Submitted by: Submitted by chateaumargeaux
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Words: 4721
Pages: 19
Category: Business and Industry
Date Submitted: 03/03/2011 12:40 PM
INTRODUCTION
David Tang, an entrepreneur from Hong Kong, founded Shanghai Tang in 1994.
It was aspired to bring the Glamour Look, Paris of the East, to haute couture fashion design. It incorporates the traditional Chinese culture into wearable contemporary clothes. They are a global “cultural innovator”.
They were known for their traditional thin-cut Chinese dresses, Qipaos, but they now design clothing and accessories for women children and men.
Shanghai Tang had more than 30 stores around the world. Richemont, a Swiss luxury goods company, bought the majority of the company from David Tang in 1998.
It is a privately held company with Raphael le Masne de Chermont as the CEO.
Shanghai Tang was the first Chinese luxury brand in the global fashion market. With “Made by Chinese” as its tagline, Shanghai Tang had made inroads into the fashion capitals of the world such as London, Paris and Milan ever since it came into being in the 1990s and had established itself, with reasonable success as a Chinese luxury brand. In 1998, Richemont, the Swiss-based luxury-brands company, acquired a majority stake in Tang. Post-acquisition its Executive Chairman Raphael le Masne de Chermont and its Marketing and Creative Director Joanne Ooi chalked out strategies that led to the revival of the brand.
When Joanne Ooi, an American of Chinese descent, was offered to give her thoughts about the company. Her critical thinking led Le Masne to offer her a job as the Creative Director and head of marketing. Her mandate was to bring cultural authenticity and meaningful differentiation to the brand.
Ooi’s attachment to her culture has given her enough of an insider’s status to fit in. As an outsider she has had the drive and eagerness to learn and adapt to the culture. True commitments lead to a successful revival of the brand.
The process she used to follow was as follows – conducting research into various elements of the Chinese history to come up with a theme. The...