An anecdote:

A friend of mine who is a young, very successful businessman went into a tailors in Savile Row wearing shorts and a t-shirt (designer but all the same casual). He was told that he might have the wrong shop. He left....walked round the corner to his Ferrari, took the £5000 cash out of his shorts pocket and gave me a call.....

So why didn't he call me in the first place? Well, my clients are different from Savile Row's clients....marketing directors would say that we meet a demand in different segments of the same market. It is for this reason that I believe my business does not compete with Savile Row and visa versa. In fact it's the opposite, I want Savile Row tailors to be successful because I believe it raises peoples perceptions of the whole industry. Indeed, my client's are at the start of their careers and eventually I would want them to aspire to owning a suit from Savile Row......that's the customer journey. Unfortunately I remain to be convinceed as to whether this view is reciprocal.

Hearing stories like this ring alarm bells, and coupled with articles like the one attached it begs the question is Savile Row's strategy working?

Furthermore, I will attach another article in a moment published over the weekend about Gieves & Hawkes being sold to Chinese Trinity Group after not turning a profit since 2005. This suggests that it is very difficult indeed to make profit as a Luxury Men's tailor on Savile Row using English labour.....what Trinity are buying is the brand which they will leverage to maximise profit in markets where English Heritage is at a premium. This concerns me enormously for a number of reasons:

1. If the greatest brand we have in English Tailoring can't turn a profit what hope is there for the others?

2. Having worked in China and and on the perifery aquisition disposal of business I am acutely aware that Trinity group will want to maximise their return in the shortest period of time. This will undoubtedly impact on quality and service and the reflection of the UK industry.

So. I think a successful Savile Row is a benefit to the tailoring industry as a whole but their strategy isn't working.

In a nutshell you can increase profit by:

1. reducing costs

2. raising prices

3. increasing sales (customers)

4. changing product mix

Points 1 and 2 we know are very difficult in this ecomic climate. But what are they doing to increase the number of customers walking through the door? I believe that they are failing to recognise the customer jouney.....and to engage with the one group of people who will actually feed their business going forward and that is the growing number of tailoring companies that are introducing 1000's of new customers to tailoring every day. The SRB need to actively think how they can lead the industry as a whole and not just their own road.....big questions need big solutions so who will step up to the plate?

Not quite our class, darling! Savile Row tailors deny snobbery...independent.co.uk

The gentlemen of Savile Row are getting hot under their stiffly starched collars as they absorb the news that yet another vulgar imposter, this time The Kooples, a French fashion brand, is about to lower the tone of their...