Fast Fashion Speeding Toward Ultrafast Fashion

Key Points

• Zara and H&M, the two largest global fast-fashion retailers, pioneered the fast-fashion business model. Now, the two companies are competing head to head with a new set of younger online-only competitors.
• New players such as Boohoo.com, ASOS and Missguided are bringing products from design to sale in as little as a week or two—faster than traditional fast-fashion retailers, and even faster than Zara. Fast fashion is turning into ultrafast fashion.
• Consumers’ demands for immediacy are increasing and production cycles are becoming ever quicker. Retailers that have the shortest and leanest supply-chain cycles are posting the strongest sales growth results.