H&M Case Study

Brief Introduction of H&M

According to the data published on the official website, we know that H&M was

established in Vasteras, Sweden in 1947 by Erling Persson. At the very beginning,

when the first store was opened, it was actually given the name Hennes (the Swedish

word for “hers”) because only women’s clothes were sold there at that time. Later in

1968, Erling Persson bought Mauritz Widforss, a hunting and gun store in Stockholm.

Just from then, the men’s clothes began to be sold in the stores. Thus, soon Erling

Persson gave his company a new name Hennes & Mauritz (H&M in short) instead. In

the following years, H&M kept expanding continuously. Especially after 1982, it

expanded with a high speed.

At present, H&M has already owned more than 1,500 stores in 28 countries. Among

them, most are in Europe and the left ones are in China, Canada and the United States,

Kuwait, Qatar and United Arab Emirates respectively. In addition, nowadays H&M

has extended its products to children and teenagers, and also cosmetics under its own

brand. Furthermore, apart from the traditional shopping in stores, H&M has begun to

sell its products through catalogues and the Internet, which provides more

convenience to customers.

As a successful company, H&M always sticks to its own business concept, that is, “to

provide people fashion and quality at the best price” (Facts about H&M, 2007). For

the fashion, it has its own design and buying department that creates the collections.

As for the good product quality, H&M pays much attention on the control of quality

and also tries to make its products have minimal impact on the environment and to

control good working conditions in suppliers’ factories. About the best price, it is just

achieved by “having few middlemen, buying in large volumes, having a broad,

in-depth knowledge of design, fashion and textiles, buying the right products from the

right market, being cost-conscious at every stage, and having efficient...