 Discussion
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afford it will buy it right away. And those who like but can’t afford it, they don’t mind waiting; they will wait until the special deals period come.
Before the research, I was not aware of Zara’s background. But now, I can say I admire what Zara has achieved worldwide: Zara has indeed broken the typical fashion concepts:
trickle-down theory, seasonal collections, famous designers, fashion shows and traditional fashion advertising.
This research has also served me to prove that my first impressions of Taiwanese fashion consumption are wrong. I used to think that Zara customers blindly purchased due to a new
‘fresh’ wave of such a foreign brand. Through the interviewees’ comments and my own observations in the Zara stores in Taiwan, I have realized that Taiwanese fashion consumer behavior is not about simple adoration towards a foreign brand, but truly about clothes and style identity.
5.1 Discussion
As our study analyzes the consumer behavior of Taiwanese in the Zara stores in Taiwan from a cultural perspective, it would be interesting here to look at the notion of circuit of culture. This is a tool of cultural analysis developed by Stuart Hall and his colleagues and proposed in their book Doing Cultural Studies: The Story of the Sony Walkman. We will apply it to explore and discuss about the cultural meaning of the fashion and social phenomenon of Zara in Taiwan. They argue that there are five major cultural processes:
Representation, Identity, Production, Consumption and Regulation. All of them together constitute the circuit of culture.
Zara has become a part of fashion consumption culture, and to an extent, part of global
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culture. Zara has developed a distinct ‘culture’ of its own. And in Taiwan, meanings and social practices have been developed around Zara. As we have observed through our interviewees, the image of Zara in Taiwan is related to an affordable luxury, which is exactly the image the brand promotes across all over the world. When Taiwanese consumers think of the word ‘Zara’, the concept of fashion and affordable price come up immediately.
Consumers have given a meaning to Zara. Therefore, Zara items are meaningful. Since meaning is intrinsic in the definition of culture, Zara is also cultural. Besides, Zara is connected to social practices, because Taiwanese consumers enjoy window-shopping in their free time, and it doesn’t necessarily mean that it leads to purchase. However, the question now is: how do Taiwanese consumers know to provide that specific meaning to Zara? How has Zara achieved that particular meaning in Taiwan?
Zara has achieved a cultural meaning in Taiwan partly as a result of how it is represented.
Representation, according to Hall and his colleagues is the practice of constructing meaning through the use of signs and language. And this is usually done through advertising. As we discussed before, Zara is known to do zero advertising. They claim that the only advertising they practice is through the stores location, decoration and window displays. Therefore, without the conventional system of representation (advertisement), how does Zara create an identity in the consumers?
Zara products reflect a global fashion image, and through our interviews, we have learned that consumers do not have a special feeling or identity towards the brand Zara itself, since their motivation is rather related to the combination of clothes, and the details in Zara clothes they don’t find in other brands, especially stores in night markets and alleys. As they find a variety of styles in Zara products, they can achieve their own goal: look different from the
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rest, but still, be in fashion. As we move further with production and consumption, we now take into account the everyday reports and records sent by Zara store managers to the headquarters in Arteixo and in Taiwan. We concluded in Chapter 4 that the twice-a-week introduction of new items in Taiwan is indeed influenced by the everyday reports. As well, we found out that the majority of the models are identical in every Zara store in the world, but still, there is a small percentage that changes to adapt locally. And this is not limited to a same country. As we learned from our interviewee who lives in Kaohsiung, that some models are imported in Taipei but not in the south. This verifies that the production in Zara depends on the consumption behavior. The introduction of items is adapted locally and even varies from one store to another within the same country. Hence, the cultural processes of production and consumption are reciprocal.
Finally, related to the regulation process, we can mention the media coverage regarding protests against toxic chemicals in clothes and condemns against inhuman sweatshops.
Consequently, all this is being covered in the media, not only in Taiwan but also in countries, in which protests and campaigns have taken place. From our perspective, it’s difficult for a global brand like Zara to have a control over such news. However, as we have observed, these facts have not influenced the perceptions of Taiwanese consumers towards Zara or its clothes. Not yet.
On the other hand, Spanish consumers seem to be much more concerned now about all these news. Social media, like Facebook, and NGOs run campaigns to pursue “clean clothes”
and fight for human rights, as well as publish reports concerning to clothing brands, not only Zara, but also Mango, H&M, among others. I have observed during my time in Spain, that consumers don’t perceive Zara as an affordable luxury, it’s considered as ‘just another
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clothing store’. Comments such as “that Zara T-shirt won’t last long” or “you buy in Zara just because you need some clothes quickly” are very common in Spain. However, the opinion about the quality of the clothes is also shared with our Taiwanese interviewees.
Nevertheless, it’s certainly because Zara has been established much longer in Spain than in Taiwan, therefore, the freshness of a foreign brand and its consequent social and fashion phenomenon in Taiwan is comprehensible.
From my perspective, it might be even harder to illustrate a customer profile of Zara in Spain, since persons of all ages visit Zara stores (whether they purchase or not is another issue). But this is what it surprised me in the beginning when I visited Zara stores in Taipei:
overcrowded. And it still shocks me nowadays during the weekends. From our observations, it seems that in Taiwan, and especially in Taipei, it’s usually Taiwanese youngsters aged between 20 and 30 who are the most common customers, whereas in Spain individuals aged approximately between 14 and 60 visit the stores. It’s curious to see such a difference.
Therefore, we think that this social and fashion phenomenon around Zara in Taiwan will remain for long, since its establishment is still recent. Maybe the arrival of another European brand would influence later in the perceptions of the Taiwanese consumers towards Zara and its clothes. In that case, it would be very interesting to evaluate the popularity of Zara, in comparison with the new European competitor.