Digvijay Singh

Ishan Goyal

Faire Price:
Will the company survive the most deadly mistake in the brand
conscious fashion industry?

SWOT Analysis
Strengths Weaknesses

1. Fashion store with 695 stores across 1. Low Worker wages & Overtime
18 states indicating a Pan-Indian given to workers indicating poor
presence. labour treatment.

2. Innovation in Customer retailing 2. Decreasing stores leading to poor

with out-of-the box strategies like profits
wider aisles and centralized
checkout to provide a seamless
experience

3. Competitor tackling with next door

stores to peers.

4. Wide range to brands to suit

multiple customer strata’s.
Opportunities
1. Wide range of M&A options due to
previous establishment of the brand
and historical brand value.
2. Quick action in the form of
campaign, ‘Doing the Faire Thing’
possibly leading to some
improvement in brand image.
Threats
1. Brand value deterioration due to
series of incidents and enquiries.
2. Reduction in market share and loss
in brand trust escalating further
leading to a vicious cycle.
3. Further reduction in Leases and
Stores in India due to poor brand
image due to the cycle of last few
events.
 Digvijay Singh
Ishan Goyal

Brand Image: Vitals of Fashion Industry

A clothing line or a fashion company is known only by one thing, ‘its brand name’.
The damage of brand name in any form leads to overall decline in sales and profits as nobody
wants to be associated with that brand anymore.

This is what typically happened with Faire Price, due to an unnecessary action by its
management to get higher profits margins, the workers were paid as less as 25p an hour.
Workers were also given high overtime working hours with very minimal payment.
The company as is clear from the narrative has understood the consequences of ill-treating its
workers and is doing full efforts to turn the scenario around.
“ They launched a five-year ethical trading plan, complete with a national advertising
campaign under the slogan “Doing the Faire Thing”, and new chairman Maharishi Sandhu
last month pledged to put the ethical policy at the heart of its business model. “
It clearly shows that the company is fully inclined towards changing their business, especially
with respect to its workers.

OPTION 1: Multi-Brand Strategy

Multi-brand strategy clearly is better for the company as of now, due to:
1. Somewhere in the 12 range of brands that the company plans to offer, the brand name
of 3-4 brands can definitely be associated with faire price, but the rest of the brands
will be seen as independent or will not be seen to be associated with Faire Price, at the
first look or the first instance of buying.
The company provides quality and versatility, and the brands launched by faire price will
surely be a success.
Brands not performing can be filtered in subsequent quarters, and successful ones can be
developed with their own individual identity, and a separate company can be listed for a
really successful brand.

2. Cannibalisation will prove helpful in this case but filtering out the poor brands and
helping keep the new ones. Once only 6-7 good brands remain, they can be clubbed
and merged as individual companies which will lead to a new product range for the
strata’s and buying class of both the brands.

3. Multiple brands will lead to multiple job openings for the workers as well, in line with
the company’s doing the faire thing campaign, and profits will go towards the
betterment of the workers.
 Digvijay Singh
Ishan Goyal

Why not Option 2 or Option 3?

As is seen from the company analysis of Faire Price, the main focus is on branding and
improving the image of the company.

The reasons for not acquiring Hinduyta are:

1. It will not be an easy acquisition, the cost to be paid would be very high, that is if Mr
Giriraj agrees for the same or else it would be a hostle takeover which will be seen as
a big dent to the company’s image.

2. The brand image and products of Faire Price and Hinduyta are not in line with each
other; Faire price has almost no relation with ethnic Hindu wear.

3. Internal rifts in Hinduyta will lead to more complications for the already burdned
management of Faire Price.

The reasons for not building a public-private partnership with Philippine

Textile Research Institute (PTRI) are:
1. PTRI has working conditions even worse than Faire Price, with the workers getting
burned due to poor factory conditions and labour violation in Manilla portrays a very
bad brand image for Faire Price, that itself led to problems in the first place

2. Less than minimum wages to workers and unpredictable economic scenario is seen an
another reason not to have a PPP with PTRI.